It’s impossible to write about our trek without mentioning toilets as they were a major topic of discussion along the way. While every one of our teahouses had at least one indoor Western toilet, that doesn’t mean it was the usual Western experience.
Major differentiators were that you had to bring your own toilet paper and it couldn’t be flushed, thus there was always a basket for used TP next to the toilet.
...with three planks spaced apart, which was baffling and made it difficult to aim.
Another was a hole with a large pile of leaves to throw in to offset the smell, which seemed to work pretty well.
The worst was definitely this outdoor loo at Thukla on our 7th day, which was just two shallow holes filled with poop and toilet paper; the wood had garlic scattered about in an attempt to disguise the smell. We also encountered several porcelain Asian toilets―some that flushed and some with buckets to use for flushing. Not surprisingly, it took some practice to get the foot position just right for perfect aim.
To
complicate matters, once we got above Deboche, at 12,525 feet (3,820 meters), there
was no running water. When we arrived at our “upgraded” ensuite room in
Pheriche, we discovered a large barrel of water with a small bucket to be used
to scoop up water to pour in the toilet to flush away the contents. The loos in
the hallways in Lobuche and Gorak Shep were similar, so for five night we got
to play a game of: How Many Buckets of Water Does it Take to Wash the Poop
Away. Ironically,
when we got to Gorak Shep, we were sadly missing our plywood closets housing
toilets at the Pheriche Bates’ Motel. The hallway toilet there didn’t have a
light, so we had to wear headlamps to do our business. Overall, we had ensuite rooms for 6 of 14 the nights: 3 with running water and 3 without. For the remaining eight nights, we used a shared loo down the hall.
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