Spa Highlights – Opal Rasul Temple

Stephanies Rasul Temple, Brisbane Australia

When I heard about this I just had to go and give it a try. Stephanies is a boutique spa chain established by Stephanie Shepherd with the aim to help her patrons find the beauty that rests within so with this in mind the Brisbane spa has at its centrepiece a mini-temple space dedicated to peace and relaxation.  How good does that sound?

So, feeling like I’d hit the jackpot that  this years Australian Society of Cosmetic Chemists conference was to be held at the Sofitel – home to THE TEMPLE I got all excited and booked it!

The temple is a beautiful little oasis in the craziness of a big city hotel and lucky for me I had two friends to share it with which took the price down to $119 per person – which given the promise of stress-free luxury  seemed quite reasonable  to me. Anyway, the three of us paid up went in and proceeded to gown up in those hideous throw-away undies covered up under a cozy white robe.  At this point I knew that the ‘hour of complete relaxation’ was going to be more of a girly catch up as we were struggling to draw breath in the high drama and comedy that accompanies our locker-room shenanigans but hay-ho it was still going to be great!

The temple was laid out ready for us with three types of mud (Rasul is an Arabic word for clay) and body brushes. The others were quite taken aback when they found out we had to apply our own mud  and were further disturbed to find that we only had a set time to get the job done before the mystical mist was to appear from the sky, turning the temple into a steam room. Oh, the pressure.   But once the door was shut and the timer was on we all got into the spirit of it and ended up resembling some rather comedic carry-on film routine as we rushed to slap the clay on each other and ‘beat the steam’.  I guess you could call it ‘team bonding’…….

Anyway, once we had muddied up we sat back, tried to avoid the steam jets burning our ankles and relaxed.  In less than 2 minutes we could barely see each other but we could still talk which we did A.Lot.  Our talking was interspersed with clumsy trips to the in-spa water tap as we tried to stay hydrated and at one point we opened the inner door a little to get a bit of fresh air – like any steam room this can feel quite claustrophobic.

At the end of our time we were promised that a light mist of rain would fall, washing the mud from our bodies. Well, if this happened I missed it and decided that the best plan would be to jump straight into the shower.  That done I, like my crazy friends felt cleansed and refreshed (if not a little bit toasted) and so we made our way to the lounge area for a re-group.

I really enjoyed the whole experience, the beauty of the room and the peace that surrounded it UNTIL we arrived.  I guess that if you want to really chill out and ‘find yourself’ the Rasul temple is a perfect place to start but it may be best to book it out individually but  if you want a fun and unusual place to catch up with a couple of friends this place also fits the bill.

In a nutshell this is a beautiful, peaceful and inspiring space to spend a couple of hours of ‘me time’ whatever form that might take. Just remember to drink lots of water and leave yourself time after to enjoy the lounge, sorbet and magazine selection.

Bliss.