So far this has mostly centered on good poop-iquette when backpacking. I've been thinking about how it goes when car camping. Particularly all the burial sites that end up around busy campsites, some of which not buried well... or at all.
Since I started boat camping in Glen Canyon earlier this year, I've had to carry a portable toilet. In the past when I needed one for car camping in a place like The Maze, it was usually just a 5-gallon bucket with a seat and some wag bags. Disgusting to deal with and the smell... oh my. But for the boat we kind of splurged and bought a pretty nice toilet,
The Thetford Curve. It's features include the fact that it is the same height as a regular toilet and it has a power flush via some batteries (lasted all year) and a freshwater flush tank built-in to the top. A little pricey at around $120-ish but it was well worth it.
After using it for a a bunch of long boat trips last year, I've decided I totally love it. You put in some chemical and clean water, then just use it like a toilet for the most part. When we're on the lake, we go to the floating dump stations every few days and empty it. It'll take care of 4-5 people for about that long. Longer if people are careful about what went into it. It's easy to clean at home too, you don't have to smell a thing if you're careful.
And unlike the wag bags I've used, this thing doesn't stink to high hell after a couple of days. Granted, when you flush it, it doesn't smell great, but just sitting around you can't smell a thing. It's so damn air tight that you have to be careful when you bring it to high altitude if it is loaded. Let's just say it gets very pressurized. Maybe
@langutah can tell us a bit about that.
Anyway, I thought pooping in a portable toilet was ridiculous at first, but now I am totally sold. I really wish more poeple would use them car camping rather than digging holes all over the place. Sometimes you just don't have space and steps can be taken to keep it lower impact, but nothing is as low impact as just packing it out.
I like mine so much that I gave it a name.
