A Dirty Treatment in a Secret Room (Jen, August 1, 2005)

"What the heck did you sign us up for?"

That's what my husband said to me when the spa attendant left us alone in our treatment room at the Canyon Ranch Spa Club at the Venetian Las Vegas.

I understood his confusion and dismay. The room was not what I had expected either. The room was pretty standard, except for the missing treatment table and the large shower curtain that evenly split the room. Before I could ask where we were, the attendant moved the curtain aside, revealing a large shower area next to a narrow wooden door. Beyond this door was what I had signed us up for. This secret room, tucked away within a treatment room and then hidden behind a large curtain, was the Rasul Chamber.

The Rasul Chamber at the Venetian is a small tiled room with two large throne like seats on opposite sides of the room, that are cut into the tile walls. The seats faced each other and in between there was a small ledge holding 5 different types of mud, each for a different section of the body. We were told that once we were in the Chamber, we were to apply the mud to each other. We had only 5 minutes to do this, then the lights went out and the steam came on. The dark chamber's only lights were from the ceiling, where fiber optic lighting gave the illusion of a starry night. As we sat back in our thrones the steam filled the room. I could hardly see my husband as the steam continued to thicken. During this 35 minutes, the mud hardened on our bodies. When the steam was through, the lights quickly came back on and the top of our thrones began to shower, actually it was more like a downpour of rain, on us. It was startling but fun at the same time. We had to laugh at how the water seemed to come at us from every angle from within our thrones. After a few minutes we were drenched...and virtually mud-free!

When the water stopped, we left the chamber and headed to the large shower in our treatment room where we continued to rinse off, making sure all of the mud was gone. The showers were full body showers with five massaging heads. We capped the treatment by applying moisturizing oils to each other since the mud, while removing impurities in the skin, also dries it out.

This treatment allowed me to experience the Rasul Chamber, a service I first became aware of at the Celtic Manor Resort in Wales, England. While I enjoyed the uniqueness of the experience, I missed the presence of a spa therapist to massage the mud into my skin and to massage the oils in afterwards. I didn't leave the service feeling pampered or relaxed. It was neat to try, but with a price tag of $290 for the two of us, it was definitely not something I'll be doing again.

back to news