Posts by Greenstone Walker
I went out once with a bag that was too warm. Sometime in the night I woke up covered in sweat and freezing cold! My sweat had soaked the down, completely ruining its insulation properties. If you...
To answer the sleeping bag question: Snow shelters drip. Constantly. You can deal with some of the drips by placing your ungloved finger on the drip and then moving down to the bottom of the wall. ...
I have cooked for 19 people on a five day trip around Stewart Island in New Zealand. We were eating dehydrated meals (from Backcountry), so our cooking requirements were three large billies and co...
Let me turn the question around: Is it ethical to use a portable stove to burn irreplaceable fossil fuels? Is it ethical to carry that fossil fuel in a pressurised can (for gas fuel stoves) or meta...
It is not. The lowest-impact solution is to use a poo-pot. These are compulsory in alpine areas here in New Zealand. Pack it out - Poo pots
If you are roped up for glacier travel and the person in front of you has just fallen in then you can hammer a snow stake in to provide an anchor. Note that in this case you probably won't have you...
I have friends who swear by silk inners. They are thin, so can be worn under other gloves, but are extremely warm for the thickness. Combine these with windstopper outers - as mentioned elsewhere,...
I have used a travel coffee plunger with pre-ground coffee. It worked well (I actually prefer plunger coffee to espresso) but after a couple of trips I decided that the extra bulk wasn't worth it f...
Titanium doesn't rust (or at least, doesn't rust in the timeframe that this gear is typically used for) so this could be a good piece of kit for a surfer or diver. You could hang keys or a waterp...
Given that it is above the mesh pocket at the side, my guess is that it is for walking/ski poles. If you need to put the poles away for a short time (for example, a traverse using your ice axe, a ...
From that linked site, "Hunting" just seems to be a marketing term, since most of the boots appear in multiple categories. Here in New Zealand, professional hunters usually wear rubber lace-ups. W...
Scheduled Transport If you are catching scheduled transport (e.g. bus or ferry) then you need a watch. There might only be one trip a day. If you miss it, you are stuck for an extra night. You mi...
I carry a Victorinox knife. On my last few trips I've used the various tools on it to pry shellfish off rocks, slice cheese and salami, prepare vegetables, cut sticking plaster, cut duct tape for g...
Ray Mears has produced videos on sharpening knives. In particular, sharpening them in camp and in the field. The teqhnique is pretty much as @WedaPashi explains it, but it's good to see a video of...
Growing up in rural New Zealand, we often encountered electric fences. Some of them were illegally high-powered to deal with big animals. We tested fences either with the back of our hands or with...
Don't freeze the bottle - fill it with ice cubes. Better still, don't use ice cubes, use ice sticks that fit in the neck of bottles.
I clean my drinking system with lots of hot water then sterilise it using baby bottle sterilising tablets. Once it is clean, I don't dry it - I store it in the freezer. :-) Additionally, I don't u...
If the tent fly can be pitched without the inner then your winter tent becomes a summer tent by leaving the inner at home.
I asked my fitness instructor this question a few years ago. She had several things to say. Electrolyte replacement is for when you have been in a high cardio, sweating mode continually for an hou...
I'm a lurker on two knife-related forums (Bladeforums.com and Knifeforums.com). On both of them, "what knife should I buy" or "what is the best knife for X" are either closed quickly or become very...
Make a sunhat or rainhat out of grass. Make a stretcher out of wood and bootlaces and carry the heaviest Scout (heh heh) for twenty metres (over some mildly challenging terrain, like a small cree...
Generally, the more times the poles cross each other, the better the wind resistance. Additionally, tents with crossed-pole designs usually have better head room. Of course, more poles means more w...
Collapsible poles, compared to fixed poles Easier to fit in luggage. Easier to fit in the side pockets of backpacks when doing something that requires two hands, for example river crossing. Can b...
I have used rubber bands, kitchen ties, pipe cleaners, half-broken shoelaces and whatever other pieces of small cord I've been able to place my hands on. All except the rubber bands worked well but...
