Joolca HOTTAP Go Review: The Most Portable Camp Shower for Dirty Adventures

I used to believe that few cases make a portable outdoor shower worth the effort. A tepid rinse is hardly a fair trade for hauling the extra weight around (plus the water) and setting the thing up. But after just one day of living in my pop-up camper and volunteering with the Forest Service in Bears Ears National Monument, I changed my tune.

Long, ash-covered days spent hiking through burn scars and the frequency of slimy mud following daily monsoons had me more than grateful for an easy hot shower. I've tested all of the best-known camping showers for Field Mag, but the Joolca HOTTAP Go is the simplest and most streamlined portable shower I’ve used, making it easy to get clean outdoors at the end of a 10-hour day.

Read on for my full, in-depth review of the Joolca HOTTAP Go.

Design

Joolca makes two showers, the original HOTTAP and the HOTTAP Go. I tested the regular HOTTAP a few years ago and loved the quick hot water, but I found the setup was a little bulky for most of my camping and road trips, and the whole system is more analog.

The new Joolca HOTTAP Go is much more portable and streamlined to use. The HOTTAP Go is essentially a self-contained propane water heater built around a 12-liter tank. That means it doesn’t require a separate water vessel. It includes a showerhead, hose, and gas line; you have to purchase the external battery pack separately, or you can connect it to a 12V power source at a campsite or in your adventure rig (it does include a car connector). When it's all packed up, everything fits neatly inside the case, which was a huge perk when car camping in my two-seat pickup truck with a tiny camper.

On my first outing with the HOTTAP GO during a trip to Bears Ears, I was lucky to have a water spigot near my campsite, so I filled the tank from the spigot when I got back from volunteering each evening. Though I didn’t need to use this feature in the desert, the HOTTAP Go does have a two-stage water filter inside the tank, so you can pour in water from unfiltered sources like creeks without worrying about clogs or damage.

Setup

Joolca has made setup so simple that I barely had to consult the instructions the first time I set up the HOTTAP Go.

To use it, you fill the water tank, connect the gas hose to a one-pound propane canister, hook up the showerhead line, and plug the unit into your 12V source. I ran mine off JOOLCA’s external battery pack—which is roughly the size of a water bottle and sold separately for $165—that magnetically attaches to the unit's side. Once everything is connected, you set your target temperature on the display, press the red button, and the portable shower gets to work heating and recirculating the water in the tank. The original Joolca HOTTAP is nowhere near this intuitive—that makes this a big upgrade in a smaller package.

Pressing the blue button and turning on the showerhead gets things going. Joolca says the 12-liter tank has enough capacity for two showers or one luxurious shower, but even on my less grimy days, I found it to be a very quick shower. It was certainly more luxurious than soaping up before stepping into the water like you have to do with other camp showers, but I'd say it's debatable whether two people can really each get a shower out of it.

Heat & Water Pressure

Depending on the water temperature setting, the HOTTAP Go generally took five to 10 minutes to reach the desired warmth. I set mine to 111 degrees Fahrenheit, though individual comfort levels will vary. The display gives a clear readout in both Celsius and Fahrenheit and beeps when it hits the target, so there's no guesswork or wasted water standing there with your hand under the stream trying to decide if it's warm enough yet.

The water flow on the HOTTAP Go is pretty much as expected. As in, it’s not as strong as a house shower but blows away the majority of camp showers. I do think it’s actually weaker than the roof-mounted showers from Yakima and Waterport, and it won’t be as effective for cleaning off bikes and other gear. It was strong enough to rinse away surface ash and mud without much trouble, but caked dirt requires some scrubbing.

The showerhead has a flow adjustment built in, along with a magnetic base that sticks to the side of the unit or to any nearby metal surface. It didn’t stick to my camper, unfortunately, but I was able to stick it onto my truck at an angle so that I could go hands-free and stand underneath. It's a small feature, but it made showering outside a little more streamlined.

Durability

Because it’s such an expensive piece of gear at $599, I babied the HOTTAP Go. It bounced around in the back seat of my truck on rough roads, but overall my unit hasn't seen too much abuse. Some days the wind was so strong it blew dust and water from the showerhead onto the unit, but never enough to cause issues inside. The instructions note that it should not be left in the rain, which is expected of anything electronic.

I was a little more cavalier with the hoses and showerheads, often throwing them in the dirt in my rush to get a shower in before dark. Luckily, I never had any issues with the connections. While it seemed durable enough for easy camping, I personally would not push anything electronic in truly gnarly conditions. I think it’s an awesome unit for many different types of trips, but for my warm, windy, and sandy trips to Baja, I’ll probably stick with the simplicity of a Flextail.

Testing Impressions & Things to Improve

Overall, I loved the HOTTAP Go. The water was instantly warm. It’s incredibly intuitive to use, and it got me showered in 10 to 15 minutes, from setup to cleanup. One of my coworkers even offered to let me shower at the USFS bunkhouse, and I never took her up on it because the HOTTAP Go is so nice to use.

If I have a complaint, it's the same one most people will have before they try it: the price. This is not a cheap piece of gear, and if you only camp a handful of weekends a year, it's hard to justify over other options. If price wasn’t a consideration, I think anyone would love the HOTTAP Go. Talking realistically, I think it makes the most sense for those who are on the move and don’t have time to set up a solar shower or heat water separately, and people who spend extended amounts of time camping in a vehicle.

There are a few things that I think would improve the experience for the more dirtbag-inclined, like myself. One thing I’d love to see is a watertight lid on the tank. Camping in the desert—and in many backcountry places—requires strict water rationing. For primitive camping, I'd prefer to fill it from a nearby water source rather than use my limited supply I've collected and brought to camp. The hoses and other parts that are typically stored in the tank would have to go elsewhere during transportation, but the ability to minimize water waste would be worth it.

Also, the hose isn’t compatible with larger propane tanks; little green cans only. Serious campers who go on long trips are likely to have a full five-pound propane tank, so an adaptable hose would be handy. Adapters exist, but the instructions explicitly warn not to use them. I also think it would be nice if the shower just came with the battery pack rather than being sold separately. I prefer the flexibility of moving the shower wherever I want rather than being tied to the car. But for what it’s worth, the Joolca battery is a solid investment—I barely had to charge it the entire time I used it, and a single shower has a negligible effect on its power.

The Bottom Line

After a week of fire scars, mud, and monsoon storms, the HOTTAP GO earned its spot in my truck bed. It heated fast; held pressure well enough to clean off sweat, ash, and mud; and packed down small enough to fit behind my seat. It's not totally without fault, but my critiques are pretty minimal. For anyone doing dirty work far from a shower, whether that is fieldwork, overlanding, or just a long stretch of primitive camping, it's hard to find a real fault with what the HOTTAP Go delivers.

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