Russian River’s recovery & revelry

The space is warm, dark and inviting with dark blue velvet wallpaper. The bar has soft lighting. Sky blue velvet chairs pop with color along the white marble bar top decorated with flowers. Sex toys replace fancy high-end liquor on the top shelf.

The cocktail menu features drinks with playful names such as Golden Shower (I drank and it was light and refreshing), Breast Milk, Hoetic Justice, Power Bottom, The Baldwin, and Larry June Creamsicle (inspired by Bay Area rapper Larry June) to name a few. A mixologist helped Joiner craft the drinks inspired by sex, social justice, travel, and other cultures.

by Enrique Asis

As summer events in Guerneville and Monte Rio return, it’s worth looking back to see how Russian River venues have recovered from the pandemic and a series of floods and fires. The history of LGBTQ attractions, with insights from several longtime business owners and visitors, brings us up to date.

“It’s not an exaggeration to say that Guerneville at the Russian River was the most important gay town and resort of the West Coast in the 1980s, with many gay owned enterprises, where most venues with pools have nudity as an option,” said Michael Preaseau, The Woods hotel owner and manager and a resident of Sonoma County for more than 50 years.

“There was one gay-owned entertainment establishment who had everything: rooms, restaurant and a clothing-optional pool on Armstrong Woods Road. There were many gay bars, as well as a gay bathhouse,” he continued. “The Coffee Bazar started in the 1980s as a gathering location for the community and still is. Also Dino’s, which later became the River Village, almost exclusively served the gay community, was gay-owned, had a piano bar, restaurant and rooms to rent.”

Nudes news

Preaseau added that the previous incarnation of iconic Woods Hotel always welcomed optional nudity in the 1980s. The Willows, another gayowned lodge with camping along the Russian River at a large grass area that led to a private beach, were centerpieces of the town’s gay history.

“These are all personal to me,” Joiner said about the cocktail names.

Examples of how Joiner’s experiences and travels show up at Feelmore Social, the yogurt drink, Breast Milk, is inspired by Joiner’s travels through Vietnam. The layered gin drink, Le Garcon, is inspired by thier tour of a Berlin lesbian bar taken over by the Nazis during World War II.

Branching out

Opening a business in downtown Oakland is personal to Joiner. It’s their neighborhood. During the last decade, Oakland’s business corridor Broadway grew darker and darker. Bars, restaurants, and storefronts one by one locked their doors and bordered up, they said. They once sponsored events and shows at many of the shuttered businesses.

Joiner wanted to expand Feelmore’s retail footprint. But doing business as usual wasn’t working anymore. It was challenging to open an adult sex shop. They had to address communities’ objections and navigate local governments’ red tape. The retail landscape in the United States was changing from brick-and-mortar to digital.

A new business model was needed. An avid traveler, Joiner took note of other small business models around the world. The businesses were adapting and diversifying long before COVID-19. They were also deeply entrenched in their communities, some for more than 100 years.

Joiner began branching out and launched Feelmore’s home line selling candles, which took off. At the same time, Joiner explained, “We would have customers come in and say, ‘Hey, where can I go and get a drink?’”

In the quest to diversify the Feelmore brand, Joiner landed on the idea of opening a cocktail bar. Oakland’s bar owners met Joiner’s interest in the bar business with silence. Joiner continued selling sex toys and kept searching for openings to see their vision take root and grow. One opening was finding the answers to their questions working for Alameda’s lesbianowned Fireside Lounge, where they learned the ropes of owning a bar from owner Sandy Russell.

When the pandemic hit, the remaining bars and surrounding businesses went dark. Ultimately, many shuttered. Oakland’s downtown became a ghost town.

“We saw a lot of the bars actually closing up shop,” said Joiner. “What is going to happen to my neighborhood?”

Unlike many of the businesses in their neighborhood, Joiner’s business thrived during the pandemic. They pivoted by selling personal protective equipment, now known simply by its acronym PPE, and saw sales increase.

The pandemic and the wake of George Floyd’s murder by four former Minneapolis police officers on May 25, 2020, was opportunity knocking for Joiner. “There were very few businesses around here, ours was one of them, that was able to benefit and profit from the pandemic.”

Joiner was able to finally see their vision for a sexy lounge become a reality. Shuttering bars were selling liquor licenses, access to capital, and new partnerships opened. Joiner did not snap up one of those licenses. Instead, they entered the California Alcoholic Beverage Control lottery, and won a license.

Transformative

A business loan helped transform the space from a retail shop to a bar. Everything was Oakland-based, from the building owner to their bank.

“It’s only when someone actually gets a stake in the ground or a key to a door that we can really see that things are changing,” Joiner said. “I really consistently believe that economic empowerment and enlightenment is actually the key for a lot of people.”

“We’ve had great energy here,” Joiner added about the space that is now Feelmore Social’s home. “There are a lot of big spaces out there, but this was something that I felt was very intimate, very similar to the size of the retail stores that we consistently put out there.”

The fact that Feelmore Adult is so close to Feelmore Social is an added value.

“Now we can say, here’s a bar that’s like-minded of Feelmore where you can talk about flogging,” they continued, stating that they are incorporating Feelmore Adult’s culture of sex education, consent, and level of service at Feelmore Social. “I want to create a cool environment where people, music, ambiance, and kindness are the main stars while people get a quality cocktail.”

In addition to serving quality cocktails, they can upsell a drink to a sex toy. Customers are responding positively, Joiner said. One of Feelmore’s values, beyond teaching healthy and responsible sex practices, is being green and sustainable.

“We tend to hire people within a two- to three-mile radius of us. It is less stressful when you can walk, live, and work in your same neighborhood,” said Joiner who bikes, walks, and buses to work from Oakland’s Laurel neighborhood.

A business’s legacy isn’t about its size, they said. “It matters about the impact, the work that gets done, and the community it serves.”

Being a business owner is all about community for Joiner, who also tried their hand at running for Oakland

City Council’s District 4 seat last year but lost in November.

Building a queer, cool Oakland Oakland is also seeing a younger generation that is thirsty for a nightlife scene. Joiner pointed out that San Francisco’s Castro District gets most of the attention. They stopped short of calling Oakland’s efforts to build an LGBTQ district “intentional,” but Oakland LGBTQ business owners, many of whom are people of color, are working “to create a queer atmosphere here in Oakland.”

“The Bay Area has this culture,” said Joiner. “If we can actually do the business culture right, we can actually ‘bat signal’ to other people around the world like, ‘Hey, this is where you should really be coming. That’s the history I want to make, this collective history I want to make with others.”

Joiner is happy to see Broadway being revived with Feelmore Social and Fluid510, which shares a wall, after a decade of storefronts sitting vacant.

“I think it’s going to create a great flow,” they said about the new queer bars opening in Oakland. Joiner expressed similar sentiments to the new gay bar, Town Bar and Lounge owner, Joshua Huynh’s desire to create an LGBTQ district where people can walk from bar to bar. “People want to walk” from one entertainment space to another.

Joiner hopes by people walking in downtown Oakland, they will see the possibilities the city has to offer.

Derrick Polk is an example of the flow Joiner hopes will grow throughout Feelmore’s products and services. The Black educator stopped by Feelmore Adult where he learned that the bar was open. Curious, he walked over to check out Feelmore Social.

“It was a pretty cool place. It was awesome,” Polk, an Oakland native who is an ally, said. “It really stands out when you walk inside. It kind of reminded me of an upscale cocktail lounge in New York.”

He told the B.A.R. he loved the chill vibe of the bar, the sex toys for sale behind the bar, the tongue-in-cheek sexual names of the drinks, and that the bar is owned by a Black queer person.

Polk plans to return to Feelmore, “I was very impressed,” he said, stating that he will support anything Feelmore does.

Open businesses downtown, especially at night, make the “street safer for people to actually walk to those places” rather than drive, Joiner said. “They don’t get stuck at one bar,” due to driving and parking they continued. “They can go to all bars.”t

Feelmore Social’s grand opening party is June 2, 5pm to closing time at 1542 Broadway in Oakland. The theme for the night is latex. RSVP by email: 1542Feelmore@gmail.com www.feelmore510.com

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“Founded in 1945, The Hetzel’s Motor Lodge, also known as the Russian River Resort, was a gay-owned and operated hotel, restaurant, bar and entertainment venue,” said Glenn Dixon, the Russian River Resort’s CFO. “The Highlands Hotel was clothingoptional from 1991 to 2021. Even in Forestville there was a gay Sunday barbeque at the Rusty Nail.”

“Gay nudity and naked pool parties were always important in gay recreational events, and in bear week celebrations,” said Paul and Tim Burns, longtime Santa Rosa residents.

Preaseau noted that the Highlands Hotel opened in 1991 and was clothing-optional. Ken and Lynette McLean were the proud owners for 38 years. But with a change of ownership in April 2021, a switch to a “family-friendly” operation left the gay community with no nude pool options.

In 2004, The Woods Cottages & Cabins opened in 2004, noted Preaseau, “with an offering of a unique display of different-sized cottages, and cabins surrounding a solar thermal swimming pool. We took the name from the original Woods. We were clothing-optional for Lazy Bear and some weeks in the summer.”

At the request of frequent patrons, the new Woods became a year-round clothing-optional pool in October 2021.

“In reality, the nudity option is code to the gay community that we are a sexpositive hotel,” said Preaseau. “The fact that we don’t sell alcohol, and we have a year-long nudity option, makes us the only sex-positive venue in town. Since then, we are in high demand, especially the spring and summer.”

Currently, The Woods is the only gay-friendly clothing-optional swimming pool operating in Northern California, Preaseau added. “We are also the only exclusively gay-owned lodge in town.” The Woods proudly hosts the daily naked pool parties during Lazy Bear Week.

Floods, fires and lockdown

Carl Ray, a Sonoma County resident for more than 13 years, recounted the recent series of environmental events that nearly destroyed multiple homes and businesses.

“The climate-related tragedies started in 2006 with Russian River big floods,” said Ray. “The merchants, retailers, restaurants and the hospitality industry in Guerneville suffered big losses and setbacks during the 2017 and 2019 floods.”

During the floods, everyone in Guerneville was evacuated, and the inundations had catastrophic conse- quences for town merchants and businesses.

Byron Serrano Wilson, a fireman in active duty during those periods, and a Santa Rosa resident, is now the Logistics Officer of the CAL FIRE Sonoma Lake Napa Unit.

“These fires were of historical proportions,” said Serrano Wilson. “The Guerneville population and other towns were evacuated entirely during the disaster. Two days in October 2017 were devastating. The Tubbs fires were considered the worst disaster in Sonoma County in many decades.”

And in 2019, the Kincade fires ravaged the county for more than a week in October through November 6, 2019. Then, in 2020, the Waldbridge fires raged in August. During the 2020 summer lockdown and during all these fires, the entire Guerneville community had to be evacuated. The

COVID-19 lockdown and the pandemic were the latest stroke in a series of devastating tragedies for Guerneville residents.

Lazy Bear revived

Before and after the many unfortunate disasters, a few larger events have become quite popular, and have helped revive the economy of Russian River tourism. The Russian River Women’s Weekend has been held annually for four decades and returned this year, the most recent edition on May 12-14.

The other big event is Lazy Bear Week. Started in 1996 by Harry Lit and a group of local bears, neighbors and bear groups in the Bay Area, the event has grown each year. Partial proceeds benefit the Lazy Bear Fund, which has raised thousands of dollars for charities and community groups since 1996.

David Barker, a member of the Lazy Bear Week Fund leadership, briefly tells the event’s history.

“In the 1990s, the gay and bear community had an important role in Guerneville development,” he said. “Bear-friendly groups were a regular feature in town, especially in the summer. It’s become the most bear-friendly and successful gathering in California and one of the most important in the US and the world.”

Barker added that “surviving the pandemic years and lockdown made the community and the Lazy Bear Week of events stronger. Lazy Bear keeps growing, attracting crowds from all over the country and the world.”

Lazy Bear Week 2023 takes place at multiple Guerneville venues July 31 through August 7. www.lazybearweek.org

Bringing sexy back

Another lesser-known group is Sexy Bastards, a San Francisco-based 1000-men online network that hosts two recreational spring and summer weekends in partnership with host hotel The Woods since 2021.

Steve McGown, a Santa Rosa resident and organizer, said, “The Sexy Bastards weekends are a lot of fun, and include communal hikes, three nighttime parties, naked games at the pool, picnics around the swimming pool and communal meals in local restaurants. Michael Preaseau leads a walking tour with exploration around town, into the woods and the river. It’s a fascinating piece of town, gay and bear history, and is our contribution to Guerneville recovery.”

Added Paul Burns, “Michael Preaseau makes it fascinating along the tour, with gay stories and anecdotes while visiting iconic areas, and other spots at the riverside.”

Officer Byron Serrano Wilson, who is also a group member, said, “It’s a special time in the summer with visitors from everywhere. The community blossoms and celebrate.”

The next Sexy Bastards weekend is July 21-23, a week before Lazy Bear. Sexy Bastards also volunteers as a group and participates during Lazy Bear Week.t

Enrique Asis is the coordinator of Sexy Bastards and a health professional working in San Francisco.