Mountain Hygiene – Keeping Clean on a Trek

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HYGIENE TIPS FOR TREKKING IN THE MOUNTAINS

Here is an easy way to reduce the environmental impact of your trek in the mountains… Don’t ask for a hot shower every day in the lodge.

This is because they often heat the water with wood rather than using kerosene. Instead, enjoy the restorative benefits of a cold bucket wash and build up your anticipation for a hot wash every few days. This will add to the challenge of your trek, and add to the enjoyment in retrospect. It will also help the environment up there in the mountains, and hope, truly make your holiday greener. If every trekker going to say, Nepal, every year (currently over 100,000 people) followed this routine then the difference would be huge. So help us make a difference one less shower at a time!

Our trek leader will be leading by example by not showering every day, not bringing soap, taking extra undies instead of washing clothes, and still smelling sweet on the trail. So don’t feel you need to do clothes washing on your trek, just take some extra underwear and put the dirty stuff in a bag to take home

When you do wash use a biodegradable soap, but remember that biodegradable doesn’t always mean environmentally friendly! Here are the soapy facts:

Biodegradable soap is NOT biodegradable when it ends up in a river or lake because it requires soil for it to break down properly.
Biodegradable soap is NOT NATURAL….it is a chemical.
If you wouldn’t want to drink it then keep it out of water sources.

You don’t need to use soap! You can leave that bar at home, and consider these alternatives:

Use a washcloth, scrubber etc.
A little scrubbing can clean mostly anything.
Use alcohol-based waterless hand sanitizers to kill germs.
Soap is not 100% necessary for good personal hygiene

And if you really, really need to use soap then make sure that any brands of biodegradable soap you use are actually biodegradable and phosphate-free.

Thank you for your help!

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