Showers, laundry and staying human for two weeks

Hot water gets scarcer and more expensive the higher you go, and stops entirely near the top. What actually works.

By Sabina Adhikari · 5 min read · Updated 1 August 2026

Nobody puts this in a brochure and everybody asks about it, usually a day or two before they fly.

The honest summary: you will be less clean than at home, it matters less than you expect, and there are three or four things that make the difference between grubby and genuinely uncomfortable. Here is how it actually works on a teahouse trek.

Showers, by altitude

Low down, hot showers are widely available and cost a few hundred rupees. Gas-heated ones are properly hot; solar ones depend entirely on whether the sun was out, so shower in the late afternoon rather than the evening.

Higher up they get more expensive and less reliable, and at the top of most routes they become a bucket of warm water if they exist at all. At Annapurna Base Camp and Machhapuchhre Base Camp, assume nothing. The pattern most people settle into is a proper shower every three or four days at the lower stops and a wash from a bowl otherwise. By day four almost nobody is bothered by this, which surprises people more than anything else on this page.

The three things that actually help

Wet wipes, or a small flannel and a bowl of hot water bought from the kitchen for a few rupees. A face, hands, armpits and feet wash before dinner is ninety per cent of feeling human and takes four minutes.

Clean socks daily, or as close as you can manage. Feet are the part that matters — for comfort, for smell and for blisters. Everything else can wait.

Dry shampoo, which weighs nothing and buys several days.

Laundry

At lower altitudes lodges will wash clothes for a modest charge, and things dry. Above about 3,000 m in autumn or winter, nothing dries overnight — hanging a wet shirt in an unheated room at altitude simply produces a cold wet shirt in the morning.

So the working system is: wash lightly and often at low altitude on the way in, wear the same two shirts up high, and stop worrying about it.

Merino base layers earn their price here; they can be worn for days without becoming unpleasant in a way cotton cannot.

Toilets

A mix of western and squat, more squat the higher you go. Bring your own paper — it is not provided anywhere and is sold at rising prices as you climb.

Hand sanitiser matters more than anything else in this article. Stomach illness is the most common thing that ends a trek early, and it is overwhelmingly transmitted by hands rather than by food. Toilet paper does not decompose at altitude. Bag it and carry it down to a village with proper disposal rather than leaving it behind a rock — it is the most visible problem on the busy trails.

Coming back down

Leave a clean set of clothes in your suitcase in Pokhara. Arriving back and putting on something that has not been in a duffel for two weeks is a small and disproportionate pleasure.

Lakeside has plenty of laundry services that turn a trek's worth of clothes around in a day for very little.

And the first hot shower after a fortnight is, according to a great many of our clients, among the better showers of their lives.

Walk it with us

Private departures on your dates, guided by the people who wrote this page.

Trekking Gear RentalRent by the dayFrom Rs 300 per item / day · See dates →Annapurna Base Camp7 days · 4,130 mRs 100,400 · See dates →Permits & TIMS ServiceSame-day serviceFrom Rs 700 service fee · See dates →

Questions we get asked

How often can I shower on a two-week trek?

Realistically every three or four days at the lower lodges, and not at all for the top few days of most routes. Plan for that and it is fine.

Should I bring a travel towel?

A small microfibre one, yes. Lodges do not provide towels and a full-size one is weight you will resent.

Can I charge an electric toothbrush or shaver?

Charging is per device per hour and expensive high up. Bring the manual version and save the power for your phone and camera.

What about periods on trek?

Bring everything you need from home — supplies are limited above the road head and unpredictable. Pack out all waste in a sealed bag; nothing decomposes at altitude. Tell your guide if you want lodges chosen with a private bathroom where that is possible.