Off-Grid Winter Bathing

Off Grid Utilities
5
melting snow

Here on the homestead, where there is no running water, baths are a little more of a project.  Off-grid bathing during the winter is even more of a project, because there is no hot water. Once you get things all set up, it is not really all that bad. Now that we have got the hang of it at least.  You just have to start collecting the day before. This means that we are pretty much always melting snow and/or heating water.

The Day Before

Yes.  We are melting snow to take baths and showers.  As long as we get as good start, we have no trouble getting plenty for all of us to get clean. It’s actually easier than buying the water and lugging it up to the cabin. Although, it didn’t snow that much this year so we did have to buy some water. The snow is also getting to be too muddy to use.

Shower Day

wood stove and tub

This is our off-grid bath tub. Notice the wood stove in the background with the melting snow. A nice pile of firewood next to it. That 5 gallon bucket is the best part though. We have a camp shower with a submersible pump so we can take a shower. This was fantastic upgrade we made. The reason the tub is not in the bathroom is because it is just not warm enough in the bathroom. We have a curtain that we can hang for privacy, and it keeps us toasty warm.
So there it is. Our shower.

Other Ideas for Off-Grid Bathing:

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well done, fair play to ye! I thought I was brave thinking of making an outdoor bathhouse with a cast-iron bath over a fire pit – i have the bath, just have to get the moxy to get going on the project;

Fair play indeed! We were lucky when we started as we had a well in place, although at 25 meters deep it was a job to get the water for the bath. The one advantage of the tin bath is how portable it is, we took ours out to the orchard and bathed under the apple trees in the summer 🙂

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