We tried Floatation Therapy at Blue Lagoon Float & Spa Hyde Park and we’ve got the lowdown on what it’s really like!
Belinda Carlisle once sang the lyrics “ooh, heaven is a place on earth” and I’m quite certain she was actually singing about Blue Lagoon Float & Spa.
Recently some of the KIDDO team decided after what has been a full on year we needed a bit of a destress sesh, and the good people at Blue Lagoon Float & Spa booked us in for their specialty floatation therapy treatment. While we were there, we were also treated to a relaxation massage, a cryotherapy session and some time in the salt therapy room.
To say we left relaxed and rejuvenated is an understatement! And it came with all the bells and whistles you’d expect from a luxurious spa treatment; fluffy white robes and plushy slippers and the all round 5 star treatment.
Let’s dive in…!
Blue Lagoon Float & Spa
Located in Hyde Park, Blue Lagoon Float & Spa is a quiet haven of relaxation; the minute you step through the door it’s like the world around you disappears and you’re taken immediately intro tranquility mode.
For those of us with kids constantly asking for snacks and drinks and with a running soundtrack of the Bluey theme song on repeat 24/7… just the peace and quiet alone is a welcome change of pace to start the whole experience.
Open Floatation pool
What you might be expecting from the floats you’ve seen on the internet is a space aged pod that closes around you, but one of the unique differences of Blue Lagoon Float & Spa in Hyde Park is their Roman inspired open flotation pool.
As a person who doesn’t love being in enclosed spaces, this option was definitely my preference and heightened the whole experience!
Blue Lagoon Float & Spa Floatation Therapy
Prepare to experience floating on a cloud.
If you’re wondering what floatation therapy is and why you would want to do it, well it’s simple. It’s saltier than the dead sea and renders you completely weightless – like… zero gravity, out of body experience kind of weightless!
What is floatation therapy?
Floatation therapy involves lying in a specially designed pool in which you are suspended in 500kg of magnesium sulphate (pharmaceutical-grade Epsom salts – you know that stuff that helps a sore achey body that people always tell you to pour into your bath when you have a muscle complaint? This is like the GRADE A, top notch, gold star quality version of that). The density of the water means it so buoyant that you float effortlessly and experience an incredible feeling of weightlessness.
What are the benefits of floatation therapy?
Studies around the world have documented mental and physical benefits of using floatation therapy. These have shown to help a broad range of ailments and medical conditions, as well as having the most profound relaxing experience like no other.
Think ZEN to the max, plus a side dish of serenity.
Mental Benefits
- Helps reach a state of total calm and deep relaxation
- Improves sleep, jet lag & insomnia
- Gives you more energy and feel rejuvenated
- Alleviates stress, anxiety, fear, depression
- Promotes clearer thinking, visualisation & enhanced memory
- Stimulates creativity, enhances learning and problem solving
- Endorphins are released which are natural mood enhancers and pain reliever
- Facilitates freedom from habits, phobias and addictions
- Enhances hypnotherapy and self-hypnosis
- Stimulates left/right brain synchronisation
- Brainwaves can shift from its usual “alpha “state into a “theta” state, which is normally achieved by people who train extensively in meditation. Floating is a much easier way to achieve this deep state of relaxation
Physical Benefits
- Relieve pain from injuries, arthritis, tension, fibromyalgia, migraines, pms, multiple sclerosis, pregnancy tension, bursitis
- Improves skin conditions such as eczema & psoriasis
- Improves blood circulation and the distribution of oxygen and nutrients
- Reduces blood pressure, pulse and heart rate
- Balances your metabolism and hormones
- Accelerates recovery from strenuous exercise and sports
- Decreases production of cortisol, ACTH, lactic acid and adrenaline
- Detoxifies the body
- Epsom salts have a natural anti-inflammatory effect on the body
- Boosts immune function
Long story short, float therapy is a gentle and effective form of healing for your body and mind.
Couple and Family Floats
Because Blue Lagoon & Spa at Hyde Park has the most spacious float pool on the market (almost double the size of the largest float tank you’ll find), they are able to offer couple floats, family floats, and accessible floats for those who need more room due to a disability or experience claustrophobia.
And yep… kids can float too!
Floats for kids must be accompanied by a parent or guardian, and child floatation sessions are curated by Matina Trimarchi, one of the Blue Lagoon Founders who has a Bachelor in Early Childhood Education.
What did we think of Blue Lagoon Float & Spa Floatation Therapy?
This is next level zen! I’m not going to lie, at first it was kind of WEIRD, but good weird, one of the best hours of my life weird. It’s like your mind completely disassociates with your body, and I imagine it’s kind of how a baby floats around in the womb.
Before attending the session, I’ll admit I had some reservations. My husband laughed at me and said “oh this is going to be great, you, alone with your thoughts for an hour. So relaxing”. Switching off my brain is not my forte, and the idea of floating around with only my own inner dialogue for company was somewhat concerning to me, given I’m the only person I know to actually FAIL a meditation course because I was worrying about the fact that I was worrying rather than meditating.
Floatation Therapy proved to be an entirely different experience however, and I was able to switch off in a way that I’ve never managed to before.
The experience of weightlessness and complete sensory deprivation was liberating to me. We live in a switched on state at all times, and the opportunity to turn off and just be, doesn’t happen often. The quiet, and the sheer lack of sensation allowed me to enter a state of total relaxation that I was, frankly, surprised about.
What is sensory deprivation?
Sensory deprivation is achieved when you turn the lights off and float silently in the dark – you block out all external distractions such as sight, sound, touch, temperature and gravity. Together these account for approximately 90% of your normal neuro-muscular activity. Once these senses are blocked, this allows your mind to truly experience one of the deepest forms of relaxation for your mind and body.
The float pool
The Epsom salt water inside the tank is heated to skin temperature (35.5 degrees celcius) so not only do you have the sensation of weightlessness, you can also tune out to the sensation of water on your skin; Ii’s like losing a sense of where your body ends and the water begins, giving a feeling of zero gravity… as though you’re an astronaut floating in space!
Once inside the float pool, soft relaxation music starts to play signify the beginning of the session. You have the option of earplugs (if you choose) and lights on or off you will drift away into a deep relaxation.
Soft music will play again to signify the end of your session – you don’t have Rhonda just buzzing the intercom, or hollering over a loudspeaker that your time is up, from start to finish you are softly guided through the motions, and given the utmost privacy to relax and zone out…and then back in…to reality.
The Salt Room
After our floats we were ushered into the salt therapy room.
Salt therapy is a natural remedy that involves inhaling pharmaceutical-grade dry salt in a comfortable, controlled environment.
Dry salt is super absorbent and has natural anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties.
Salt inhalation
Once inhaled, the salt causes mucus to thin and liquefy, making it easier to dislodge and expel – along with pathogens, debris and pollutants. Dry salt particles also gently stimulate your body’s natural cilia movement.
Think of salt like a toothbrush for your airways, cleaning out mucus, pathogens and pollutants.
Salt for the skin
For the skin, dry salt can absorb impurities, regulate the pH level and promote your skin’s ‘good’ bacteria. It improves the skin’s protective properties, reducing inflammation and encouraging natural exfoliation and regeneration. Stress, Anxiety & Fatigue Sports Performance.
Massage
Blue Lagoon Float & Spa also offer whole menu of massage options and I can honestly, hand on heart say this was the most relaxing massage of my life.
Massage Menu
Offering relaxation massage, mum to be massages as well as remedial and warm stone and bamboo massages this is your opportunity to experience utter bliss and relaxation, especially if you have a massage pre or post float!
Blue Lagoon Float & Spa Cryotherapy
I’ve been intrigued about Cryo for awhile so was thrilled to actually try it!
When you step inside this high tech cylinder, liquid nitrogen-cooled air (-140 degrees below zero) rushes in and cools your skin to a chilly -30 degrees, yet penetrates just a half millimetre. You slowly rotate for up to three minutes, holding your hands up and out of the freeze, wearing socks on your toes, and some underwear to cover your nudey bits!
The Cryo Chamber is a new way of improving the health of the entire body. It corrects physiological processes, restores natural balance and stimulates metabolism. The treatment is based on short contact of skin with extremely low temperatures of -120 to -180 °C for 2-3 minutes. The results of a treatment can be seen in 5-10 minutes after the session and last up to 8 hours. The treatment provides intensive stimulation of immune system, provokes endorphin saturation of blood, and blocks pain of any origin.
Let’s just say… expect to be HUNGRY a few hours later, they say you can burn up to 800 calories in just one cryo session. Somebody tell me why I’m running 10km per day if I can be doing this??!
All in all…
The KIDDO team can’t recommend Blue Lagoon Float & Spa floatation therapy, and their suite of spa treatments, highly enough. We felt relaxed for DAYS afterwards, even when we returned to our busy hectic lives of child rearing and school drop off and putting a magazine together!
For more information or to book floatation therapy:
