The Best Laid Plans….

For the past week I have been staedily improving my fitness with slightly longer walks and a few more gradients.  Things within feel a little more settled now, I’m completely off medication and the system is recovering reasonable quickly.

My tentative plans for this weekend have been shelved as I have a family commitment on Sunday.  Next week though - Tuesday onwards - come hell or high water I am away for a few days. 

I’m looking closely at my kit list and deciding where I can shave a few grams without jeopardising my comfort.  Maybe I’ll have to take a little less liquid refreshment for the evenings.  I certainly will be able to reduce the amount of water I normally carry and use my Aquagear filter instead.  I’ve tentatively tried a Primus Micron TI (http://www.backpackinglight.co.uk/product311.asp) and found it to be a ferocious boiler with very small gas consumption.  I have found a consistent result of 10 grams of gas per 1 pint of water boiled.  So a ‘100′ cartridge should give me a 9.3 pint boil capacity.  My first thoughts are that one ‘100′ cartridge should last me three days.  I  shall be able to determine the accuracy of my premise next week. 

 Food weight cannot be reduced by much as I prepare and dehydrate my own.  I do take the odd treat and a few nibbles but generally speaking I stick to a simple breakfast of cereal and water (I don’t like/use milk) lunch is likely to be flavoured couscous and my main meal something hot and spicy.  Generally I look to consume 1000 calories per day plus some fresh fruit if I find any.  Drinks consumption is generally in the form of strong tea (or brandy) plus water during walking time.

Cooking pot is an MSR titanium kettle or the slightly larger Snow Peak titanium kettle, utensils amount to a folding Ti spork.

The Steps Resume

Early start today - 0600 - and my Pacer Poles see the light of day for first time for nearly two weeks.  Sun was up, birds were singing and I felt great.  A favourite walk of mine takes me through fields on a sheltered sunken path, I pace along gently at first and then up the tempo slightly.  I’m not pushing myself yet but hope to build up a little more fitness by this time next week.  I have plans for the weekend of 16th - 19th May.  If all goes according to plan I shall be out then with a pack and doing three overnights.  I have a couple of new items of kit to try and evaluate as my starting point into lightweight.

For me lightweight wont ever become a fetish or even all consuming passion.  I have so many ‘old friends’ in the kit line who have given me years of happiness and enjoyment that I will not part with them.  As I age I know I won’t be able to caarry so much weight as far as I have done.  That’s fine by me, I’ll go less distance and probably see more and maybe become more in touch with the soil.

I have long felt that, for me personally (and I only speak for me), the current trends towards speed and distance somewhat negate the reasons for backpacking.  I started too ‘get away from the hurly burly of life’ and thus the last thing I wanted to do then (in the early ’70’s) was become competitive even with myself.  Now even more so I am not interested in either how far nor how fast I can or have travelled.   Similarly I don’t have to be in high places (nice as they can be) to enjoy proceeding across the face of England on my own feet.  In fact, it may be obvious from earlier posts that I have an extreme love of flatland.   For myself and those members of my family who want to walk the object of the exercise is ENJOYMENT, FUN, PEACE and TRANQUILITY.   These are my essential ingredients to make a good period.

More…..

Re-reading my last post, it now seems so inadequate.  The real heart of the weekend, wasn’t me and my minor troubles, but the fun and joy my grand-daughter both had and provided.  She is a joy to be near - even half way through the ‘terrible two’s’.   She is a splendid character reference for her mother, who as a single parent tears herself in half much of the time to earn a living and spend quality time with Hayley.  Somehow, and I really don’t know how, she seams to achieve both.  She does start work at 0500hrs and rarely sees her bed before 2230 but that is her choice and she seems to thrive on it.  I spoke to her earleir today, one of her ver very rare days without full work and she said she was ‘tired’ - because she didn’t arise until 0630!!!!   I know she’s my daughter but I have to give her respect for the way she strives.  

Somehow I seem unable to find quite the right words to say what I mean - so I guess I’ll leave the subject alone for now.

During the weekend of soporific floating I have also re-read another Colin Fletcher book - ‘The Secret Worlds of Colin Fletcher’.   Somehow that man did manage to embody so many of my reasons for backpacking.   It’s not the miles but what HAPPENS during those miles and where those happenings direct, lead or impel the mind to roam.

I have never been one for miles.  Five good miles to me have always been better that 25 miles of nothing but miles.  I know in this age of lightweight, go faster, go further that my philosophy (that of a Dinasaur) is probably more governed by my body than mind, but that is MY way.  To those who want more or different or whatever, then I say ‘go for what suits YOU and remember FUN and ENJOYMENT are the goals’

OK rants etc., over.  I’m still not sure I’ve really said what I wanted to say, but maybe in a few more days when the residue of the medicaments have flushed from my system I will be able to make things a little clearer.  Yeah…Maybe!!

Return To The Fray

A week without posting and that week seems like a month.  I’m not a very patient patient when ill and even less so when I’m confined by a medically induced semi-comatose state.  Things seem on the mend now so I’m looking forward to next weekend.

I should not complain though for the last weekend was SO good in many ways.  A family get-together at my daughters home - a 14th Century cottage on the edge of the Cambridgeshire fens.  My elder son and my daughter-in-law also came from more northern climes.  My little grand-daughter was terribly spoilt but, what the hell?  It’s not that often we manage to get even some of the family together, so nearly all of them (younger son, partner and daughter were not able to journey from Edinburgh through work committments) together in one place is an occassion to note.

Despite being spaced-out I did manage a gentle stroll with all to a local hostelery for a beer of three on Saturday.  The evenning was warm and still, we could hear ducks and geese in the reed-beds and this year’s first cuckoo (for me at least).  We sat outside the pub and idled away about three hours.  On the walk home with daylight fast fading we encountered three Muntjac deer.  They seemed surprised to see two-legged creatures crossing ‘their field’ but didn’t take fright and run.  I had the feeling that maybe it was not us enjoying the view, but instead, them enjoying THEIR view.  Who was watching who (whom)?

A sight to thrill was three pairs of Red Kite hawking the fields and plunging now and then to make a kill.  I have known they are back in the area but never seen more than one hunting pair at any one time.  The female bird has a spectacular way of taking food from her mate when he has made a kill.  He will fligh ’straight and level’ for a very short time while she will approach head-on, flip and take the kill from his talons with her own, right herself and swoop away to feed - herself or young.  It is a truly amazing feat of flying control and one I have seen only about three times.

Out Of Action

Isn’t life a ‘B’.

Good weather arrived Thursday and by Friday I’m rendered Hors deCombat by an irregularly occurring problem with an old wound.  From many years of experience I know to seek immediate help from a medic.  Trouble is, I then have to imbibe a cocktail of two different types of antibiotic, plus non-steroidal anti-inflamatories(NSAI’S) and painkillers too.  Lovely.  Just about scrambles what brains I have left and makes me very miserable.  That misery is topped-up by the excellent weather over the weekend and running through to the present.

So, not only am I doped up to the eyeballs but I’m well p****d off by the weather

HOWEVER…..As I sit trying to make some sense of this post I can see a tall flowering cherry in full bloom (some of the cherry blossom is even falling) and sitting in its top-most branch is a sleek male Blackbird singing his heart out.  The sound has an almost crystal ring of clarity and I know this, more often than not, presages a storm.  The moments-ago brilliant sky has also turned a slightly murky grey.  Should I gloat?  No not really but in my present frame of mind I really do find it hard not too.  YEAH, I’ll have a gloat - just a small one eh?

Ok, gloating over for now.

I have spent some fruitful time reasing ‘M & G Go For A Walk’  gayleybird.blogspot.com  and find it both informative and funny.  Best of luck to them both.

Time for another cocktail……………………..Hmmmmmmmmmmm Nice!

Eventide

Returned home fairly late yesterday from some necessary family commitments - such things are necessary even with a grown-up family.  Someone once told me that ‘children improve as they get older’ - THEY LIED! not that I mind in the least helping them out - It keeps me young (that’s what I keep telling myself anyway) especially my 2.5  years old grand-daughter who seems to have unlimited energy and an unlimited capacity for that ‘WHY’ word.

So, I’m home and the dog needs walking.  I’m surprised when I take her (at about 20.30hrs) that there is still considerable light, the sky is clear and the sun’s afterglow is bright in the west.

What suddenly struck me most forcibly though was the smell.  An evening smell of damp earth, some woodsmoke and just a hint of freshly cut grass.  There was a stillness that often seems to prevail in that Celtic ‘Time between Time’ - the half-hour before full sunset and the half-hour before sunrise.

A few late roosting birds were flitting to shelter and finally the local blackbirds began to sing the sun to bed.  In the slightly damp stillness their calls had a crystal bell-like quality.  A pigeon cooed and then all was silent and the darkness crept upon us.  Great 30 minutes with just my dog.  Simple enjoyment for the expenditure of so little effort to walk and smell and listen and feel.

Restful weekend in a forest

Sherwood Forest, legendary home of Robin Hood; now the actual home of ‘Center Parcs’ forest village.  For a long weekend break, Firday to Monday, and ideal spot to laze about.  My wife, daughter and grandaughter  plus myself have just arrived back home.  Everyone seems to have had a good time, some enjoying the water sports, some enjoying the food (or, in my small grandaughters case) the feeding habits of the semi-tame wildlife - Mallard ducks, grey squirrels, furry bundles of rabbit, a heron and numerous other birds.  She was facinated when the animals and birds started to come to the patio doors on the villa and, in the case of the ducks, ‘knock’ (tap the window with their beaks) whenever they saw movement and wanted to scroung more scraps.

I managed three 15 mile walks through the forest tracks and also completely read (for the nth time) the alas late Colin Fletcher’s account of his walk through the Grand Canyon - “The man who walked through time”.

Awaiting when I arrived home was a brand new copy of the book, sourced through www.abebooks.co.uk  this despite the book having  been out of print since the 1990’s.  For hard-to-come-by books this is an excellent site and very simple to use.  The prices are excellent too and books can be sourced worldwide.

The book has always been an inspirational work to me, since my first reading of it when the author originally  released it!  So much so that I think this latest book is copy number 6 that I have ‘read to death’.

 

LOSE OVER HALF A STONE (or 8.1lbs or 3.69Kg) IMMEDIATELY

09.30     Our postman knocked the door.  There it was, a smart plain brown jiffy bag looking suitably stuffed.  THIS was what I had been hoping for today.

The package was from Bob Cartwright at http://www.backpackinglight.co.uk/ and inside…..a brand new product…the Aquagear water filter as discussed by Bob in a recent podcast and shown here. http://www.backpackinglight.co.uk/product353.asp

I heard the podcast a couple of days ago and read the facts on the website.  This was something I wanted.  Not a simple ‘it would be nice to have’, but, ‘I want this and I want it now.’

In more than 40 years backpacking and longer day walking, I have NEVER used ‘wild’ water.  My pack has always bulged with at least enough ‘fresh’ water to last until the next treated water source.  Thus I have laboured under the weight of 2, 3, 4 and sometimes 5 to 6 litres of water.

In future things will be different.  The Aquagear Survivor delivers INSTANT potable water from, by all appearances, the murkiest sources.

How do I arrive at my calculations of weight loss? 

Simple, read on.

My standard for a full day, overnight and sufficient water to get me to the next treated potable water is 2 x 2 litre Nalgene flasks plus 4 litres of water = total weight 4.14Kg (or 9.1 lbs), I can reduce this to a maximum of 460grms (1 lb) saving 3.69Kg (8.1 lbs) - see below.

My standard for a long day walk (either winter or summer) is 2 x 2 litre Nalgene flasks plus 3 litres of water = total weight 3.14Kg (or 6.9 lbs).  I can reduce this to a maximum of 460grms (1 lb) saving 2.68Kg (5.8 lbs) - see below

My standard of a short/medium day walk is 1 x 2 litre Nalgene flask plus 2 litres of water = total weight 2.07Kg (or 4.55 lbs).  I can reduce this to a maximum of 460grms (1 lb) saving 1.61 (3.54 lbs) - see below

Reasoning….

The Aquagear Survivor weighs in at 180grms, add to that a 1 litre Platypus flask at 30grms and 250grms (250ml) of water as a ‘starter’ and the total is 460grms (or 1.01 lbs).  Plus I never need to worry about running out of water.

My reasons for the ’starter’ are simple.  I like to drink plenty right from the off and I don’t want to have to start filtering immediately.  I could simply fill the Aquagear Survivor from the home tap and work straight from it, but I also like to have a supply of more than 500ml for breaks when I may brew-up soup or, on a backpacking trip cook some food.  The 500ml ‘Survivor’ would be adequate and acceptable but a small reserve is, in my opinion useful and now so simple to obtain - just top up a platypus from the ‘Survivor’ top the ‘Survivor’ up from somewhere, and carry on.  I really don’t mind 280grms extra load….not with the weight savings I will be making nor after some of the water loads I’ve packed!!!!!!

Following the manufacturers instructions I have flushed 3 x 500ml of treated tap water through the appliance and each flushing took about 1 minute.  The fourth fill I drank and I have to say the improvement was noticeable even on our tap water.  It had lost its chemical tang and ‘bleach’ smell.

In the little use I’ve made of the bottle I can find no fault.  It fills quickly, it filters quickly and it produces ‘spring’ water.  Oh, where has it been all my life?

This unit should surely be a ‘must’ for serious lightweighters as well as or including TGOC competitors even for this year.  

Perhaps I should,  finally,  mention the price…..£29.99….for at least 400+gallons(1600+ltrs).

‘Get ‘em in Bob!’

 

Simple Pleasures

This morning my wife and I strolled into our local town.  There was an almost eerie silence to the area.  Admittedly the hour was not late but the quiet was profound.  In the town centre we could hear birds in the nearby churchyard singing.  By the river the Mallard ducks were squabbling to protect territory and the drakes were strutting and flouncing their feathers in shows of eager anticipation (or hope maybe!)

There was a pleasant warmth in the sunshine and for once it was possible to meander without being forced to take drastic course alterations to avoid the usual press of somnambulistic pedestrians.  What was even nicer  was to be able to hear sounds normally drowned by the rumble of traffic.   A few remaining dead leaves still attached to their host trees were rattling and chattering in the light wind; occasionally another would fall and float gently into the market place then skitter around as stray gusts played with the debris of last nights nocturnal urban fox forays.

Thirty-six  years we have been married and still to walk hand-in-hand gives us both tremendous pleasure.  In this mornings setting that pleasure was even more intense.  We had no pressures to be anywhere but where we were.  No time constraints or ‘urgent’ tasks to perform.  We could simply be ourselves and ENJOY!

More Thoughts etc.,

11.55 hrs

Friday is not a good day.  To me it is neither weekday nor weekend; and I have various family duties to perform which do not improve the day.

Ok, so yesterday I started the day with a ‘Spanish’ breakfast - that would be a couple of large tomatoes thinly sliced and anointed with garlic flavoured olive oil and liberally sprinkled with hand rubbed oregano and a large mug in my case of tea, as I don’t drink coffee – washed down with a tumbler (or two) of either sour anise of Soberano brandy.  Thus fortified I face Fridays.  Somehow the morning and early afternoon pass in an ethereal sort of way!

During yesterday’s ‘relaxed’ afternoon I idly passed some time ‘fiddling’ with a 5cm strip of aluminium foil, part of a piece of ‘Super Thin Windshield’ sent by BPL Bob.  http://www.backpackinglight.co.uk/product308.asp

I have had this windshield material for a couple of weeks and am using it a lot.  When it first arrived I immediately thought that it had a different ‘feel’ to the usual MSR/Primus windshield material.  It also sounds different when handled.  It didn’t have a tinny rattle sound but something slightly more resonant.  The material certainly works and my ‘fiddling’ yesterday raised another question.  While idly bending and twisting the 5cm strip I became conscious that it was not showing any signs of wear or cracking. 

Now I know that ‘normal’ aluminium work hardens as the more it is ‘worked’ in one place the harder that area becomes until ultimately the crystalline structure becomes brittle and begins the crack.  This sample I was ill-treating did not appear to be doing that.  Certainly not for the 150+ times I bent and straightened it.  This augers well for longevity in use.  It probably illustrates how sad I can be too!!!!

I noticed in the May edition of TGO a reference to Bill Wilkins and the Ultimate Equipment Company.  The company was about in the mid ‘70’s and manufactured some fine tents.  I still have 2 Ultimate Bivi’s, one a prototype Bill sent me to test and made from a new ‘wonder’ material, namely Goretex.  The Ultimate Bivi in its original form was very prone to condensation and I have to say the prototype I found no better.

I also had the pleasure of testing an Ultimate Packer tent, a beautifully designed and crafted ‘two-man’ lightweight (for that era) double skinned unit which still resides in my loft in excellent condition even after maybe 300 uses.  So far as ‘two person’ was concerned the occupants had to be very, very close friends as my wife and I discovered.  This snugness could be advantageous as we found when camped in mid May in the middle of a thunder storm.  There was sleet and hail and rain and, immediately overhead, forked lightening and the crash of thunder.  The tent was red on the fly with a light blue inner and the lightening, thunder and downpour could have come straight from the score of Wagner’s Gotterdammerung – definitely it was twilight for the Gods.  However we were ‘snug’.

Finally from Bill I received a High Country 3 (there were three to cater for now our first son had arrived) and this was a ‘3 person’ tent; a roomy one too, but not exactly lightweight.  I still have all of these tents and they occasionally get a work-out.

What a shame Ultimate disappeared, although I seem to recall that it was resurrected under the name of ‘Phoenix’ for a period – when ‘phree’ named tents appeared.