Anyone who has gone to a remote island for a holiday, dive trip or any other purpose knows that except for high-end luxury resorts, the “fresh water” that is offered in the showers and toilets are more likely a mix of salt and fresh water, that leaves your skin and hair sticky even after a thorough shower. For those that absolutely hate this feeling (like me), it is hard to get a good night’s rest knowing that your body still isn’t fully clean.
I’ve spent a few weeks at these resorts, and here are some tips to get you through that sticky feeling (especially if you are staying at a no air conditioning room!).
1. Request, or get your own freshwater for the final rinse
Saltwater showers actually do clean your body especially if you use soap along with it – the problem is that after the salt water dries, it leaves behind a sticky residue. To avoid this problem, ask your resort for a small bucket of fresh water, or you could even use a 1.5l drinking bottle for this purpose to create a “shower bottle”. The trick is to shower as usual with the salt water, but after your you have lathered up your body with soap, do your final rinse off with the fresh water. This will at the same time get rid of the grime on your body from the soap, and also washes away the remaining saltwater on your body, making it as if you had a complete fresh water shower even if it was just the final step that you used fresh water.
2. Use prickly heat powder, or baby powder
People who’ve spent a long time in Southeast Asia understand the power of prickly heat powder in cooling down your body, while at the same time removing any stickiness on your skin. Many soldiers in the Singapore army also swear by it, taking “powder baths” with it when no clean water was available for a proper shower. As such, it is a very good post-bath ritual to also do a small powder bath – this will get rid of the sticky feeling of salt water. If prickly heat powder is not available, regular baby powder will also work fine (just without the menthol cooling effect). The only setback is that you might end up using too much and look like a ghost…
3. Bring along wet wipes
Wet wipes are also a good way to wipe away grime left over from a saltwater shower. Although not as effective as rinsing off with fresh water, sometimes you just do not have access to fresh water even if you want it. In this case using wet wipes will help you feel much cleaner afterwards and gets rid of some of the salt left behind at least.
There is also a different type of wet wipes, called “powder” wipes that leaves behind some powder, similar to baby powder, after the solution dries on your skin. I’ve used those before and indeed the effects are a little better than regular wet wipes, but it will not match the full sticky-removing feeling of actually using powder.
Or you can use all 3 methods together
It might be a bit of an overkill, but if you love your hygiene and can’t sleep with a sticky body, then there’s really no one stopping you from using all 3 methods above. Rinse off with fresh water, use wet wipes right after drying off, and then sprinkle some powder for the full effect – if this still isn’t good enough, perhaps you might want to look for another place to stay in…
