Algonquin Adventures / What do you call it? Thunder Box? Outhouse? Sh**ter? Kaibo?

**Posted by CanoeClaire** 8/13/2018 1:57 pm

Weirdly, one of my favourite things about Algonquin is that the sites have Thunder boxes.

Having camped in US parks that typically have nothing in the backcountry and having just recently hiked the Juan de Fuca trail which features fully enclosed pit toilets (I actually saw a rat at the bottom of one ), Algonquin's thunder boxes are the unsung heroes on the campsites.

But, I'm curious, what do you call them?

I've always called them Thunder Boxes but I just recently camped with someone who calls them Kaibos (spelling?) and says he learned the name at Camp Ahmek as a kid. Any other names out there I don't know?

**Posted by AlgonquinLakes** 8/13/2018 3:26 pm

Ha, I worked at Ahmek for a few years so I too call them kybo (keep your bowels open) or thunderbox interchangeably. Either way, they’re awesome.

**Posted by trippythings** 8/13/2018 4:44 pm

Went to an overnight camp growing up and kybo was the common term. Only ever heard of thunder box when I started camping on my own outside of that camp. I’ve stuck with thunder box though. There’s also privy which you didn’t list

**Posted by Lofty** 8/13/2018 6:25 pm

I use a few names depending on where or who I'm with
Kaibo is for summer camp / scouts
Thunderbox is backcountry camping
Outhouse is at the cottage
And the S***er is a gas station

**Posted by Marko_Mrko** 8/13/2018 7:47 pm

Personally I'd favour "Destroylet". It's particularly appropriate when it falls apart on you... Happened to a friend... The first and only time I saw this was north of APP, by Mattawa.

**Posted by ReadyIn-10** 8/14/2018 8:42 am

It's a kybo at camp and a treasure chest in the backcountry.

**Posted by RCSpartan** 8/14/2018 10:22 am

My group has always gone with the term 'Boombox'

**Posted by scoutergriz** 8/15/2018 6:54 am

I've also known it as the boom box! When I was a kid in the sixties, my dad said it was because of the sound you hear across the water when someone drops the lid

**Posted by RCSpartan** 8/15/2018 9:42 am

@scoutergriz, Yes, that along with another booming sound that may be heard while in use...

**Posted by DanPM** 8/15/2018 8:52 pm

I call it a thunderbox, occasionally latrine. On my last canoe trip in the park about 3 weeks ago we started calling it a DropBox with lots of euphemisms about file transfer and file cleanup.

To me an "outhouse" implies an enclosed structure. At the summer camp I went to as a kid they used the term kybo for what they had at camp; these were outhouses.

**Posted by APPaul** 8/16/2018 6:17 am

Thunder Box
Boom Boom Box or Boom Box
Groover

Over a long trip we start making up other silly names, but those are the one's we use most.

**Posted by Peek** 8/16/2018 11:57 am

In my group, we like to call it the Scatbox - and it's sort of a weird tradition, but we kind of bee-bop, snap and scat while walking the trail to the scatbox (picture the bathroom scene from The Cable Guy and it's a lot more funny (to us at least)). We're a bit off, what can I say.

Last edited by Peek (8/16/2018 11:58 am)

**Posted by PaPaddler** 8/16/2018 2:09 pm

Thunderbox, usually.

My story around them is that I was planning a trip with my brother-in-law years ago and he alerted me that he has a shy bladder and was somewhat concerned about going in the woods. I did my best to put his mind at ease but it ultimately would come down to trying it out for himself to see. That trip went well and after subsequent trips he actually developed an affinity for using "the largest bathroom in the world" with excellent views. It got to the point that when we inspect campsites for the night, the final straw after looking at layout, landing, views, tent/hammock options, etc. is an inspection of the thunderbox location and setting. As long as you're not bothered by bugs, it can be a wonderful part of a trip, oddly enough.

Cutest story, though, was when tripping with my wife and selecting an island on Burntroot Lake; she was happy because it would limit the risk of bears...until I showed her the pile of bear scat on the trail to the thunderbox. In spite of that, we slept soundly that night, undisturbed.

**Posted by vanslyke** 8/19/2018 6:28 am

Kaibo.
When I was a kid at camp that's what we all called it.
Now my buddies and I call em that when camping.

Last edited by vanslyke (8/19/2018 6:29 am)

**Posted by Ron S** 2/23/2020 11:22 am

Kaibo...or "the shitter"

**Posted by MooseWhizzer Dave** 2/24/2020 10:18 am

I generally go with thunderbox, but there are some names that I've wanted to use for for some reason haven't. My two favorites of that category are "mailbox" (I'm going to go post a letter!) and "safe deposit box". In high school my girlfriend's family had a cottage way up past North Bay somewhere, and had to deal with their own...leavings. So when they had to boat the stuff out in whatever gross container they used, they called it a "honey run". Not really a thunderbox euphemism there, but I always liked the image of them wrangling some heavy, nasty container of yuck off their island, onto a boat, and off to wherever that stuff was dealt with.

**Posted by CanoeClaire** 2/24/2020 2:32 pm

Honey Run makes perfect sense. A manure wagon on the farm is called a Honey Wagon.

MooseWhizzer Dave wrote:
I generally go with thunderbox, but there are some names that I've wanted to use for for some reason haven't. My two favorites of that category are "mailbox" (I'm going to go post a letter!) and "safe deposit box". In high school my girlfriend's family had a cottage way up past North Bay somewhere, and had to deal with their own...leavings. So when they had to boat the stuff out in whatever gross container they used, they called it a "honey run". Not really a thunderbox euphemism there, but I always liked the image of them wrangling some heavy, nasty container of yuck off their island, onto a boat, and off to wherever that stuff was dealt with.