Ultimate Road Laundry Idea
 

I've seen recent posts about using the hotel towel in your room to wring the clothes you just washed in the tub, sink or bidet. Hotels frown both on using their linens to dry your clothes and making wet messes on their bathroom floors.

After years of trial and error, I've settled on what I think is the best way to do laundry on the road.

Start with a large zip-lock bag. Mine is called a big bag by either Hefty or Zip-lock and is a two or three gallon bag.

Washing - Put your dirty clothes in (I wash one pair of socks and one pair of underwear per day and a t-shirt every other day. Heavy items like sweaters or pants still get washed every couple of weeks at a laundromat with an occasional tide stick used for small spills). Add a small squirt of liquid laundry detergent and fill the bag no more than half-way with warm water. Shake vigorously then drain the bag into sink, tub or bidet by opening one corner of the bag. Add rinse water, shake, drain and repeat until the rinse water drains clean.

Drying - I pack a car chamois to wring my clothes, it soaks up an incredible amount of water then wrings to nearly dry to use again (unlike your hotel room towel). Wring everything as well as you can then hang overnight on a nylon travel clothesline.

When I travel, I change my underwear and socks before dinner each night rather than after my morning shower. If I'm traveling in the morning, my laundry will be dry and ready to pack by then.

The chamois is an excellent idea, thanks. But does it make your clothes smell like animal hide? If not, I will use that idea and the zip lock bag!!

I take a microfiber towel to roll my clothes in before I hang them up to dry.

It has never made my clothes smell bad. The tanning process for the chamois leaves them pretty odorless.

They also have synthetic chamois material. I've used some but none were as good as a real chamois.

We also bring microfiber travel towels. The big weakness with towels, whether cotton or microfiber, is they don't wring as dry as the chamois. Microfiber are better than cotton but after you use them to wring the first item of clothing, they stay damp and limit the effectiveness of towel wringing.

topping

How about using a Shamwow?

I think a Shamwow would work. I haven't used one so I can't give a personal recommendation. I saw a box of four Shamwows available at Costco recently and you don't even have to pay shipping and handling.

Usually I vacation in Mexico, where the drop-off laundry services are extremely inexpensive and very common. Other than rinsing my bathing suits, that's what I do there.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't see how this method is any better than using the hotel shampoo and washing in the bathroom sink (for lightweight items) plus you don't have to pack anything extra.

You can really wash your clothes (not just lightly rinse them) without making a mess and your clothes will be dry quickly.

When using a sink you are either just lightly rinsing your clothes or you are getting water everywhere and using your room towels to dry up the mess/wring your clothes.

Mexico is cheap, so it may not matter as much.

Laundry in Europe is expensive and many hotel owners get upset with people either making a mess or requesting extra towels because they used theirs to dry clothes or clean up their mess.

I generally do fine washing my clothes in the hotel sink. Occasionally I encounter one that's just too small, but that's rare. I use the hand towel to wring socks dry, and the top part of some pants, but it's almost always dry again by morning, so I'm not asking for extra towels. My washing doesn't get drips all over everywhere - I usually hang it over the bath/shower, with the bathmat underneath.

The hotel I stayed at in Venice did have a sign about not doing laundry in the bathroom, which I thought was a bit much as it was the kind of bathroom that showered with you! (I.e. no shower curtain.) It was getting wet anyway. I ignored the sign, especially as the cost for laundry was really high.

i do a kind of stamping dance under the shower for my smalls while im shampooing my hair
the only thing im not satisfied with washing in a bath. shower are jeans
they really need a good thrashing to get clean
oh
and childrens clothes
but theyre not coming anyway ( the chn that is)

I do pack a couple plastic hangers in the bottom of my suitcase, to hang damp clothes to day.

I really like the idea of using a chamois!

If you plan well you can make a landramat stop a nice multitasking stop. First determine where the closest coin laundry might be--- check with your hotel, b and b or hostel. Many coin laundries have internet access--- we use Ondablau a lot. We load the machine, then sit down to the picnic lunch or snack we get at a local market. Check out email, chat with locals, read through our guidebooks to plan our upcoming activities , write post cards, eat a snack write in our journals etc.

I still do a little hand laundry in the room using the Ziplock bag method above.