What's up with the toilet seat removal?

[Damien Reynolds]

Ok, here I am in a perfectly fine privado albergue and I was surprisingly reminded of one of my most vexing Camino questions... Why the heck do they remove the toilet seats in some albergues?

 

[stratophile]

Too many people take them home as souvenirs...

 

[JohnnieWalker]

They never fit them in the first place!

 

[whariwharangi]

Easier to clean?

 

[stratophile]

It's the new BYOTS policy (bring your own toilet seat). Yes, you are now expected to carry one with you...

(I'm imagining a peak day on the Camino in early August with thousands of pilgrims walking along each with a toilet seat strapped onto their backpack... hehe).

 

[Mark Lee]

That is rather odd.
Maybe removed due to always being broken by pilgrims, or perhaps frequently left down while male pilgrim doing #1 and seat gets soaked? Or could just be easier to clean that way.

 

[Rach]

This is pretty common in Mexico as well, especially in public places. When I worked there I was told 1) It's easier to clean 2) It keeps people from lingering to long in the bathroom, especially bathrooms where you pay a peso or two to go, that helps them up their daily revenue

 

[jirit]

Very common practice is most of Southern Europe.

Practise your deep knee bends and learn to balance while squatting

 

[Al the optimist]

In some places it is bog standard practise.

 

[RENSHAW]

Al!!

In some places it is bog standard practise.

'Bog standard!' wwaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!! let me know when you on the camino again so we can get together for a drink or 2.

 

[natefaith]

Definitely a common sight in Spain - the kids' school doesn't have seats, either! And most other public places don't. It's too bad that your albergue doesn't have them, though
Faith

 

[jpflavin1]

 

[Coleen Clark]

View attachment 17831

Now we know where it is......

 

[jeffnd]

Great, now we have to endure countless "Which toilet seat should I bring?" threads.

You have your weight obsessed folks who try shave every ounce talking about how you only need one of those paper seat covers you see in public bathrooms.

Others will say that you should bring the seat from your own toilet at home, since it's already broken in and will help you avoid blisters.

And of course, you'll have the folks who refuse to walk the Camino without their luxury padded seat with built-in heat and massage functions.

 

[Suzanne S.]

I'm thinking a solar powered heated one. How much would that weigh???

 

[newfydog]

The hotel owners go in and steal them. "Ahhhh, let's splurge tonight on a private room with a toilet seat."

 

[Felipe]

..and you have not seen the squat toilet, popular in bars of south France and Spain's Andalucia....

 

[fraluchi]

Lack of financial planning? Budget cuts?

 

[Urban Trekker]

Wait until you get a look at the toilets at the Santiago bus station​

 

[grayland]

You can always drill holes in the seat (ala toothbrush handle) to save weight.

 

[mspath]

It could be much worse, ie just a floor hole model which requires precise balance.

 

[newfydog]

It could be much worse, ie just a floor hole model which requires precise balance.

Bhutan---two boards over a pit--you put a foot on each and squat. Fall off and you fall in. This in a country where you are required to spend $250 a day.

 

[stratophile]

Bhutan---two boards over a pit--you put a foot on each and squat. Fall off and you fall in. This in a country where you are required to spend $250 a day.

Yikes!

 

[Bajaracer]

The bar/cafe in Linares after O'Cebreiro has pop a squat pit toilet in their sanitarios.

 

[Coleen Clark]

I am so happy we can now discuss something other than which way the toilet paper should hang, front to back or back to front. As for me, I am following the guy with the seat attached to his pack, and never ever going to Bhutan. Well, not this year anyway.
Can't wait to meet all of you.

 

[Bernard duffy]

Posh pilgrims are nicking them to use in the woods,stops their precious bums touching the ground

 

[Roger B]

It's the new Health and Safety reguations officials are concerned that the seat might fall down and trap a part of the male anotomy!

 

[Felipe]

C'mon folks, don't scare the newbies! Or, at least, try to give a motivational angle to the issue

 

[yolanda Mejia]

View attachment 17831

LOL!

 

[Tincatinker]

Bhutan---two boards over a pit--you put a foot on each and squat. Fall off and you fall in. This in a country where you are required to spend $250 a day.

View attachment 17833

And why you always use the Tea-house at the up-stream end of the village...

 

[bystander]

How about taking an inflatable lifebuoy ring for emergency seating?
I can remember, from nearly 50 years ago, staying at a French campsite where the "facility" was a small shed on the branch of a tree overhanging a stream. Inside, the seat was a plank with a round hole and a clear drop to the water below!

 

[Tincatinker]

A campsite where a river runs through it and probably with Ecrevisse and Grenouille on the menu... La Mal (de estomac), c'est normale

Bystander, there will be an inflatable bog seat on the market by next spring. You will wish you had taken out the patent

 

[txpeah]

This might just be my favorite thread this far.

 

[miguel_gp]

View attachment 17831

I see he has one of those new "CrapPacks".

When you gotta go, lay the pack on the ground, open the lid and do your business. Empty the pocket out at the next WC.

It keeps the Camino clean but you're unlikely to make many friends along the way.

 

[Annie G]

Last night I had a dream where I was carrying a large styrofoam toilet on my back while on the Camino. It had magical plumbing and was always clean and fresh. Clearly, in my waking hours, I am preoccupied with this subject and have now found it necessary to work it out in my sleep. I'll let you know what I come up with.

 

[bystander]

This is pretty common in Mexico as well, especially in public places. When I worked there I was told 1) It's easier to clean 2) It keeps people from lingering to long in the bathroom, especially bathrooms where you pay a peso or two to go, that helps them up their daily revenue

I can, from 50 years ago, well remember an "anti-lingering" loo on the riverside municipal campsite at Cahors in France.

The door of the w.c. opened outwards, inside the space was no larger than the standard ceramic French footprint "squat" loo.
My co-camper (we were hitchhiking to Spain), who liked to take his time over his "functions", disappeared post-breakfast with a magazine to read whilst in the facility.
What he didn't know, which I did and had "neglected" to inform him, was that the cistern was on an auto-flushing timer meaning one had to be speedy to be able to exit before the loo flushed.

He wasn't.

My memory of his screams as he struggled to unbolt the door, pull up his sodden trousers and flee the flood will live with me till my dying day!

 

[Tia Valeria]

So we went for a walk in Haldon Forest. The old corrugated iron 'facility' is falling apart, but the seat is still there. The 'loo with a view' ?

 

[naplesdon]

One of my projects in West Africa was to train folks how to build VIP latrines. VIP does not mean it was for " very important people" it stands for the ventilation system. Anyway we were trying to replace the reliance on the standard roadside squat and the slightly more improved two boards over a stream public facilities. Sub-Saharan African can not understand why anyone would close themselves up in a stinky, hot little shed to do what is nature's business. My favorite story was about an associate who went to the loo late at night with her headlamp, it fell off and she had to lower herself down, gymnast style on parallel bars, into the pit and retreive her light with her feet. Yuck, but even yuckier when you consider these pits are usually full of pythons who feast on the rats that live down there.

 

[MKalcolm M]

It stops women getting angry at us guys for leaving the seat up...

 

[Annie G]

I once spent two weeks at a remote island village in Western Samoa. The people there had trained themselves to do their business on the beach at low tide. I never actually saw anyone doing this -- they were quite discreet. When the Peace Corps was there in the late 60s, they couldn't handle that so they built a long pier out into the waves with an outhouse at the very end. Villagers referred to it as the "fale la Peace Corps" (fale=house). After the PC left, they torn down the outhouse, seeing it as rather superfluous...and hot.

 

[Meldelcamino]

All fascinating and entertaining as I rest my tired feet in Villa do Conde at the end of my first day of my caminho Portuguese da Costa. Fortunately, the 'facilities' are more comfortable and no rats or pythons - at least I hope not!

 

[Pattii]

One of my projects in West Africa was to train folks how to build VIP latrines. VIP does not mean it was for " very important people" it stands for the ventilation system. Anyway we were trying to replace the reliance on the standard roadside squat and the slightly more improved two boards over a stream public facilities. Sub-Saharan African can not understand why anyone would close themselves up in a stinky, hot little shed to do what is nature's business. My favorite story was about an associate who went to the loo late at night with her headlamp, it fell off and she had to lower herself down, gymnast style on parallel bars, into the pit and retreive her light with her feet. Yuck, but even yuckier when you consider these pits are usually full of pythons who feast on the rats that live down there.

OMG I would have rather walked back without the light!

 

[Pattii]

It stops women getting angry at us guys for leaving the seat up...

well not having a seat is just as bad as you leaving it up....we gotta do both jobs sitting...you at least get to stand for one of them...lol

 

[Pattii]

I once spent two weeks at a remote island village in Western Samoa. The people there had trained themselves to do their business on the beach at low tide. I never actually saw anyone doing this -- they were quite discreet. When the Peace Corps was there in the late 60s, they couldn't handle that so they built a long pier out into the waves with an outhouse at the very end. Villagers referred to it as the "fale la Peace Corps" (fale=house). After the PC left, they torn down the outhouse, seeing it as rather superfluous...and hot.

Well I hope if low tide it was still going out or I would definitely not be swimming at that beach...ick

 

[Annie G]

Well I hope if low tide it was still going out or I would definitely not be swimming at that beach...ick

I know, huh? But I can tell you that this was the practice in this village for a very, very long time and the population there was stable, i.e., their resources never exceeded their need, including waste management. They had plenty of fresh water and did not suffer any ill effects from defecating in the sea and then eating fish and seafood caught just yards offshore. It must have been a perfect ecosystem. We could have learned a lot from those people.

 

[DebraS.]

well not having a seat is just as bad as you leaving it up....we gotta do both jobs sitting...you at least get to stand for one of them...lol

Seat or no seat....doesnt prevent the dreaded dribble!

 

[Pattii]

see we are still getting the "bum" end of the deal...lol

 

[Coleen Clark]

One of my projects in West Africa was to train folks how to build VIP latrines. VIP does not mean it was for " very important people" it stands for the ventilation system. Anyway we were trying to replace the reliance on the standard roadside squat and the slightly more improved two boards over a stream public facilities. Sub-Saharan African can not understand why anyone would close themselves up in a stinky, hot little shed to do what is nature's business. My favorite story was about an associate who went to the loo late at night with her headlamp, it fell off and she had to lower herself down, gymnast style on parallel bars, into the pit and retreive her light with her feet. Yuck, but even yuckier when you consider these pits are usually full of pythons who feast on the rats that live down there.

My list of not going there this year now includes Sub Saharan Africa. Poopies and Pythons and Rats...Oh My!

 

[MTtoCamino]

Another fine example of albergies/bars & at the ocean loo at the end of the walk at Finnesterre. Just darn glad to have them when needed. I just realized I never mentioned it to my wife when she accompanies me on the next Camino.. Best let her enjoy the discovery

 

[SYates]

There is a solution to nearly every problem: www.amazon.com/The-Camping-Travel-Toilet-Black/dp/B002V94KCW

SY

 

[Tia Valeria]

Three very different toilet 'seats' from our latest Camino. One 'aseos' with no liftable seat, one toilet in a hotel bathroom that could also give you a wash and dry (we daren't try all of those buttons!) but also functioned 'normally' and one 'servicios' that lacked any seat at all.

 

[Icacos]

Three very different toilet 'seats' from our latest Camino. One 'aseos' with no liftable seat, one toilet in a hotel bathroom that could also give you a wash and dry (we daren't try all of those buttons!) but also functioned 'normally' and one 'servicios' that lacked any seat at all.

My goodness! Couldn't they have placed the last one kitty-corner? How's a person to angle himself over that one !?

 

[Tia Valeria]

Tucked in the corner it wasn't really difficult. What we liked (there was only the one for men/women) was the clean it up squeegy broom, as well as a tap, as a hint to leave it clean.

 

[Icacos]

I guess if everyone aimed right, there would be little problem.

 

[Hanne]

Spanish women are "scared of toiletseats" and find them yukky, so if you are next in line to use the toilet, there will very likely be pee all over the seat .
Please Ladies, if you don't want to sit down on the seat, put the seat up !

 

[Coleen Clark]

Ok. Ok. I'll admit it. I ordered one of those little Women's Pee thingys that is a bright purple rubber funnel shaped thingy that guarantees I can pee standing up and not have to hurt my already bad knees. Guaranteed! But there is NOTHING in the instructions that says what to do IF, during the training process of using this bright purple thingy, I get a mad case of the giggles and start shaking and laughing and trying not to make a mess.
And NO, it did NOT come in a "plain brown wrapper" as advertised, so my neighbors think I am some kind of old perverted woman. I take umbrage at the old part of that.

 

[Icacos]

........I ordered one of those little Women's Pee thingys that is a bright purple rubber funnel shaped thingy .......But there is NOTHING in the instructions that says what to do IF, during the training process of using this bright purple thingy, I get a mad case of the giggles and start shaking and laughing and trying not to make a mess.

No, Coleen, the giggles - hysterics rather - come AFTER you make a mess, because you realize you hadn't practised enough. Then you end up doing laundry in the middle of the day.

 

[Anniesantiago]

Ok. Ok. I'll admit it. I ordered one of those little Women's Pee thingys that is a bright purple rubber funnel shaped thingy that guarantees I can pee standing up and not have to hurt my already bad knees. Guaranteed! But there is NOTHING in the instructions that says what to do IF, during the training process of using this bright purple thingy, I get a mad case of the giggles and start shaking and laughing and trying not to make a mess.
And NO, it did NOT come in a "plain brown wrapper" as advertised, so my neighbors think I am some kind of old perverted woman. I take umbrage at the old part of that.

Haha! Good luck with that.
I tried one and dumped it the first time I peed all down my leg trying to use it.
I know some people love them, and I had a hard plastic one that worked great, (can't remember the name) but the soft one didn't work at all for me.

 

[J Willhaus]

Three very different toilet 'seats' from our latest Camino. One 'aseos' with no liftable seat, one toilet in a hotel bathroom that could also give you a wash and dry (we daren't try all of those buttons!) but also functioned 'normally' and one 'servicios' that lacked any seat at all.

Tia Valeria,
I hope you are not collecting photos for a camino book titled- The Potties along the Pilgrimage.

 

[MTtoCamino]

Never thought of it butt I bet if they got smart & had a rental seat on a big stick (so no one carries it off) they could pay for there own holiday away from the indignant pilgrims. Just put a hose were they store it behind the bar... Oh even better charge for the use of the hose, Then pilgrims could hose off as well.

 

[Tia Valeria]

Tia Valeria,
I hope you are not collecting photos for a camino book titled- The Potties along the Pilgrimage.

No , although there used to be a book called 'the Good Loos Guide' about toilets in London in the 1960/70s. The Post Office tower was the new 'revolving loo with a view'