Raven’s RV
The ongoing education and adventures of two rank newbie RVers

I was the first to “christen” the toilet. It does not work like any other toilet I’ve ever known.

Campgrounds have hookups, i.e. you can have running water, sewer and electricity (and sometimes even a phone line) hooked into your RV. If you dry-camp, such as we are doing at “Camp Wal-Mart,” you’re dependent on the RV’s own systems: battery, generator and propane. Since our house battery leaves something to be desired, such simple issues as running water and toilet flushing are a matter of conservation and care.

Here’s what’s involved in going to the loo.

First we need to turn on the water pump, which is operated from a switch on the stove fan. If your batteries are not charged or it’s too late to use the (loud!) generator, you are kind of out of luck and have to flush with The Manual System (cue dramatic horror movie music).

Assuming for a moment that there is enough electrical power to drive the water pump, you switch it on and then go to the loo where you step on the small pedal to pump a tiny bit of water into the bowl. Then you do what you must and use the large pedal to open a gaping chasm into the “holding tank,” a collection of nasty material situated directly beneath your vulnerables.

RVs have three main tanks: one for “fresh” water (the kind you’d cook with or wash dishes with, say); one for gray water (the run-off from your showers, washed dishes, etc.) and one for Black Water, and I really don’t have to explain that, do I? Without a suitable layer of water and chemicals, you just don’t want to be depositing any “solids” into that third tank, and ours was pretty empty. Also, before preparing to do such a nefarious bodily function, I’m informed that it’s smart to lay down a cross of toilet paper to “catch” the deposit before it is “flushed.”

Taking these two precautions, I am told, will prevent nasty things from sticking to the holding tank, things which cannot simply be pumped away a at the appropriately named dump station but must be “manually” dislodged.

Oh, and if you don’t have running water, the “Manual System” consists of dumping a cup or more of water down the loo as you create the material-swallowing chasm into the black water tank.

There, aren’t you happy that I posted about this?

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