A bunkhouse is a

barracks Barracks are usually a group of long buildings built to house military personnel or laborers. The English word originates from the 17th century via French and Italian from an old Spanish word "barraca" ("soldier's tent"), but today barracks are u ...

-like building that historically was used to house working

cowboy A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the '' vaquer ...

s on

ranch A ranch (from es, rancho/Mexican Spanish) is an area of land, including various structures, given primarily to ranching, the practice of raising grazing livestock such as cattle and sheep. It is a subtype of a farm. These terms are most often ...

es, or

loggers Lumberjacks are mostly North American workers in the logging industry who perform the initial harvesting and transport of trees for ultimate processing into forest products. The term usually refers to loggers in the era (before 1945 in the Unite ...

in a

logging camp A logging camp (or lumber camp) is a transitory work site used in the logging industry. Before the second half of the 20th century, these camps were the primary place where lumberjacks would live and work to fell trees in a particular area. Many ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

. As most cowboys were young single men, the standard bunkhouse was a large open room with narrow beds or cots for each individual and little privacy. The bunkhouse of the late 19th century was usually heated by a wood stove and personal needs were attended to in a

cookhouse A cookhouse is a small building where cooking takes place. Often found at remote work camps, they complemented the bunkhouse and were usually found on ranches that employed cowboys, or loggers in a logging camp. Prior to the 20th century, cookho ...

and an

outhouse An outhouse is a small structure, separate from a main building, which covers a toilet. This is typically either a pit latrine or a bucket toilet, but other forms of dry toilet, dry (non-flushing) toilets may be encountered. The term may als ...

Background

While the modern bunkhouse today is still in existence on some large ranches that are too far away from towns for an easy daily commute, it now has electricity,

central heating A central heating system provides warmth to a number of spaces within a building from one main source of heat. It is a component of heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (short: HVAC) systems, which can both cool and warm interior spaces. ...

and modern

indoor plumbing Tap water (also known as faucet water, running water, or municipal water) is water supplied through a Tap (valve), tap, a water dispenser valve. In many countries, tap water usually has the quality of drinking water. Tap water is commonly used fo ...

. In the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

, a bunkhouse provides accommodation with fewer facilities than a larger, staffed

youth hostel A hostel is a form of low-cost, short-term shared sociable lodging where guests can rent a bed, usually a bunk bed in a dormitory, with shared use of a lounge and sometimes a kitchen. Rooms can be mixed or single-sex and have private or shared ba ...

. Bunkhouses are found in mountainous areas, such as the

Scottish Highlands The Highlands ( sco, the Hielands; gd, a’ Ghàidhealtachd , 'the place of the Gaels') is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Sco ...

, as well as rural areas in England and Wales, for example at

All Stretton All Stretton is a village and a now separate civil parish in Shropshire, England. Much of it is covered by a Conservation Area. Geography All Stretton lies about a mile to the north of the market town of Church Stretton, on the old Shrewsbury ...

. Bunkhouses are very different from hotels: bunkhouses often just offer a basic accommodation with few amenities for passers-by such as hikers.

References

External links

* Hostels Adventure travel Backpacking Hotel types {{struct-type-stub

Background

See also

References

External links