A friend and I were riding through Wales on bikes. It had been many days since we had had access to a shower (we were mainly sleeping in sheep pastures, and even the sheep seemed a bit put off by this point). We decided that at the next town, we’d ask around at houses and see if maybe we could pay a pound or two to get a shower. That’s just how desperate we were.
The first guy we asked told us we should just go shower at “the pit”. We had no idea what he meant, but he explained that everyone in the town worked at the local coal mine, the pit, and that we could probably ask to take a shower there.
We eventually found the pit, and went into what seemed like the main entrance. This put us in the mine’s clinic, and we were met by the medic. He was fascinated by what we were doing (riding across Europe) and pointed us toward the showers. They were, as you can imagine, just rows of shower heads in a big tiled room. We tried to look as much as possible like we belonged there, so we wouldn’t end up having a conversation au naturel with a bunch of Welsh coal miners.
On our way out, the medic was so anxious to send us on our way with his blessing that he looked around desperately for something to give us. He ended up plunging his hand into a box and giving us a fistful of BandAids.