Camp Shower

Today's brief post is about the assemblage of seemingly random things Boo put together to create a fully viable, small-packing private camp shower for use with the bus.

Nexus
Boo had this idea at our first camp together (Furthur in 2011): a portable shower with privacy so we could get clean while camping, using as little water as possible. So, we bought a solar showerbag and started bringing it with us to festivals so we could consider options.

We tried using just a solar showerbag at NorthWest String Summit a few years ago. Since they park cars so close together, privacy wasn't as much of an issue as other places. Still, We strung beach towels between our bus and the pickup truck next to us using clothespins in the rain gutters. In this early experiment, we were standing in dirt, so our feet got dirtier the longer we showered. We thought we could just bring a small slatted platform or something to stand on. We later concluded that getting clean without waste water going all over the place, making mud, was better than just getting off the ground. The net result is very simple, and consumes no space during travel.

From the Ground Up

Underfoot, the shower floor is a 4-foot diameter inflatable kid pool. This catches the water and keeps your feet clean. Being inflatable, it travels very small, but these are harder to find than the large hard-plastic pools. Also, there is a puncture concern. We are thinking about how we could make the air sections less puncture prone.

Overhead is a 4-foot diameter hula-hoop which acts like a shower curtain rod. It holds up 2 dollar-store shower curtains. The dollar store curtains are very thin, but not opaque. Those were chosen for their weight, so they are not weighing down the hula-hoop. They are also very inexpensive, which works well for our initial attempts at a design. We used a couple of clothespins to hold the curtains closed while in use.

For mounting, the hula-hoop is held in place by pinching it between the top of the passenger door window and the top of the window frame. Yes, it's that simple, and the operation is that lightweight. On the other end, we used a small bungy-cord looped around the hula-hoop and hooked to the canopy.

Last, we used the solar camping shower bag to heat the water so it was warm-ish. The bag was set in the luggage bin to catch the central Oregon desert sun and then shifted to outside the front corner of the luggage bin / on the passenger-side wind-screen for use.

In Use
We both took showers at least once at 4Peaks. The curtains created complete privacy. We oriented the splits in the curtains so one pointed at the hinge in the door and the other 180* the opposite side. The hinge-side opening created a way to grab a towel or clothes without letting water into the bus. We climbed into and out of the shower through the other side, into the main camp-living space. Once the shower was complete, the pool would be carried to a spot where waste-water could be dumped. For the most part, we were each able to shower in less than 1/2 gallon of water. It is amazing how little water you can use if you set your mind to it.

Tucked Away
When the shower was not in use, the hula-hoop detached from the bungy cord and window. Once dry, we would set them inside the pool and then slide the unit under the nose of the bus. There, the wind didn't touch it, the pool wasn't subject to random punctures, but it was ever-ready for use. The shower bag would go back into the luggage bin to collect more sun.

I highly recommend duplicating this, especially at hot dusty festivals. At the end of festival, when the curtains and pool were dry, we deflated the pool and set the hula-hoop inside, complete with the curtains still attached. The combined unit fits on top of the upper bunk pad, underneath the pop-top when closed: taking up no previously used space.

That's it for today. Thanks, as always, for following along-