Cowboy Showers

Cowboy Showers


Usually when Peg and I are  camping  out  of our  trailer and /or  camper we just use a solar shower  and  hang it in the  horse trailer  to take our showers in camp. The  problem is that you really  need to have  some warm direct  sunlight to heat the  water (which we may  get in AZ). Too often though, the water  wouldn't  be warm enough sometimes because  we were  camped at a higher elevation and  sometimes it was due to our  NW weather and  the  bag wouldn't  get hot enough.
      For those  of you that  haven't  used one  before, they really are  great for light weight  packing. They hold  5 gallons of water, and can rollup tighly in your pack, panniers, or larger saddle  bags. without  the water in them ; they weigh next to nothing.
     But  Peg came  up with a  better idea lately that  will work better in the  horse trailer  or somewhere  that we can have a propane  source with us. It's called a shower power and is a propane tankless water heater. It uses 2 D batteries to ignite it. The unit costs around  $100.00.
     Last  year we  bought  an electric transfer pump that we use with our  Honda generator to pump water from a stream to fill our  tanks on the  trailer or  5 gallon water  tanks when we are  in the  hills. I plan on using that pump and  using the  horse  water we  haul in the 55 gallon drums that  I mounted in the  trailer to take our  showers since  we  won't be in any established campgrounds. We plan on "boon docking" for the  most part. Which is off of the  grid. We should  be able to stay out  for several days in between having  to replenish water (Even for the  desert  conditions).

      We carry the  Transfer pump with us when we go anywhere  in the  mountains and  are  camping  out of our  camper. Sometimes  the  creeks are  too shallow to draw water into those  tall 6 gallon water jugs. And  if I have  a longer  hose I can also use it to pump water from the  55 gallon barrels over a longer  distance.
      A couple  of words of  caution though. If you are pumping  directly  from a creek for horse water, you should  use a plastic water bottle with a sock or stocking wrapped on the  outside  to filter larger particles. If you are  using the water  for drinking; make sure that you use  some sort of water purification system so that you don't contract  Guardia or other disease. Remember you don't always  know the source of the water or if  something  died in the water above you or if  someone  dumped something in the water source. Just because it looks  clean and  doesn't smell doesn't always mean that it is.