Lightweight, compact and quick-drying.
Before leaving on our 5 year, 50 state road trip, I did some research into travel towels. Those three features were what I was looking for, with quick-drying being the most important one. The last thing we wanted was to have our stuff or our car smelling like mildew.
In the end, we settled on ECOdept Microfiber Towels that we bought on Amazon. Now that we’re more than 6 months into our road trip and have had a chance to use them several times, I thought it’d be worth reviewing them on the blog to share our experience in case they’re something you’d find helpful for your own travels.
A couple of things to note beforehand. First, we don’t write sponsored posts on the blog – here’s why we don’t write them. That means we didn’t get sent these towels as freebies, nor are we being paid by ECOdept for reviewing them – we’ve had zero contact with them. We bought them with our own money and are reviewing them because they’ve proven to be a great product.
This post does have links to the product on Amazon though. If you click one of our links and buy the towel – or anything else – on Amazon, we get paid a small percentage of the transaction by Amazon. It doesn’t cost you anything extra, but it helps support our road trip. We’re on a limited budget, so every cent helps – check out our monthly stats to find out more about how much we spend each month.
We ordered the towels back in November 2017 and I didn’t think to take photos of them in their packaging at the time, so the photo above shows how they’ll be sent to you.
Actually, that’s not strictly true. They won’t send you a box, a bag and two towels all separate to each other. The towels come in the bag which comes in the box…you know what I mean. n.b. the bag it arrives in is waterproof, so a wet towel can be placed inside without getting anything else in your suitcase wet, so don’t throw it away if that’s something that’d be useful for you. We got rid of our bags though as we carry ours in something else – read on for more about that.
We ordered two sets of towels – one for me and one for Shae. To ensure we knew whose was whose, she got the green set and I got the blue.
The first thing I’d noticed when unpacking them was the material. It felt like chamois, so I was a little curious what it’d be like drying with it. It’s one thing to use chamois on a car window, it’s another to dry off your body with it. Don’t worry, I won’t include a photo of me using it the first time 😉
To be honest, it felt a little weird. When you’re used to drying yourself with plush cotton towels, using a towel made of 80% polyester and 20% polyamide is a whole other sensation. It’s not a bad sensation, it’s just…weird. You also have to pat yourself dry with the towel rather than wiping it over your body like a regular towel.
Ultimately though, we didn’t buy our ECOdept Microfiber Towels for a luxurious post-shower experience. We didn’t even buy them to use after having a shower at all. We live in hotels and Airbnbs, so those always have towels to use. Instead, we got them for using as beach towels. For drying ourselves off after going in rivers or waterfalls. For if we get caught out in the rain on a hike.
In all those scenarios, the most important factor was for them to be quick-drying. How quick-drying? I’d love to say I’d done some kind of scientific tests, but alas not. What I can say is that even when you’ve dried yourself off, the towel doesn’t feel particularly damp. It does also dry quickly, but the length of time varies depending on quite how wet it gets. It’s certainly quicker than a bath towel though.
One helpful feature of the towels is that they come with snap tags. These can dangle over hooks in a bathroom if you’re using them as a standard towel. If you’re using them when hiking, you can use the snap tags to attach them to the top of your backpack so they dry quickly while hiking along.
As you might notice from the above photo, our dog Truffles decided to photobomb the picture. You might also notice that the bottom inch or two of the towels are touching the floor. I’m 5’9″, so you might need to be a little taller to ensure they don’t drag on the ground behind you. Alternatively, you could attach them to your backpack by using the corner of the towel to tie a knot, thereby reducing its length by a few inches.
An added benefit of drying your towels in this way while hiking is that you can pretend you’re a superhero with a cape. Or two capes.
I mentioned earlier that we use our ECOdept Microfiber Travel Towels as beach towels. This isn’t their ideal use as they’re not as big as many beach towels. The Amazon listing for the towels says they’re 52″ x 32″, but ours are 51″ x 31″. I didn’t measure them when we first got them, so they might’ve just shrunk an inch in the wash.
Here’s what it looks like with me laying on one. As always, Truffles wanted to be the star of the show.
As you can see, the very top of my head and my legs below the knee aren’t on the towel, so you’d need to lay in the fetal position on the beach if you didn’t want any part of you in the sand. Given that regular beach towels would take up far more space when packed up, I’m happy to make that sacrifice.
This large towel isn’t all you get though. Each package also comes with a smaller hand towel that measures 23″ x 14″. The Amazon listing has it as 24″ x 15″ so again, ours might’ve shrunk an inch in the wash. We’ve rarely needed to use the small towels, but I imagine they’d be helpful if you take them camping or something like that. The small towels also come with the snap tags to make them easier to hang up and dry.
Even though I gave the measurements above, the soda can’s included in the photo to give an idea of quite how big the hand towels are.
One of the things I love most about these towels though is how compact they are. Not only is that helpful when it comes to not taking up space in the car, it’s even more helpful when it comes to not taking up much space in a backpack when hiking.
If you’re wondering quite how compact the towels can be, here’s how compact. We have one of the small eBags Ultralight Packing Cubes you can find in this set. By folding them in the right way, we can fit all four of our towels inside one packing cube – two large towels and two hand towels. With all four towels in there, the packing cube measures 7.5″ x 6″ x 4″.
To help you picture how compact that is, I folded up a bath towel from the Airbnb we’re currently staying at. The bath towel measures 48″ x 27″, so it’s smaller than the large travel towels which are 51″ x 31″.
The bath towel isn’t even particularly plush, yet folded up it’s still longer, wider and higher than four of the ECOdept Microfiber Travel Towels in one packing cube.
In case it helps you visualize it better, here’s the packing cube full of towels next to a can of soda.
Like I said, fitting four towels inside one small packing cube is pretty compact.
If there’s only one of you though and you don’t need the hand towel, the larger towel can be folded up and slid inside the pocket of a pair of cargo shorts or cargo pants.
In the above photo, I left the button undone to show that the towel was inside – the button could easily be done up.
The towels also doesn’t weigh very much. We don’t have scales in our portable kitchen and there’s not a set in the Airbnb we’re staying in, so I can’t give a definite weight. However, it weighs less than a can of soup, so it doesn’t weigh down a hiking backpack or beach bag.
All in all, we’re very pleased with our ECODept Microfiber Travel Towels. If we lived in a house or apartment, I definitely wouldn’t use them to dry off after showering. However, to dry yourself off at the beach, at a waterfall, when tubing, hiking, camping, etc., they’re a worthwhile investment. Having quick-drying towels that can fit in your pocket makes traveling much easier.
Pros
- Quick-drying
- Compact – can fit inside large pockets
- Lightweight
- Has snap tags for easier drying
- Comes with large towel and hand towel
- Machine washable
Cons
- Not as big as a beach towel
- Feels a little weird drying yourself with it for the first few times
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