2021 Upgrades
As a new dad, I don't know how much backpacking, if any, I'll be able to pull off in 2021. As a substitute, I'm starting to look into trail running as a way to get out and see the sights without the time commitment of spending the night. However, I've still had my eye on a number of backpacking upgrades for theoretical future trips: The Zpacks Arc Air 50L backpack is 532g in size medium/medium and constructed from Dyneema. Not only is it a jaw-dropping 321 grams lighter than my Osprey Levity 60L, it uses pre-curved stays to arch the [...]
2020 Year In Review
Better late than never! Also, babies are really time consuming. 2020 By The Numbers Trips: 20Days: 33Nights: 13Miles: 264.9Elevation (new!): 55,086 feet Compared to 2019, that's almost double the number of trips with a similar number of days but a little over half the nights. It's almost double the number of miles as well. In other words, I did a ton of day trips and then a handful of much longer and more strenuous trips. Gear Lists We'll be comparing the following two lists: Q4 2020 gear listQ4 2019 gear list Overall, my base weight decreased from 16.61 pounds to [...]
Experimenting With Esbit
Having tried canister and alcohol stoves, this evening I decided to broaden my horizons with a solid-fuel stove, specifically the Esbit pocket stove and Esbit-branded hexamine fuel tablets. Conditions were a 65F ambient temperature and 5mph winds gusting to 10mph. The goal was to bring two cups of water to a rolling boil inside the Evernew TI Mug Pot 500 with lid. Note that, having a relatively narrow base, this pot doesn't heat as efficiently as a wider-bottomed pot would. Weights Esbit pocket stove: 88gEsbit fuel tablet: 15g each Experiments The first round consisted of using the pocket stove itself [...]
Black Diamond Traction
I was browsing clearance outdoor gear on DVOR (a sort of Drop [which has largely abandoned outdoor gear] for hunters run by OpticsPlanet) when I came across some really interesting winter traction options from Black Diamond, a brand I normally don't pay much attention to: First up is the Blitz, a minimalist device with spikes only in the front. The website claims that the weight of each device in size medium is 57g, but it also says that the weight of a medium pair is 45g per pair, so... Either way, my Snowline Chainsen Lights in size XL are 136g [...]
Lunar Solo review updated: winter/snow performance
After some grueling backyard testing, in which I set up the tent and took pictures as snow piled up, I've updated my Lunar Solo review with a section on how it performs in the snow. As a result, I now feel comfortable using it year-round.
Half Bag/Quilt?
Is the down in the top half of your quilt redundant with the down in your puffy? In other words, could you save weight by wearing your down jacket to bed and using a shorter quilt? Yes. Potential Savings My current quilt is an Enlightened Equipment Enigma 20F in size long/wide, weighing 684g. My current jacket is an original Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer, 232g. So, any combination weighing less than 916g is an improvement. Nunatak's Akula half-bag weighs in at 454g for the 54" version, but that would go all the way up to my armpits. The 46" version would [...]
Wide-Brim Hats Don’t Interfere With Photochromic Sunglasses
On the tail-end of a recent eye exam I had a chance to ask the doc one of my longest-burning questions: do wide-brim hats interfere with the ability of photochromic lenses to darken in response to UV light? Her answer was no. For context, almost all photochromic lenses rely on ambient UV light in order to trigger the darkening effect. However, car windshields block the portion of the UV spectrum that the lenses are sensitive to, effectively reducing them to regular fixed-transmission sunglasses while driving. Since wide-brim hats block all of the direct sunlight that would otherwise hit the lenses, [...]
Estimating Quilt EN Ratings
To my knowledge, only Therm-a-Rest and Sierra Designs properly rate the temperature ranges of their quilts using the EN standard. Originally designed for sleeping bags, the standard test assumes that there is a hood involved, which quilts obviously do not have. TaR and SD circumvent this problem using the simplest approach possible: just throw a hood on the thermal mannequin and be done with it. In a previous post on buying a winter quilt, I used data from TaR and SD to put together an equation that could estimate the EN comfort rating of any quilt given the amount of [...]
Montbell Traction
Montbell's new traction offerings are just rebadged Chainsens from Snowline. Earlier this month, Montbell announced their new traction (chain spikes) lineup, including their aptly-named and outdoor-focused Chain Spike. They listed the country of origin as Korea which immediately made me suspicious since Snowline, who make the Chainsen line of traction devices (and, I believe, were the original manufacturers of Kahtoola's Microspikes), are headquartered in Korea. I used my meager image compositing skills to put together this side-by-side comparison: Snowline Chainsen Pro left, Montbell Chain Spike right Snowline makes a number of Chainsen models, however, it appears that the Montbell offering [...]
Baby!
Back in November I became a father. As a result, my time for both writing and backpacking is somewhat constrained. I still have lots of reviews and articles to write, but I doubt I'll be doing any five-day out-of-state jaunts anytime soon. Time will tell. On the other hand, in a few years I'll probably be writing about ultralight backpacking with kids so there's something to look forward to.