BELIZE BITE #2
October 3rd, 2008
I used to always travel with a small rubber ball. Along with a piece of cord and some liquid soap, these three pieces of gear were the trifecta of doing laundry on the road.
But while the soap made suds and the cord worked as a clothes line, the rubber ball often failed miserably as a universal fits-all sink stopper. It made for a poor seal and I was always knocking it out of place, sending my precious sudsy water down the drain.
But while doing laundry today in Belize, I stumbled upon a solution: The Dry Bag.
A dry bag is simply a waterproof bag with a roll-up top. You put in the items you want to keep dry, roll-up and lock the top and presto: your stuff is protected.
I have a couple of dry bags in my travel kit. A smaller one for things like portable electronics (never worry again about taking your point-and-shoot camera on a canoe trip) and a larger one for bigger things like DSLR cameras and lenses.
Which brings me back to my discovery: rather than using a dry bag to keep water out, I used it to keep water in! I filled my large dry bag (about 10 litres) with a couple of dirty bits of clothing, a couple of capfuls of biodegradable detergent and tap water. I squeezed the clothes until they were soapy, sealed the bag, shook it for a few minutes and let it sit.
An hour or so later I repeated squeezing process (fun!) and then poured out the soapy water. I found that by rolling and kneading the dry bag I was able to squeeze out most of the soapy water. I refilled the bag with clean water to rinse out any remaining soap.
After squeezing most of the water out a second (or third) time, I removed the clothes and hung them in the sun to dry.
The beauty of the dry bag is that you use much less water and you can let your clothes soak overnight — meaning less work. And if they’re not dry before you have to hit the road, you can use the dry bag for damp stuff. That is, if you don’t need it for something else.
I will now carry a dry bag just for laundry… and then use it to carry containers of liquid (like tanning lotion) when I’m flying.
And in the spirit of multi-use, I reckon you could also use a dry bag as a portable aquarium. Or to mix a large batch of Sangria!
[DCM
Do you have any other travel tips? Tell us about them. Comments below.
