Back once again to Boondocking: Expanding the Holding Tanks. In compliment of our brand brand new solar install on the bus, we’ve been getting back again to boondocking lately, and loving it.

In because of our brand brand new solar install on the bus, we’ve been getting back once again to boondocking lately, and loving it.

Boondocking is residing in places without hook-ups (water, electricity or sewer) and generally speaking ‘out within the boonies’. You can also hear terms like crazy camping and camping that is dry explain it.

During our first 4 years on the way, our travel trailers were optimized for off-grid living, and we also got pretty darn good at residing without hook-ups or amenities that are typical.

Finding RV Dump channels on the way…

Then once we purchased our coach in 2011, we just about instantly headed towards the eastern shore to be near household in Florida while my dad had been sick. Since we’d be on full hook-ups anyhow, we didn’t optimize much for longer off-grid living.

Nonetheless it ended up being constantly our objective utilizing the bus to ensure it is a versatile nomadic vessel. Comfortable while being parked in A rv that is tight when required… or ample in off-grid ability while crazy camping.

Considering that the start of November, we’ve been enjoying plenty of off-grid camping. So we thought we’d begin sharing several of our classes and experiences in enabling returning to boondocking…. from energy preservation, maintaining hot, finding boondocking places, and optimizing water usage.

In this specific article, we’ll share about our keeping tanks and ways to get the absolute most away from them while far from dump channels.

Our Holding Tanks

We purchased our vintage coach conversion currently transformed, also it had 100 gallons of freshwater (90 into the tanks under our sleep and 10 within the heated water heater), 90 gallons of grey water, and 45 gallons of black. Since we had been originating from a 17′ Oliver Travel Trailer (32f/38g/18b) and a 16′ T@b teardrop trailer (without just a 5 gallon fresh tank), it was pretty ample that is darn.

Dumping our tanks after 17 times of being off-grid.

In regular ‘not reasoning we typically dump & re-fill our tanks every 9-10 days without a problem about it’ usage. That’s offered us large amount of freedom in areas without complete hook-ups become without sewer access regularly. And since we love state areas and such, this works out very well.

At our boondocking location that is latest, into the Anza Borrego Desert of southern Ca – we’re in a location with no stay limits like numerous general general public lands have (typically 14-days). The publicly that is nearest accessible dump place is all about 8 kilometers away at the state park, usable for an $8 cost. While here – we made a decision to observe how far we’re able to extend our tanks by having a small preservation to prevent needing to finish off a lot of times.

We had been wondering to see just what would offer down first – the black colored or perhaps the water tank that is fresh.

In the long run, it had been the fresh water that revealed signs and symptoms to be empty on Day 17 of our boondocking.

Pretty impressive, specially considering we didn’t health health supplement fresh water much at all by consuming water that is bottled. And also though we did collect some rainfall water to augment dish washing or flushing, we finished up perhaps not making use of it.

But, with an inspection that is visual the black tank had not been far behind and might have burped mercy perhaps perhaps not immediately after.

Therefore now we know… with being easily conservative, we are able to easily get 14+ times, that will be the typical boondocking limitation on general general general public lands anyhow. And we’re frequently itching to go out of after 7-10 times in one single location.

Enhance: After our summertime 2015 Renovations, we currently have 112f/120g/70b which includes GREATLY extended our capability. We are able to now get 2 weeks in regular use mode without also great deal of thought before depleting our fresh water, and have actually our waste tanks each at about 1/2 complete. With a few water conservation, you should be able to perform a solid 3-4 days. When we brought in a few fresh to top from the tanks (we set our power up in order to ‘suck’ water in to the tanks if required) – we could expand further.

Methods for Optimizing Holding Tanks

After many years of staying in RVs, we’re pretty conservative currently within our water use. We simply take ‘Navy showers’, we clean meals with small water, and typically thrive in just about 250-300 gallons of water usage four weeks. This can be a huge decline in our previous ‘sticks and bricks’ usage of 2000+ gallons per month. It might be hard to get back to utilizing that much water also whenever we did relax anywhere.

Heck, even though we lived for 5 months during the cold winter for 2011 in the usa Virgin isles, we lived down a cistern and had to be conservative with water usage.

Therefore right here’s just just exactly how we do so:

Showers:

Navy Showers: my father had been a submariner throughout the Cold War, and frequently they’d be underwater for months at the same time. Fresh water is at a premium. Therefore I call our showers ‘Navy Showers’. You switch on water to down rinse yourself. You turn fully off water . You detergent and scrub up (we use yummy smelly liquids that are low-chemical from Dr. Bronner’s Soaps to my yummy Lush bath ties in with a ‘poof’). Then you rinse. We’ve done this for a long time, and from now on we have the shakes whenever I view a film that displays anybody showering without switching from the water while soaping up.