Sleep.
The last
installment of my gear guide, just in time for the holidays. Happy
hunting!
Part 3: Odds and Ends
Water Purifying-
21st Century-Style
Oh my goodness I
have spent a lot of time crouched at the edge of a stream pumping
water through a filter. Hours. Maybe even days. Really, a lot of
time. I have also drank more than my fair share of iodized water,
often only sort of improved by the addition of vitamin C or powdered
sports drink and patiently boiled water each evening for use the
following day. I have too, foolishly, and not since my youth, drank
directly from all kinds of streams. Clean drinking water can be a
pain in the butt, regardless of how important it may be. That's just
how it is, a chore's a chore.
Unless, like me,
you have been out of the loop for a while. I have grown so used to
filtering when touring that it never occurred to me to look for an
alternative. Apparently, I haven't checked for about 15 years. And
twelve years ago, a product called Steripen hit the market. It uses
ultra violet light to sterilize water. It's small, lightweight, and
incredibly fast and easy. Press the button, stick in water, wait
briefly. Amazing. I really wish that this had been around for field
work in Mexico.
The irony of a
product like this is that there's no real way to prove how well it
works other than by the evidence of your own body. So far, so good.
But Steripen has a good reputation among long-distance tourers and
thru hikers and has been around long enough to prove that it works,
its really pretty great. I have heard from some that they can be
fragile and need to be packed carefully in a side or top pocket to
avoid being broken, but beyond that, its a great alternative to other
forms of water purification.
Don't throw out
your filter though. Steripens may make the water safe to drink in
terms of critters, but it doesn't remove particles like clay and
silt. Use your hand filter in deserts and other areas with cloudy
water in addition to any chemical treatment.
www.steripen.com
www.steripen.com
The Kit
It has been a long time since I have
owned a formal first aid kit. I have pretty much always made-do with
plastic bags filled with supplies that I would periodically replace
or refill. Whenever I have owned a first aid kit they have been
purchased from the local drug store and largely geared towards
household bumps, scrapes, and burns, rather than emergency wilderness
care. The older I get, the more important that difference becomes. So
this year I checked out the options and discovered that weren't
actually very many. A lot of what is out there is a little bit of
overkill for anyone doing less than a week in the back country. What
I was interested in was something that was comprehensive enough for a
week of car camping or a short backpacking trip and still small
enough to throw into a day pack.
I ended up trying out the ultralight
travel kit from Adventure Medical Ultralight and Watertight .5
It's, you know, a first aid kit. And a
really good one. That it comes in a bright yellow pouch is a plus,
especially if someone besides you is looking for it in your pack. The
real cool thing about it is how customizable their kits are in
general, there are tons of different versions and it's nice to know
that a health professional has gone over the list. You still have to
clean it out and refill it every so often, but if you are one of
those people walking around with little more than a grubby band aid
floating around in your pack, pony up and buy a kit, for peace of
mind if nothing else.
The Tent Hammock
By far the coolest thing I have seen by
way of new, or at least new to me, gear is the Hennessy Tent Hammock.
Hennessy isn't the only company out there making tent hammocks, or
camping hammocks in general, but they are doing it better than just
about anybody. I had vaguely heard about such things in the past, but
it wasn't until a friend and Appalachian Trail thru hiker mentioned
to me that she had given up her traditional tent entirely for a tent
hammock halfway through the trip that I began to take them seriously.
They are really wicked cool. And
hammocks come with a bunch of advantages. You will never again sleep
on uneven ground or with tree roots digging into your back, they are
warmer in winter, and cooler in summer, lighter than regular tents,
and don't come with awkward and heavy poles and stakes and they can
be used as comfortable seating. Mostly, they are insanely
comfortable, which is pretty much the most important thing.
But. There are a couple of things.
First, I had to watch not one but four videos to figure out how to
really use the thing, rain fly and all, and I'm pretty sure there are
things I'm still not doing properly. And, there is the tree problem.
You know, the part where you have to be camping someplace with trees
of an appropriate size and distance to one another to make it
feasible to pitch your hammock. Not such a big deal really, unless
you are in the desert, or maybe grasslands. I haven't had mine for
very long, but I am still trying to find the balance between
separation distance, tree diameter, and how much cord I have to hang
it, it feels like a bit much, but so can setting up any new tent. I
am hoping it sets up faster as I get used to it.
They do seem to be every bit as sturdy
and water tight as any other kid of tent, even more so when you
eliminate ground seep and flooding problems and Hennessy has lots of
options for bells and whistles from ultra lite models to full fledged
tents with thick insulation pads. Again, pretty much too cool. Check
back in another six months to hear how it makes through the winter
camping season.
And that's it! Now go update your gear.
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