The Power of the Shower

Article by: Vanessa Arrington, September 2007

After a seven-week journey through the vibrant cities and sleepy villages of Russia, the vast deserts of Mongolia and the mammoth, pulsating territory that is China, I think I've discovered what separates intrepid travellers from those who dare not venture beyond their own country's borders: a good shower.

It is, perhaps, the thing many of us take most for granted. Temperature that can be controlled; a surrounding structure that keeps the water from flooding the floor; a strong, steady flow that stops only when you decide.

Even a showerhead can be a luxury, as I found out riding the Trans-Siberian Railway from Moscow to Beijing in summer. I've camped and trekked and gone several days without a shower in the wild, but a train is different, with its close, sometimes stuffy quarters and stern Russian provodnitsas - those in charge of the train carriages - who don't always let you open the window.

Hardy travellers on the train didn't skip a beat, converting the public bathrooms on the end of each carriage into temporary watering spots. Picture a space not much bigger than an aeroplane bathroom; there's nothing to hold on to, and the water coming out of the tap in the sink is icy cold. Now imagine a rocking train and some vivid green scenery flashing by (unless you're really unlucky and the train starts pulling in to town as you're still bathing in the window). Then throw in some antsy passengers knocking on the door every 30 seconds.

The procedure here is to gather water in buckets and throw it over your bathing partner.

When my turn came I filled a large plastic bottle with boiling water - burning my finger in the process - from a water heater in the train's corridor. Once mixed with the tap water and thrown over my head, this was just enough to shampoo my hair - halfway. The rest was icy cold, and I rushed to get the sudsy water past my flip-flops and out the small drain to the track below (yet another reason for feeling guilty, along with the mounds of empty water bottles discarded during the long trip.)

It took four days (I managed two showers) to get from Moscow to Russia's eastern city of Irkutsk - once called the Paris of Siberia, and the gateway to Lake Baikal, the world's deepest lake. (It takes seven days for those truly audacious souls who go direct to China - a 7865-kilometre journey.) On the charming Olkhon Island, the jewel of Lake Baikal, more bathing adventures awaited me.

At Nikita's Guest House, a bustling traveller's mecca just a few hops from magnificent views of the lake, toilets are in shared outhouses and there are no showers. But one can sign up for a 10-minute turn in the banya, a traditional Russian sauna heated with vats of boiling water.

I've discovered what separates intrepid travellers from those who dare not venture beyond their own country's borders: a good shower.

When my turn came I entered a small wooden cabin, left my clothes in the changing room and took my soap and shampoo into a steaming sauna redolent with eucalyptus. The procedure here is to gather water in buckets and throw it over your bathing partner - 'ooh, ow, HOT!' Five minutes later, and with no permanent scalding, I was finishing off my wash.

At the start of my journey in St Petersburg my hotel room had a small, stand-up shower with fabulous pressure. The environmentally friendly contraption shut off every few minutes, giving you a chance to lather up without leaving the water running. A quick push on the one-touch knob brought back the water at the same temperature as before. Brilliant. Until, while drying off and swinging the towel over my head, I accidentally bumped into the knob and was drenched.

In Mongolia I stayed in a traditional nomadic ger (a felt yurt) at a beautiful camp in the middle of the remote Gobi desert (locals just say 'the Gobi', as that word actually means desert.) In this vast, dry land I really absorbed the importance of taking a short shower and turning off the water when I lathered.

By the time I got to China, several train trips and two wearying border crossings later, I was opting for more traditional lodging in hotel rooms with private bathrooms (and normal showers). Now at an apartment in Cyprus with solar-heated water, I'm trying to appreciate the joy of a good shower coupled with the need to cut short my time in there. There's no recycling here, so it's the least I can do. Then again, perhaps those days on the train have earned me the right to a few extravagantly long soaks.