Treasures of the sea - sensual kit discontinued by Kama Sutra - review by Jul!a

Baths are wonderful. They can really help you unwind and relax after a hard day, or help to sooth sore muscles after a lot of activity. The fine people with KamaSutra have given you an equally fine tub of bath salts designed to do just that; help you relax.

The little tub you get is pretty nice overall. The most risque thing about it really is that it says "KamaSutra" and some people may find that to be too out there, but you can peel off all the stickers if you really wanted to. The back of the label gives you a small blurb in 4 different languages about it, and on the side you can find the ingredients: sodium sulfate, sodium sesquicarbonate, sodium thiosulfate, sodium dodecyl benzenesulfonate, magnesium sulfate, sodium laurl sulfoacetate, hydrated silica, sodium c14-16 olefin sulfonate, fragrance, triticum vulgare (wheat) germ oil, algae, blue 1, geraniol, butylphenyl methylpropional, linalool, and benzyl benzoate. The tub itself is 24.6 ounces, plastic, and features a plastic screw off lid. It'll travel very well and will keep extra moisture out, helping your salts to last longer without clumping together.

This really is less like a container of salts and more like a container of powder that also has some white stuff in it. I'm not 100% sure what the white chunks are, but I can tell you that they dissolve as well as the rest of the powder does. It doesn't really have a listed scent other than "treasure of the sea" and I'm not sure what that's supposed to smell like exactly, but I imagine something oceany when I think of it. In reality, this doesn't smell like the ocean, at least not to me. "Things that are ocean scented but do not smell like the ocean" is about as close as I can get to trying to describe it, but it's definitely different than the Shunga ocean scent. It's also not very overwhelming either. You can unscrew the lid and inhale deeply without also wanting to choke slightly. You should easily be able to get between 20 and 30 baths out of this tub depending on how much of the product you use all at once. Do be careful when you first open the container though, as it's very easy to accidentally make a mess.

Using these is easy; take the provided seashell scoop (about 2 1/2" x 2 1/4") and add the desired amount of salts to your bath under hot running water. They'll dissolve nicely and turn your tub a lovely shade of blue. You also get an extra little surprise: bubbles! I was able to use two scoops to create a pretty nice bubble bath and the bubbles lasted at least 20 minutes. While soaking, I could feel a few rogue crystals down by the drain under my feet, but the water felt like water to me. The scent of the bath filled the room in a really awesome way, although the next day I walked in and got a whiff of whatever you'd call the scent version of an aftertaste. Afterscent maybe? Either way it was something I didn't agree with, and it wasn't until my next bath that I figured out what I was smelling. It cleared up relatively quickly though, and only happened the one time. After each bath my skin felt very nice, and I was able to forgo my usual moisturizing after a bath when I took it right before bed.

After you're done, you may notice some slight traces of blue either on you or on the tub. I didn't have any consistent problems, but either way it's easy to take care of. On me, I just wiped myself off with a towel and was all clean again. In the tub, a cup of water can help direct any stray bubbles towards the drain, and some light rubbing should take off any residual blue. The scent clings nicely overnight, but is still hard to detect in the morning. Should you enjoy the scent while bathing but not want to smell like this after you're done, it's easily covered up by just about any other scent you may want to layer on.

Here are a few pictures for you, to show you the consistency of the salts in the tub and also to show you what it looks like in a sink, since I never remember to take the camera into the bathroom with me when I take a bath.

I just love the scent of these salts. Unlike with my Shunga salts, this scent I took to immediately and didn't have to grow on me. I'm just sitting here smelling it while writing this review.

Overall, I wouldn't necessarily say that I really love one over the other, but I do equally enjoy both of these bath salts. This particular one has a more generally pleasing scent, and is less work to get out of the tub, which I really like.