No Longer A Dirty Girl

After a fiddly and annoyingly lengthy session to get the shower curtain hung, it was time to cut bait or fish.  Or take a shower.  I don’t know why I was nervous about the whole thing, but I imagine I was remembering the particularly heart breaking episode that happened one year when I’d cobbled together a hot and cold running water system in the back of a moving truck for use at Burning Man.  It took a great deal of effort to get it hooked up, and when I stepped in to take that much longed-for shower, I got a two second blast of water before the pump died.  It was a crushing disappointment.  Maybe I was half expecting something similar to happen here.

It’s impossible to get a fully inclusive picture of the shower because the space is so small.  But here are some shots so you can get an idea. 

This is looking in through the open door.

The Phoenix faucet, Cabana model.  I picked this one because it is white and has comfortable handles with no sharp edges.

Detail of the  corner, showing KD's original aluminum trim strip.  These were cleaned up and reused.  They help to hold the panels in place and further protect the joints.  The panels themselves are glued to luan paneling behind, and all the walls are insulated as well.  You can also see the new shower pan in place.  The original was 24 by 39 inches, but I could only find a 38 or 40 inch long pan, so one wall had to be built out a little to make the 38 inch pan fit.  The original trim ring around the bottom was dispensed with, and instead just a simple caulking seal was used.  Also you can see my beloved bucket potty, which lives there when the shower isn't being used to take showers.  I decided I didn't want a regular flush toilet in little KD, so I pulled the toilet and black tank.  They were both broken beyond repair anyway, and would had to have been replaced.  With them went their bulky old copper and brass plumbing, which saved weight and simplified the plumbing system.

The ceiling still needs a protective layer added to cover the luan panel that was put up by a good friend in Indiana.  But it's fine for this trip.  A basic Phoenix handheld shower head was also installed.

The stuff on the walls is not tile.  It’s a fiber reinforced plastic product (FRP panel).  The product is called Symetrix from a company called Marlite.  It’s great stuff.  Glossy with a tile pattern that looks real (but it’s a solid sheet, there’s no real grout lines, just grooves for effect), it is completely impervious to moisture and can’t rot or leak.  Of course all the seams where sheets come together need to be sealed, but this material is so much better than the coated Masonite that was in there that I can’t say enough for it.  Symetrix comes in soft gray, almond, taupe and white.  I picked white because it is such a small space, I thought it was important to maximize brightness.  I’m glad I did, it gives a very clean look.  You can also get Symetrix with a colored border for the New York subway tile look.  I considered that option, but decided a monochrome scheme was better in the tiny space.

I turned on the shower before I climbed in, just to see if hot water would actually come out, AND IT DID!  I fiddled with the controls a little and it was just as easy to adjust the water temperature as at home.  I shucked off my clothes and got in.

The vent was open, and of course everybody outside could hear me perfectly well as I yelled out status reports:  “OK, I’m wet now!”  Encouraging cheers and some commentary drifted in to me from outside.  “OK, got shampoo all in my hair!”

This went on for a while until I got involved in the joys of hot water and stopped calling the plays, or more likely the people outside got involved in conversations and lost interest in the proceedings.  Now, here’s the truly awesome thing:  the water pause button on the shower head actually worked.  I could set the temperature and then turn off the flow to save water while I soaped up, and I didn’t have to reset the temp.  It worked so well I couldn’t believe it.  When I pushed in the button to start the spray again, the water was the same comfortably warm temp.  A small trickle of water still escapes the nozzle, but it’s so slight the pump didn’t seem to notice it, so there wasn’t the annoying cycling of the pump that I was expecting.

I moved fast, partly because there were two people in line behind me, and partly because I’m just programmed to take speedy, water-conscience showers in a camping situation.  But with 2 6-volt batteries in series providing power to the pump, 6 gallons of hot water, and 55 gallons to draw from, I could have probably been a little less miserly.  Next shower will be longer, I think, or at least more relaxed.

After I dried off and got dressed, I burst out of the trailer singing Born Free to general congratulations. 

It may seem silly to make such a big deal about taking a shower in a travel trailer, which is supposed to be equipped for it.  But it has been a long journey, from the moment the first gleam of an idea to even buy a trailer like KD entered my head, through long months of planning and dreaming when a great deal of patience was called for, to the Big Adventure of bringing KD home, and then gutting her shambles of a bathroom and finally taking the parts and materials to the crew at RV Dr. George’s shop and communicating my vision of how I wanted it to turn out.

A lot of people have had a hand in helping me get to this point, some of them directly, some indirectly.  Some people were just encouraging and reassured me I could make it happen.  Others gave me ideas and suggestions, through their own blogs and pictures of how they remodeled their Shasta trailers, and others gave hands-on assistance, showing up just when I’d hit a wall and piling in to push things into the next phase.  Still others did the skilled labor required to finish the job and make the final result a useable, functional part of Kadydid.  A big thanks to John at Dr. George’s shop, and of course to George as well.  And John, yes, I did think of you!  And as always, thanks to mia karaj amikoj Luo kaj Biela!

So bravo and thanks to you all.  And bravo to me.  I didn’t do it all by myself, but I made it happen.