Wayfaring Hygiene
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Good Health on the Path means Good Hygiene.
These are a few core aspects of Wayfaring hygiene: teeth; toilet, washing clothes, & washing hands/body.
Teeth
Twice a day you will need to cleanse those pegs. Oral hygiene is vital, and a dodgy tooth can be as debilitating as an ankle sprain.
In terms of basic practice, be sure to brush your teeth far enough away from water sources. Cover over your pastey spit, don’t leave it lying on the surface. Be sure to rinse with clean purified (or mains) water. Even though you aren’t drinking it, you can still get ill from a tiny taste of contaminated water.
A wooden toothbrush feels like a better item for the Wayfarer. One less piece of plastic. As for toothpaste, carry a small Nalgene pot so you can avoid lugging a whole tube around.
Bamboo Toothbrushes (x4) - £6
Toilet
This part of Wayfaring hygiene is necessary even for short journeys. Finding the basic skill to be free from industrial sewage systems is a deep relief and core independence. No other animal requires such fuss to perform such basic functions.
It is advised to read up on the ‘Leave No Trace’ Principles for human waste disposal.
If you are peeing, simply find a sheltered spot, far from waterways, and do your deed. You may wish to find a beautiful viewpoint - a pee vista (pista). Try to consider urine not as a shameful discharge, but as a rich natural gift to the land. The nitrates in urine are highly nutritious to plant life. Urine is sterile, and will cause no harm, as long as you don’t pee multiple times in the same spot.
If you are Coldharbouring, be sure to pee far enough from your camp. Also, remember urine is used by many animals as a marker of territory, so you might pee in various places to mark the boundaries of your space. The badgers and foxes will know what you mean.
Some Wayfaring women carry pee-cloths, which they use to wipe with. These can be hung on the outside of a backpack for UV cleansing, to be washed at the first water source found.
For pooing, you need to take more care. Again, don’t forget this is a gift to the soil, and will become in time a nutritious source of life. Human poo is tremendously rich, due to our extravagant diets.
The simple routine is to find a good spot, private and far from waterways or oversight. Use a trowel (vital wayfaring tool) to dig a ‘cat-hole’ 6-8 inches into rich dark soil, where you can be sure there are plenty of living microbes. If you have no trowel, use a stick.
Deposit your poo in the hole, and wipe with toilet paper/moss/water. Fill in the hole with the original soil, and pad it down securely. In rocky or desert environments it is advised to ‘carry out’ all used toilet paper. But in most landscapes this is unnecessary, as toilet paper will biodegrade quickly. Be sure to use recycled paper, otherwise toilet paper is typically made of virgin hardwood trees, ancient forests chopped down just to wipe up your poo.
The microbes in the soil 6” down will make (relatively) short work of the gift you have left them. If you carry seeds, you might want to plant some where you have pooed. Also, you may want to leave a twig sticking up in the ground to show other Wayfarers where you have gone, to prevent them digging up what you have left behind.
Be sure to wash your hands after all toilet stops. You may wish to use a wipe before water and soap, to keep your water pouring system clean. In this case, make sure you have already got a wipe out and ready.
There are a variety of trowels available, but this orange Coghlans one is the cheapest. I recommend sawing off the last inch of the ‘blade’, to add stability.
Coghlans Trowel - 50g - £5
Ultralight Trowel - 19g - £25
If you are counting the grams, this aluminium trowel that weighs 19g, and has a better edge for more effective digging.
Wild Flower Seed Bombs - 5x 21 - £30
You may want to leave behind the promise of future growth amongst your deposit?
Washing Clothes
A really important tip is covered in the kit pages is to wear wool rather than cotton while Wayfaring. Wool is naturally anti-bacterial, and will not allow cotton’s level of bacterial build-up that can cause discomfort and stench. But even wool is not a miracle fabric, and all Wayfaring clothes need washing regularly - especially socks, pants and baselayers.
You should carry a small pot of soap suitable for this task. Dr Bronners is what I recommend, as it lacks harmful detergents and is biodegradable, so will not harm wildlife like other more aggressive and smelly soap products. Also, it can be used for hair and body and washing up.
Dr Bronners Magic Soap - 946ml - £19
You should try to wash your socks, pants and baselayers at least every two days (I would recommend carrying three pairs of each). Handwashing is easiest, in a flexible bucket you carry, or in a handy sink you find. It is also sometimes possible to find laundrettes in towns along the way. If you are taking hospitality, you may find that clothes washing is a service offered?
Handwashing needs warm/hot water. You can provide this by heating water on your stove, and using a flexible sink to create a washbowl. Agitate the dirty clothes with soap, rubbing them together rigorously. You might want to use a stone to help gain purchase. Use the same hot water for as many items as you can, until it gets dark and grimy, then replace it with more.
This is obviously harder work if you are sourcing/cleaning/heating your own water. Finding a sink with a hot tap makes everything easier. It is usually quite easy to find such facilities. Many churches offer it, as do almost all pub toilets, and of course campsites usually do too.
You’ll need plenty of clean water to rinse the soap out. Squeeze each item until there is no more soapy residue emerging, and be sure to place them somewhere clean while you wash the next item.
Sea to Summit 10L Flexible Kitchen Sink - 134g - £24
Don’t wash clothes directly in streams or rivers, even if you use good soap. Consider the frogs.
It is recommended that you wash your mid-layers less frequently, as you’ll probably not be carrying extras, and these often take much longer to dry. Most of your sweat will be in the layers next to your skin, so these are your regular priority for Wayfarer washing.
To dry your clothes, carry a line of twine to rig up for drying when you stop. Hang clothes in direct sunlight and watch the dampness steaming out of them. This is wonderful ancient magic in action. While walking on, you can strap your damp clothes onto the outside of your backpack. Be sure to have squeezed them thoroughly of all water first.
Washing Body
The first thing you need to wash regularly is your hands. Before and after cooking/eating, and after toilet. You probably already know how to do this! Soap is again vital. Dr Bronners works a treat. Be sure you have ample clean water. Cold is usually good enough!
More difficult is the washing of your whole body. Whenever you find a sink with a hot tap to wash your clothes, clean your body at the same time. Your skin is your most important garment!
A lazy way to keep clean on the path is with biodegradable wipes. There are many brands claiming to degrade, but I would recommend only using ‘flushable’ wipes if you want to burn them rather than carry them to a bin. These Natracare wipes are pure cotton, with zero plastic. You can use these every night to clean the essential parts, for times when a deeper wash is not possible.
Natracare ‘Flushable’ non-plastic wipes - 6 pack - £14.50
To help keep clean while Wayfaring, I also recommend wild-swimming as regularly as you can.
For wild swimming, and all body washing, you may want to carry a wash cloth and ultralight towel. A wash cloth can be a flannel from home, or a jay-cloth. But a towel should be light enough to carry.
Sea to Summit Airlite Trekking Towel - 63g - £18
To really soak and scrub, you may wish to seek out showers. Taking hospitality at campsites is a cheap-ish way to get deeply clean before moving on. Leisure centres also sometimes offer this service.
It is also possible to shower off-grid while Coldharbouring. Simply heat up clean water in the same way you would for washing clothes, on your stove or fire, then mix this hot water with cold in a portable shower system, which can be surprisingly lightweight.
Risepro Solar Shower - 350g - £12
A portable shower technically can work if you hang it in direct sunlight for 3 hours, but this is Britain. Also, if you intend to use it while Coldharbouring, you’ll probably want the privacy of darkness, and water cools quicker than it heats.
One trick is to fill your portable shower at a hot tap before heading out to the woods. You’ll need good planning to make this work.
A lighter and better portable shower is made by Sea to Summit.
If you are planning to shower in the woods, you’ll need a pot big enough to heat sufficient water.
iBasingo 2.9L Titanium Pot - 240g - £48
