Van‭

I used to work at Eastern Mountain Sports (a New-England, USA, based chain of outdoor goods). Granted, I haven't worked there in over 15 years, but I know what you are talking about. It was very ...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

You may have some luck in Florida. The Florida Wildflower Foundation list some things still in bloom. I'd say poke around on their site; especially the links to South Florida parks. It you're go...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

If you want to make them even more compact (especially for longer slings), you can hold onto the biners, and twist one a couple of times, then continue twisting in the same direction and clip one b...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

Second Edit: Thanks for all the upvotes. I just want to clarify one thing: I don't think I've done a good job in answering the OP's question. I think cr0's answer is much better for winter hikin...

posted 6y ago by Van‭  ·  last activity 6y ago by System‭

Does it make sense to train rock climbing wearying a weight vest... ? To expand a bit on what Jan said: it depends on why you're training. Back when I was a solid gym rat, some of my climbing...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

Questions like these two have made me wonder about my own answer in the first linked question. I have to admit, I haven't 'tested' the kits I put together. I have some wilderness survival trainin...

4 answers  ·  posted 6y ago by Van‭  ·  last activity 6y ago by System‭

Maybe this is an obvious thing, but does your BOB have to be completely prepacked? (Or even, is it?) I.e. do you expect to need to grab this bag and have less than 60? 30? 10? seconds to get out ...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

Like Jon Custer said, move your board so it's level (board not not pointing downhill) and then lean into the slope. I.e. you want someone downhill of you to be able to see some of the bottom of th...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

This video for Portable Soup (aka Pocket Soup) from James Townsend popped up in my feed. If you don't know (like I hadn't until I saw the video) Pocket Soup is basically a shelf-stable ultra-reduc...

0 answers  ·  posted 6y ago by Van‭

My answer is going to be: depends. When I started climbing, I was in a similar height / weight bracket as you are. However, my finger strength was fairly decent for a novice. I did install and u...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

I have a set of titanium cookware that I use for backpacking. It's a small set for one to two people and consists of two little pots and one cover/frying pan. Mostly, this set gets used for boili...

1 answer  ·  posted 6y ago by Van‭  ·  last activity 6y ago by System‭

According to this USGS pamphlet (last page, bottom right), solid green is "Forest". This link gives us The mesomorphic tree canopy is typically >10% cover and often exceeds 5 m in height ...

posted 6y ago by Van‭

(Maybe not a great answer, but too long for a comment.) I guess this would all depend on how much tension we're talking and how much extra line you'll have (and whether you have another set of han...

posted 5y ago by Van‭