Backpacking is all about simplicity: Living life with everything you need on your back, focusing only on the basic necessities of life, moving from place to place, acquiring water to sustain life, setting up a temporary home, eating and, of course, peeing and pooping. In the civilized world, pooping is a quick process that is done without thought while reading a magazine. In the woods, however, it takes on new importance.

I dropped trou and was just getting down to business when a young woman popped around the corner about 3 feet away.

For me, pooping in the woods begins with picking up the neon-orange plastic shovel and toilet paper and setting out from camp. The shovel has two purposes. First, of course, you use it to dig a hole for your dung drop. The second is equally important, to warn other campers in the area: “Whoa, stay away from the shovel or you will see something that you don’t want to see.”

Read Tim’s story on following the Leave No Trace principles

The next step in the process is finding the perfect place to lay a deuce. Some folks are so uncouth as to just take a few steps from the tent and start shoveling. How lame. For me, it takes a good bit of exploration to locate the perfect spot because there are quite a few requirements that must be met. First is privacy. Second is follow the Leave No Trace principles, which means be at least 200 feet from water and carry out your toilet paper. Then it’s important to find a smooth rock behind the dumping zone on which to lean. As a guy who was never a baseball catcher, I don’t have a lot of experience holding a squat for a long period of time, so I need something to lean on.

Next find dirt that is soft enough to dig down 6 inches; it must be real dirt, not a thick pile of pine-needle duff, which will not allow a successful recovering of the doo-doo. Often rocks or roots can make your chosen site impossible to dig into and this can really be an issue if you wait until the last possible moment to take your scat stroll.

Once you have all of these necessary requirements in hand, the pièce de resistance is a nice view and sunshine adorning your throne. Just make sure that the tent across the lake from you does not contain a person with binoculars who loves surveying his or her surroundings. Sometimes finding just the right spot can be a true highlight of your backpacking trip.

While I consider myself an aficionado of wilderness excrement evacuation, I’ve certainly had my share of challenges over the years. I remember one early morning near busy Showers Lake on the Tahoe Rim Trail/Pacific Crest Trail. There were lots of folks around, but I thought I’d located just the right spot in between two boulders. I dropped trou and was just getting down to business when a young woman popped around the corner about 3 feet away and nearly knocked me over before gruffly apologizing and slowly backing away.

While life in the wilderness is simpler, without the benefits of civilization those few things that have to be done become complicated. At home, you turn up a lever and water pours out. In the woods, you have to put in the time-consuming process of slowly filtering your water supply. You have to set up a tent, fill up an air mattress and in the morning wander around in the woods attempting to discover the perfect place in which to add your personal DNA to the forest floor. It’s all part of the process of slowing down and focusing on the real basics of life.

Carry out the TP
Wait, did I say you have to carry out the toilet paper? Yes, please. Anyone who has backpacked around Tahoe recently has most likely experienced the less than wholesome sight of toilet-paper flags popping out from under rocks or just flying in the breeze in the wilderness. Yeck.

All you need to pack out your used toilet paper (and feminine care items) is a small plastic bag and a large plastic bag. Put a teaspoon of powdered bleach or baking soda in the small bag. Fold up and place your used toilet paper in that bag. Seal it and then put it in the big bag. Seal that and you are done.