General Q&A about the great outdoors and outdoor pursuits.
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Reading some of the comments on this answer: ....they're seen in the UK as winter birds. Not, I think, that they're not around in the summer; more that other birds aren't around in the wint...
Tents and tarps have these long straps (sketch here), which may be used to tie them to distant trees. When unused, they can look untidy and become tangled. This can happen both when the tent is in ...
Sometimes due to a high ridge or other land feature, the time that the sun comes over the horizon and gives direct sunlight is different from the time calculated by a sunrise table. From personal ...
One of the things you can do with a retired climbing rope is to decore it (remove the main center section), and turn the sheath into rope bracelets. The last time I decored a rope I cut it into a...
The Kenow fire burned ~38,100 hectares of forest in BC and in Waterton Lakes National Park. There are rumours surfacing about the number of animals found dead in the park thus far. Ground crews hav...
We have a new puppy and can't wait to take him to TGO. Since he's still growing he'll grow out of any harness that fits at the moment. I'm considering tying a harness out of webbing, but all inst...
How to grade a route when cumulating grades for multiple sections? Is it based on the overall feeling of difficulty or is there some cumulative formula to apply which yields a more or less accurate...
Whats are some simple knots to attach a rope to a pole? It involves simply looping around the pole, and then running through one of the ends through the loop and tightening
I found these pair of binoculars that were bought at least 15 years ago. Please see the 3 questions in the picture below.
I am planning to rent a campervan during a 1-month trip to New Zealand (South Island) which is self-contained, however, does not come with a shower. I wonder whether it is ok to use a solar shower ...
I know that in the mountains around Grenoble there are some huts. I would like to go on a two-day hike and spend a night in such hut. I mean how much snow there is? How low can a temperature drop d...
According to Wikipedia (German Wikipedia - Truthuhn), there were several attempts to domicile turkeys in Europe since 1732. All of them were not successful at all. Still they kept on trying until 1...
What's the best or easiest way to attach a loop tag onto a canvas tent? A loop tag is a loop of canvas so that I can tie a guy string to the loop tag and then down to a stake so that I can implem...
When walking on Hofsjökull glacier in Iceland, I wondered: how do people camp on multi-day trekking trips across icecaps, such as when crossing Greenland? My primary choice of tightening a tent is...
I found this arrowhead-shaped rock on the Toiyabe Crest trail in Nevada, USA. I'm wondering if it actually is an arrowhead. It's about 1.5 inches long. The reasons that I think it could be is th...
I saw mention of a 'dish' hold, and cannot figure out what this means exactly from Google searches. There are many sites selling dish holds like this one, but I don't understand what 'dish' means f...
In Iceland, off-roading is strictly prohibited. Unfortunately, it still happens and one can find tracks of off-roading all over the central highlands. On the other hand, in the landscape, some ro...
Several posts on this side make mention of tent "skirts". For example: A "skirt" at the bottom of the tent, which makes outer tent reach the ground, so wind is not beating into the inner tent; i...
I'm going to be a Dad for the first time early next year. My wife and I are very active outdoorsy kind of people. I've started looking at a baby carrier so we can take our wee one out on short walk...
My neighbor has asked me to pull their pontoon boat out of the lake to store for winter. However, this particular boat has been beached, so much so that I cannot push it back in to the water which...
Is it safe to follow a equestrian trail and assume I can ford where the horse-trail does? Or should I expect equestrians to ford rivers too deep or swift to ford on foot? I'm thinking of the situ...
I am regularly using the Click-Up belay device from Climbing Technologies together with a 40-meters rope from Edelrid I bought recently. Now, after using the two only about 10 times together (alwa...
Last weekend I went to the range with a youngster. Naturally he was very curious and asked me a lot of question. One of them was, why there even was a cock feather which needs to be pointed away fr...
We're looking for an overnight loop near the Boston area. I've checked out the Pemi Loop Hike in New Hampshire, but it's strenuous and we think it might be a little too much for the more novice mem...
I was in Nepal two years ago and got the stomach flu. Last time I was only in Kathmandu and Pokhara and didn't do any trekking, so it was not critical, although it was very unpleasant. Two years l...
At the moment I have a sport harness which is not ideal for trad climbing. I might buy a trad harness for outdoor climbing only, however I for the moment, I've been focused on Grivel Lynx and have ...
I occasionally hike in the Sahyadri ranges in Maharashtra (India). During the rainy season there are a lot of crabs on the trail. In case the crab bites, what are the first aid steps that can be ta...
To start I am from the Midwest in the United States. In the recent years, many lakes and rivers have been taken over by an invasive species of fish called Asian Carp. These fish are disgusting/slim...
Yesterday I was flying above the Mediterranean sea, it was a nice day, without storms or strong winds. I fly around 20 minutes above it before arriving to the ground. During these 20 minutes I saw...
I want to climb a mountain with my daughter. There is a glacier on the route that we should cross. Other routes take much longer or are technically more difficult. The glacier does not have many ...
I occasionally design or lead hikes in areas with multiple trail junctions. I attempt to be thorough in the planning by having several different ways for hikers to follow the trail. (Maps and GPS ...
In this answer about mountaineering on a glacier, @StrongBad mentioned 4th and 5th class belays. I have never heard of belays being classified into such classes. In what context are these classes u...
For reasons of time-saving and avoiding retie figure 8 knots all the time, can I clip the figure 8 knot via two carabiners each clipped to either loop of the harness? This way there will be no cros...
A recent question made me wonder how a running belay is really done. Suppose you are climbing an alpine route, maybe of difficulty UIAA 5. You encounter a stretch of 100m of UIAA 1 terrain with n...
When birds gather into groups, they fly in a variety of different formations and patterns. Some birds fly in a formation that looks like the letter "V". Several species of geese, pelicans, and ib...
I have experience in backpacking but have no climbing experience. I am trying to learn how to camp on top of mountains after class 2 or 3 climbing. My motive is to take sunrise and sunset photos. A...
During the winter I travel long distances over 25 miles into forest, lakes, rivers and mountains. I always worry that when it's time to leave I'll find myself trapped by tree laying over the road. ...
A recent comment Cows eat grass, doesn't mean you can! got me thinking. Corn, wheat, rice, etc are all grass that we eat regularly. I am not sure the human race could survive on the planet...
After using tape gloves for crack climbing, I always have some tape gunk left over on my skin. While it doesn't hurt and goes away a few days of rigorous scrubbing, it doesn't look super great at t...
Humans differ in their food preferences. One person loves oysters, another can't stand them, etc. What about animals? Are there any rabbits that don't like carrots? Lions that don't care for zebra...
Obviously, the solution to this problem is to pack food that everyone enjoys eating. However, according to Murphy, this doesn't always happen. Also, sometimes the best tasting food is ruled out by ...
I have a 1972ish sunfish I am planning to re-gelcoat the entire bottom of the hull. I made one fiber glass repair where there was a crack through the hull, I took that area down to bare fiberglass...
I was chacking a map to see access rights on a particular route I know. I was checking if a path was a bridleway or footpath as I know Mountain Bikes should only use bridleways. Studying the key cl...
I am watching a video about a climb of Annapurna. To acclimate the climbers head up from base camp to another camp higher up, stay for a day or two, then return to base camp. They repeat this pro...
A lot of the fatal accidents in Yosemite National park come from people getting swept over waterfalls. Yes, the falls in Yosemite have fences and warning signs and yet people still ignore them. If...
The easiest way up Half Dome is the cable route (rated Class 3), which looks like this. As six people have died on this route since it was put in place, and it looks really steep and scary, how ...
We're planning to do a dayhike on a mountain almost two thousand meters above sea level (Mt. Tapulao). The trail is almost 20 kilometers to the summit, and me and my fellow hikers are pretty slow...
I have been reading some "make your own gear" forums, and making waxed canvas bags seems to be a popular craft. I recently did a little research into ripstop nylon (for another SE, here), and it s...
I thought about asking this question on English Language and Usage, but decided not to because I want answers from people who are familiar with cascades and waterfalls in reality, not just in the a...
TopHat has two roving points in its range. One is the Roving Crown... ... and the other is called Charly Point. They seem to have an identical concept but still the Crown costs three times a...
