The 9 Rules for peeing on holiday…
- RULE ONE always know where your nearest food outlet is that might be big enough to have a toilet you can use
- RULE TWO be prepared to spend 3 euros on a cup of coffee you don’t need that will only make you want to pee again sooner rather than later
- RULE THREE wear suitable peeing-on-the-side-of-the-road wear
- RULE FOUR wear dark colours that don’t pop when trying to hide in scant bushes
- RULE FIVE put modesty aside in favour of not exploding your bladder
- RULE SIX don’t drink anything en-route
- RULE SEVEN go before you leave home AND
- RULE EIGHT do lots of squats before you leave home to build up your quads to better handle squatting over Southern toilet bowls AND
- RULE NINE NEVER, EVER PASS A TOILET WITHOUT GOING even if you don’t need to.
The concept of public toilets doesn’t seem to have made it’s way to Europe, or to America for that matter. In fact, only Australia seems to think it is a great idea to have a rest stop with a picnic table, rubbish bin, car parking and public toilet. Sometimes there’s even a tap! This will either be in the public park in town, or on the side of a highway, or at a roadside service station. No matter how bad that toilet may be, I will never complain about them again because you don’t realise how amazing it is that they exist until you’ve had to pee on the side of the road everywhere else.
It’s not that I have a problem with peeing on the side of the road. I’ve done it in Australia plenty of times, just not as an ADULT! There is something completely wrong about pulling up on the side of a road and trying to make a stroll into the trees look like a lust for nature instead of a toilet break. I try to time this walk so that no cars see me doing it. If a car comes by, I stand with my hands in my pockets looking at the nice trees or nice view going “la, la, la isn’t it a lovely day for a walk” whilst trying not to wet myself.
The amazing thing is that wherever you stop the car, someone (or many someones and definitely some female someones) have been there before you. You can tell this by the tissues lying around in the grass, or in one case by the tissue covering an enormous pile of human poop. I could have lived without the image.
One beautiful scenic drive on the San Bernadino passo in Switzerland had a parking area to stop and view the entire valley and winding road. It was one of the few actual scenic stopping points I’ve seen provided for tourists, with a monument to the road building and some history etc. It also had an outcropping of rocks which I and every other woman in the history of the road used as a bathroom.
This outcropping is out in the weather – snow, ice, sun and arctic gales. And yet it still smelled like a public toilet that has never been cleaned and was littered with tissues and bits of toilet paper. I added my tissue to the pile and tried not to think about what was on the bottom of my shoes when I got back into the car.
Peeing for men is obviously easier and much more accepted in public places. Andrew has had to pee by the side of the road in all of these places as well. The difference is that his imitation of someone just admiring the view is much, much easier to pull off. At least Andrew makes an effort to walk away from the road and be a little more circumspect. I have seen a lot more peeing than I really need to on this trip, since it seems that European men don’t mind just pulling it out and peeing right on the road.
Two incidences of peeing in public come to mind as being pretty special. One was in the U.S.A. a couple of years ago. I walked down into a stand of pine trees hidden from the road but not from the double-decker bus full of tourists that slowly trundled by with a full view of me with my pants around my ankles. Fact is, we hadn’t seen a bloody double-decker bus all day and didn’t see another one the entire trip.
The second was just the other day when we had stopped several times trying to find a spot for me to pee that had some cover and didn’t require me to mountain-goat my way up or down a gorge from the road.
Eventually the need was too urgent and there was nothing but scrub and sheer cliffs either side. So I decided that it was going to have to be just beside the car and sent Andrew off for a walk to have some privacy (whilst peeing on the side of a public road – a little ironic). Now this would have been easier if we were driving a four door car – at least I could have used the space between the two open doors as a privacy screen. Alas we are driving a two door car and that leaves you completely exposed on one side. So I waited until the road was clear and started to pee next to the car. Of course, mid-pee, a pile of cars came around the corner looking straight at me. All I could do was lean my upper body into the car so at least they wouldn’t recognize me in a mug shot. Leaning over then caused a bit of a trajectory problem so I ended up with pee all over my tights. Ho hum. Don’t mind me, I’m just changing my tights and boots on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.
I think the plan is to NOT to wear bright pink tights in these situations, which makes it impossible to hide successfully. Pants are bad because your butt is left completely exposed to the elements and onlookers. You also pee onto the bottom of your pants as they pool around your feet. Recommended peeing-in-public clothing would be a dark skirt of medium length and volume with dark tights. Without tights would be even better if the weather allowed.
The fact is that in Europe, you are supposed to go to a restaurant/café/bar and purchase food and/or drinks then use their bathrooms. However, you may go in and never be able to come out because you can’t find the flusher. They vary from a normal button on top, to a motorcycle throttle that took me 5 minutes to figure out how it worked. They can be a foot pedal on the floor or a sensor on the wall that automatically flushes. These will always not sense you at all unless you jump up and down waving your arms extravagantly or go off whilst you are peeing then refuse to sense you again.
If you are trying to travel on a budget or food ration (for fatties like us who use our trips to trim our waistlines) or you are in an area where such establishments don’t abound (or God forbid close during the three hour siesta), then you’re screwed. If you’re travelling out of season you’re even more screwed because there may be no-one open for four months.
We found that Chef Express service stations along the autobahns have very good and free toilets without a purchase. Also some areas along the pass from Italy to Switzerland had absolutely FANTASTIC toilets. Frequent, clean and set in enormous concrete buildings for protection from below zero temperatures and blizzards. When I noticed these buildings I thought I had finally found another country with civilized standards. Alas it seems they used all of their public convenience budget on this one section of road and we didn’t see another for the whole trip.
PUBLIC TOILETS DO EXIST…
We came across some public toilets in some towns we visited. San Marino has one in the building where the cabine operates. (There wasn’t a sign, but the line of tourists gave it away.) This was not clean, had no soap or paper towel and was not big enough to turn around in but it did have a door that worked. Pompeii and Portofino have paid toilets in tourist areas and free toilets just around the corner. Dozza has a wheelchair accessible toilet with an arrow down two flights of stairs under the restaurants. Not well signed, enormous enough that you couldn’t reach the door that wouldn’t stay closed from the toilet seat, (why is it always the way) with no soap and no paper towel. Orta has public toilets in pretty much every carpark on the way into the beautiful town. San Leo, amazingly, has a reasonable and free public toilet in the carpark at the bottom of the mountain before you walk up to the mountain. Brunico has public toilets at the roundabout end of the Passage (an old town style shopping street tucked back from the main street and a joy to wander through).
There was a set of industrial looking public toilets at the crossing between Italy and Switzerland and again at the tunnel on the Italian side. Andrew tells me that they consisted of a stainless steel urinal with a seat that you could drop down over it and it looked like if you stayed too long the entire booth would self clean with you inside it.
In the South, toilets are a problem but if you do find one, then toilet seats are your other problem.
But Toilet seats don’t exist in the south!
I thought it was just in public toilets – perhaps people steal them? Or it’s easier to clean without them? Or they are cheap and don’t want to fork out whatever the cost is for a plastic toilet seat? It turns out that all toilets have no seats in the South no matter where you are. The villas we stayed in provided seats so I assume that private homes use a seat. All others – both mens’ and womens’ – it’s bare toilet bowl only.
Even in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, one of the most respected galleries in Europe with its fancy marble bathrooms, we were faced with bare toilet bowl only. I thought this was just in the South, but the Palazzo Albergati in Bologna also had just a bare bowl with no seat as did restaurants in Venice.
Obviously no one wants to place their hands on the bare toilet bowl in a public toilet, so all women must wee by supporting themselves with their thighs. Great for the thighs, a bit awkward if you are trying to hold a handbag off the floor at the same time (no hooks in toilets either), and it seems impossible to achieve given the amount of pee on the floor in ladies’ toilets. My question is what happens if you have to have a long sit down? Are they doing their long sit down supporting themselves on their thighs? Are they just not doing their long sit down or do they try to perch on the lip of the bare toilet bowl? Luckily I never had to find out.
