Posts by Tullochgorum
A lot depends on the climate, on your budget, and on how much you sweat on the move. Pros and cons of merino Merino is the king if you want to prevent odour and most people find that it's the mos...
GENERAL CONDITIONING As @ap2 has said training is quite task-specific, so the priority for hiking hills with a heavy pack is to get out as much as possible and hike hills with a heavy pack. You wa...
Late to the show, but I'm not entirely convinced by the current answers. First, we can't really talk about 4-season tents without considering the activity and conditions The term "4-season" can m...
Research has established that humans adapt well to heat. Adaption to cold is a more controversial topic, but according to this literature survey any benefit from cold training is small and unrelia...
What are your options? As someone who makes their own shelters I've given a great deal of thought to the pros and cons of different architectures. But like most things involving gear choice, the r...
I think you're going to have problems with camping. The age of responsibility in Italian law is 18 years. I've looked at the terms and conditions of a number of campsites, and they all say that e...
I've had this issue too - my feet are small but wide and I often have too much length in order to get the width. The main downside I've found is that I initially tend to trip or stub my toes on di...
You say that the tent is held up by a single straight pole. That pole looks pretty minimal for the job, so if you make a straight replacement you'll likely face the same issue again. If you walk ...
Lightweight shelter selection is all about tradeoffs In general terms, for wind-worthiness you're looking for strong poles, small panels, a low profile, plentiful peg-out points and flies that pit...
There's really no simple answer to this. Here are some variables that people sometimes overlook... Are the walls sloping or vertical? The first factor to consider is the slope of the inner at you...
OK, so here's a completely different take on this. I'm an enthusiastic customer of Aarn Packs - a specialist New Zealand company. They are one of the few manufacturers to explore load carrying fro...
Personally the sleeping mat is one of the last things I would leave out of my pack. Inflatable mats with internal baffles like the top-of-the-range Thermarests and Expeds are much less bulky than c...
WHAT ARE YOUR OPTIONS? You have three main choices: A dedicated PLB (Personal Locator Beacon) A satellite messenger with added rescue facilities (DeLorme or Spot) Conventional measures such as a...
I was once the rather unhappy participant in a study on ankle injury treatment at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. I came in with a serious injury and was told that with conventional treatment I wo...
Yes - it's true. The source is a 1984 study by the U.S. Army Research Institute, which found that it takes up to 6.4 times as much energy to move at a given pace when weight is carried in the foot...
I think that Klara pretty much nailed it. I've been stoveless for a bit now, and I haven't found any hidden gems that people aren't aware of. What I do find is that on longer treks where the food ...
In my experience the two most important things you can do to improve the range of a bag are: Improve your ground insulation. Warm your extremities. Ground insulation is far more important than ...
Good luck in your quest to find a well-fitting boot - I never managed it. So I'm going to suggest an alternative approach. Outside of technical snow and ice, more and more walkers are abandoning bo...
If the ground is firm or frozen rather than rocky I strongly recommend a quality Y shaped peg such as the Groundhog. When made with good materials this shape is so strong it can easily withstan...
Well, there's the obvious issue that the bottom may shelve very steeply, so that non-swimmers trying to paddle may drown. Beyond that, I think there's a specific point and a more general point. S...
As a supplement to Martin Hugi's excellent answer I would add that there will likely be groups of people locally with an interest in outdoor swimming, and they will know all the best spots. In my ...
The best research I can find is from The Institute of Altitude Medicine in the US. Quoting studies on skiers visiting high resorts in Colorado: AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness) can afflict any ...
Well, if you've ever tried walking in countries like Spain or Italy, we should celebrate the fact that we are spoiled for choice. You can always get by with an OS, so why would you ever choose Harv...
Yes, the UNESCO WHS classification would be an obstacle to Monbiot's rewilding proposals, as it focuses on the preservation of a farmed landscape. But that begs the question of whether radical rewi...
Well, I'm a total scatterbrain on the trail, so I can answer from hard experience. There are three scenarios - before you go, leaving camp or accommodation, and getting back on trail after a rest....
