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-

Life Rhythm finding a Beat

It's been an interesting couple of weeks. I've moved, and started getting settled in. I've gone from seeing my boys every couple of days for a few hours at a time to actually having them stay overnight. This new-ish life is starting to take a shape, though I can't tell exactly what shape it is yet. I'll try to be brief on the chronology.

Keys
I got the keys on the 12th, and started moving in the flotsam from my folks place by the car load. I had the boys that evening, so we had a pizza-picnic on the carpet. They tried and approved of the pool. Great start.

Moving Day
The following weekend I moved the big stuff. I scheduled the move weekend without considering work impacts (not wise, but that was the available day). So, while moving things out of the garage, I got a call from work about some kinds of problems. Perfect. I got through the U-Haul rental stuff in record time, and then I was sidelined with a firefight. boo. Fortunately, by the time my helpers arrived, the panic at work had passed and we were back on track. Big thanks to my brothers and my folks for helping out. Before noon, we had the truck loaded and the bus on the tow dolly. 30 minutes of caravan-ing later, we're in an office park across the street from the new place. I dropped the bus there (and the tow-dolly), so we could empty the truck. By 2:30, the truck was empty, and the bus was snuggled into his new shelter. eye-witnesses tell me there was a good 5 inches of clearance above his roof as I backed him in. That gives me the room for bigger rims and the Riviera poptop... maybe.

Life Rhythm finding a Beat
The 14' truck carried a small subset of what's needed to create a home. That's where my sister-in-law jumped in. While I was returning the truck, she and Tim (a friend helping on the move) hit Ross and created an insta-home with dishes and decorations and stuff. Crazy. I was totally floored. We truly are measured by the depths of our relations, not by the content of our bank accounts.

Still, I didn't have the things needed to host my boys, so for the next 2 weeks, I saw very little of them. As much as I wanted to be enjoying the new-space creation, I missed them so terribly, it was very hard to. Work was chaotic, with a major release looming and budget cuts rumored. I was in a very negative emotional space. I pressed forward, though, locating the final items to host the boys, and finally having them for a sleepover this past weekend.

It is hard to describe the emotion of hearing them together in the morning when I got up. I can't tell you what exactly they were talking about, but it doesn't really matter. From the top of the stairs, I could hear quiet voices and giggling.... made my heart leap. It really felt like home. The morning of cereal and hanging out topped a weekend that included C shooting a hat-trick at his lacrosse game and a family get-together (uncles, aunts, cousins, grand-parents) to celebrate T's 13th birthday. Dropping them off was extremely hard, so I worked it out at the gym, like I used to. I'll have them over on Tuesday for the first week-night sleep over. It will be interesting to see how that morning goes. Now that it's started, though, I can make it through those days without them.

Thanks for following along. I don't have the boys this next weekend, so I may start looking at the bus as soon as Saturday. We'll see. Then, you just might hear about that progress again :)

pictures:
top - my helpers taking a break by the truck
upper middle - bus on the dolly
lower middle - bus and car in their new home
bottom - T hanging out (mostly) in the pool