I never imagined that I would have the nerve to walk around other people butt ass naked, but here I was at Spa Castle doing just that.

This was my first time at a Korean Spa, and I was invited by my homegirl to celebrate her birthday. This is what she wanted to do, and so this is what we were doing. I’m a Leo, and so I’ll try almost anything once. I honestly had no idea what to expect, but when she asked me to come, I made the decision right then and there to check this off my bucket list before I turned 40. When we first arrived I was informed that once I go in, I’m in for the night. So basically there is no going out until you check out. ‘Oh, okay, so it’s like a prison?’ I said to myself. We had decided to stay the night and I must admit I was a little on edge about sleeping out in the open, but I’ll get to that later.

Once we arrived, we stood in line in between ropes like we were entering an amusement park waiting to check-in. We were given waterproof armbands that would serve as keys to our lockers as well as keep track of our purchases. The bands were to stay on at all times, and losing them would cost you $25. We were told that this was a barefoot facility, which means we weren’t allowed to wear shoes anywhere. I thought to myself, ‘Not even in the restrooms!?!? You got me fu—okay, okay, Maranda. Calm down. You can do this.’ We checked in, and the first thing we did was head straight to the women’s locker room where phones are ‘forbidden’ because this is where the bucket nakedness happens, freely. The first thing on the agenda was to put your stuff in your assigned locker then get naked and walk naked to the hot pools and the shower area to shower, naked.

Me – Wait, right now?!? We gots to do the naked walk of shame, now? But we just got here. I need a minute to warm up. Shit.

This was the conversation I was having with myself because outwardly I’m a G. But my friend Kira was used to this life, so she already had one boob out ready to get to it. I walked to my locker and texted a few people to let them know I would be without my phone for a grip. And I slowly started to undress. Of course, by now several naked women had walked by, and I did my best to not look directly at their bodies. But in all honesty, I was hoping to find one shaped like mine so I wouldn’t feel so ashamed. It’s easy to be confident with your flaws when you have clothes on, but when you are walking around literally bucket naked, it’s a whole different ball game. Well, it didn’t take long for me to find a bigger body type floating around, considering we were in Texas and everything is bigger there, as the saying goes. This gave me quite the boost of confidence as my friend appeared at the end of my locker aisle naked with only a towel around her shoulder looking like she was picking me up from school. “Come on, gal!” I closed my locker and took the first liberating naked ass step towards the pool area. I felt better about it being a women’s only locker room, so it really wasn’t as hard as I had imagined.

We showered and hung out in the heated pools for a bit and returned to put on our uniforms. That’s right. They made us wear uniforms everywhere unless you were at the pool in swimwear or bucket naked in the locker room. I was pleasantly surprised at how clean the entire place was, ESPECIALLY because we couldn’t wear shoes anywhere. I don’t remember stepping on any crumbs, trash or nothing. Even the restrooms had clean mats to ease my slight OCD.

We hung out by the outside pools and the water jets there were heavenly. Yep. That’s all I’ll say about that. And later on that evening after eating sushi, we tried out the saunas. They were themed and all over 100 degrees. The Golden Room was by far the hardest to sit in. We barely lasted 5 minutes. We did, however, stick it out in the Charcoal one, so I guess you can call it a favorite, if sitting in hell is your thing. After transitioning to the ice room to cool down, it was time for bed. All of the eateries and even the pool shut down about 10 p.m. It was the spa’s way of saying, ‘Tak yo ahhh to beh.’ Ha! While most people come and leave, a few of us brave souls were in it for the long haul. There were several places to sleep, and most of them were pads on the floor. The other places were like lounge chairs that were okay for sitting but not sleeping, in my opinion. After enjoying some of God’s air on the balcony and doing some work on my laptop, around midnight or so, I took my chances on the floor. Because you know what they say: real girls get down on the flo. I took my headphones out, turned on the rain sound in my Calm app, and I was ooooouuut!

Overall it wasn’t a bad experience at all, and I would do it again. So if you are thinking about going, here are a few suggestions. Some of these I got from a lovely review online, and the rest are from me.

Things to bring:

• An empty water bottle to keep water in
• A beach towel and a dry off towel
• Swimwear
• Your charger and headphones
• A pillow and blanket if you are staying overnight
• Toiletries
• Shampoo, conditioner and grooming supplies