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Laundry while travelling - Portable drying rack?

Laundry while travelling - Portable drying rack?

Old Aug 9, 2015, 5:29 pm
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Question Laundry while travelling - Portable drying rack?

Greetings all!

As I'm getting ready to plan a trip, I'm trying to think of ways to reduce clothing and such and was thinking that if able to do laundry that, it's an easy way to reduce the amount of things I'd have to bring.

I'm sure like most people here, no one wants to sit at a laundromat waiting for something to wash AND dry. Now short of paying a hotel to do it for me (which means it'll quickly eat up my budget money) there are few options a traveller has. Especially if it's something like a food stain.

Now I'm thinking washing can be done in a sink easily enough, but what about drying? Depending on the chair you can really only hang up an item or 2, short of socks and undies.

Anyways, I'm wondering if anyone has any suggestions for a portable drying rack? My thought would be to wash something and then leave it drying overnight and on the next day while I'm out exploring the city, but am not having much luck finding anything!

Thanks in advance!
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 5:52 pm
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Ok, I don't have advice on the drying rack but....Where in this world are you travelling to? Asia has some very good deals on laundry services.

I cleaned stuff in the sink all the time and used a towel rack or the shower rack (if available) for drying. Usually for t-shirts I would use hangers. Even in the hostels I've stayed at there are usually a couple of hangers available.

One tip is to take a towel and roll up your laundry individually and ring out as much water as you can before hanging. I found this absorbed a bit more water than just doing it by hand!
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 6:03 pm
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Originally Posted by radnub
Ok, I don't have advice on the drying rack but....Where in this world are you travelling to? Asia has some very good deals on laundry services.

I cleaned stuff in the sink all the time and used a towel rack or the shower rack (if available) for drying. Usually for t-shirts I would use hangers. Even in the hostels I've stayed at there are usually a couple of hangers available.

One tip is to take a towel and roll up your laundry individually and ring out as much water as you can before hanging. I found this absorbed a bit more water than just doing it by hand!
Europe!
Just was thinking of future travel and how it would be convenient to possibly have a portable drying rack of sorts.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 6:10 pm
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Laundry while travelling - Portable drying rack?

Just spent three months in Europe and the airbnb properties had a clothes horse (as a few called it) to dry clothes. The few wash/dry locations I found in Spain and Florence were quick and not too expensive - I quickly passed the time on Twitter chats and researching dinner options while many shops were closed for siesta .
In a hotel request more hangers and turn the heated towel rack on
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 6:22 pm
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Hmm....any foldable rack could take up a lot of space but if you could figure out a way to secure a clothes line in your room that could work (and it's more compact).

I shudder to think the costs of laundry service in Europe. Sorry I couldn't be of more help. Good luck and enjoy your trip!
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 6:23 pm
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For underwear and socks, agree with the towel rack and heated towel rack (just wash them out in the sink every night or every other night, then let them dry on the rack). I use the shampoo provided by the hotel to do the laundry (one less thing to pack).

Items like jeans, slacks, sweaters, and skirts are carefully chosen and made of materials that don't absorb odors, and therefore don't require washing that often. When they do I bite the bullet and send them to the hotel laundering service at a trusted hotel.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 6:42 pm
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Cool

http://www.rei.com/product/804639/rei-clothesline

Just get one of these.

Where are you traveling? Many mid-range US hotels have washers/dryers. La Quinta very often has them. So do Motel 6, but I doubt you want to go that direction.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 7:16 pm
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Don't a lot of baths have the hanging rail thing attached to the wall you can just pull out.

I've hung things with pegs on clothes hangers. I don't take powder washing powder (it looks like other banned stuff) but I take a liquid in a small bottle.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 7:28 pm
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Laundry while travelling - Portable drying rack?

Why not a small ball of string and construct your own at each location. It could be some fun engineering! No need for clothes pins, probably.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 8:01 pm
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Originally Posted by radnub

I cleaned stuff in the sink all the time and used a towel rack or the shower rack (if available) for drying. Usually for t-shirts I would use hangers. Even in the hostels I've stayed at there are usually a couple of hangers available.

One tip is to take a towel and roll up your laundry individually and ring out as much water as you can before hanging. I found this absorbed a bit more water than just doing it by hand!
All good tips that I've used too! And if the room has some of those pants hangers with the clips, those are handy for not only pants but anything else oddly sized that wouldn't do on regular hangers. The portable clothesline or your own string work too.

Packing items that dry quicker helps a lot. If I have an item that needs more drying time (or I'm pressed for time), judicious use of an iron sort of helps to "steam out" some excess water to decrease hang drying times.

I've actually had fairly good luck finding good hotels with guest coin laundries inside. I couldn't quote the exact prices offhand but, I can't say the prices were anything more than the "chump change" range per load. Might check around your destinations to see.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 8:42 pm
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agree

I do this all the time the towel trick helps. also you can get some camping underwear which will dry in about 4 hours
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 9:50 pm
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I travel with mostly polyester or poly blend clothing and use this clothesline:

Amazon Amazon

Most things are dry by the next morning or the next afternoon at the latest. I just make it part of my nightly routine. You can travel incredibly light if you follow this strategy.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 10:03 pm
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As a lot of the discussion suggests different travel products, let's move this to the Travel Products forum for more discussion. Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 10:32 pm
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Extended stay hotels tend to have coin operated washers and dryers on site.

Travel/luggage stores used to sell some gadget that was a clothes line with suction cups on each end so that it could be temporarily installed in hotel bathrooms, for instance over the bathtub if there's no pull out retractible clothes line.

I some times travel with a couple plastic coated wire hangers and some plastic over the shower curtain rail clip handers. If there's no shower curtain rod or other suitable high place from which to hang wet laundry, one can bend the hanger to rig a solution in many bathrooms. For instance, you can bend the top to make it fit flightily over a shower head and also bend the bottom up so than a pair of the clip hangers stay at ench end, suitably separated and high enough for long items to dry properly.

If something is still damp when needed, using the hair dryer on it is a quick and easy solution.
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Old Aug 9, 2015, 11:01 pm
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Availability of laundry facilities seems to vary from country to country.

In Japan, the chain budget hotels have onsite coin laundries for guests, and the Tokyu Stay apartment hotels have washer-driers in the rooms. Locals can also guide you to neighborhood laundromats.

Laundromats in the UK and Scandinavia were scarce and expensive, although I did have the unique experience of having the Zimbabwe women's BMX team help me figure out how to use the machines in Copenhagen (the world BMX championships were being held there). Interestingly enough, the otherwise expensive Hurtigrute ship in Norway had a reasonable laundry room that was available to guests.

Depending on the length of your stay, you may just want to take enough clothes to last. I once went on a 10-day group tour to a music festival in Europe, and one mother and daughter, who would be going home immediately afterwards, just packed ten days worth of clothes.

In the U.S., laundromats are relatively easy to find in large cities.
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