Ryley‭

I've been surprised by how durable tent floors are. I've never used footprints, and I have a silnylon-floored tent (i.e. not very durable material) that has lasted hundreds of nights and still doe...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭

I've gotten shin splints on long hikes - once 2 weeks into a hike, and another time 2 months. I wasn't able to determine how I got them though, which has really annoyed me! I get that I could pro...

1 answer  ·  posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 13y ago by System‭

If you're hiking in dry, hot weather places, and you have a whole backpacking setup your best bet is to store your water deep in your pack. The sun is your only real enemy here. In the desert, I'...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭

I would recommend making your own. I've used a bunch of the recipes from FreezerBagCooking and found them generally easy to make and incredibly tasty. You can adjust them to fit your budget or so...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 8y ago by System‭

Shoes and a harness. Some places don't have belay devices or carabiners attached to each rope, so check on that beforehand, as you may need to provide your own. That's it. Chalk and a chalk bag ...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 13y ago by System‭

It somewhat depends on how warm you sleep and how much you're willing to layer up in your bag. I've met people who claim they used one 30F bag the whole trip (with thick layers at the start, and u...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 13y ago by System‭

Sadly, in North America, there is no rating beyond what each manufacturer decides for itself. I suspect that in the US especially, some thought goes into liability (i.e. if someone freezes to deat...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 13y ago by System‭

I use this system exclusively, and there's an entire site dedicated to the variety of ways you can do it. I think it is generally called "freezer bag cooking", and the main site I'm aware of is ca...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭

I think you pretty much covered it. Advantages of a tent: Keeps more rain/snow out (particularly if you have little skill in tent/tarp setup) Keeps out insects. For me, this is the big one - in...

posted 11y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 11y ago by System‭

Do boots really last (only) 400 miles? In short, yes. If you are a hard-man/woman, you might stretch one pair of boots to half the AT. Normal people go through quite a few pairs - I used 10-is...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 10y ago by System‭

If you treat your gear well, it will almost all last a whole thru-hike. Rain Jacket If you have a bad year, you can have 80+ days of rain, and the shoulder straps of your backpack will wear out...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭

I would call it a reasonable risk to camp in the desert without a tent (but with a tarp available if it was to rain!). I've "cowboy" camped 40 or 50 nights in the desert and never had any company ...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭

If the GPS is mostly off (i.e. you're only rarely using your GPS app), I think you will get ~2 days of battery life. To get that much battery life, you'd need to do these things: Keep the GPS of...

posted 13y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 13y ago by System‭

If you are into sport climbing, Thailand has got to be the place. Specifically, check out Krabi or Railay, also anywhere that offers deep water soloing. The downside to Thailand is that you'll sp...

posted 12y ago by Ryley‭  ·  last activity 12y ago by System‭

It represents a two major things. I'm not going to illustrate, but the core of it is: Don't load carabiners across the gate or spine side of the carbiner (i.e. the side opposite the gate). This...

posted 12y ago by Ryley‭