{"id":2128,"date":"2008-11-10T22:17:23","date_gmt":"2008-11-11T06:17:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/?p=2128"},"modified":"2008-11-10T22:25:08","modified_gmt":"2008-11-11T06:25:08","slug":"birthday-presents-of-mine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/2008\/11\/10\/birthday-presents-of-mine\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiking gear: the best birthday present"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every year my mom mails me a birthday<\/a> check, which I promptly squander on hiking gear. This way I get to pretend like I’m a smelly, unshaven (but way-cool) outdoors dude who’s so broke he still needs checks from home to avoid dumpster diving at the local REI. Well, the smelly, unshaven part stands. <\/p>\n

A previous check went toward one of the last-ever Dana Design packs, a cross-country ski pack that has never seen snow but has carted my hiking kit all over the Bay Area. It’s built to withstand a nuclear blast, and I always look vaguely silly on the trail with all this pack on such nowhere-near-out-of-bounds terrain. So I decided to go smaller and lighter. <\/p>\n

\"Gregory<\/a>After an hour-and-a-half power-shopping session at Mel Cotton’s<\/a> that would’ve impressed Imelda Marcos, I settled on a nice little number called the Gregory Icarus<\/a>. Why they thought it’d be neat to name a pack after a mythical boy who plunges to his demise after flying too close to the sun is beyond me, but anyway, that’s what it looks like at right. <\/p>\n

It’s quite light, made mostly of silicone-impregnated nylon, and very comfy. Has lots of pockets (though no hole for a hydration hose; not like you really need one but still). Here’s a review<\/a> by a real live mountain-climber type who likes his fine (more of his exploits here<\/a>.). It’s about 1500 cubic inches, has a waist belt with a handy ditty pocket, lots of straps and exterior water bottle pockets that are unreachable while you’re wearing it. Goes for $89 but I got it $20 off. <\/p>\n

This is my second Gregory pack; I can’t speak for the rest of Gregory’s line but I’ve gotten great fit from mine. <\/p>\n

\"Camp<\/a>The pack was the main thing, but I also needed some rain gear. I thought about using Mom’s check as a down payment for the latest EVent hard shell (this one by Integral Designs<\/a> and this one from REI<\/a> caught my eye) but it occurred to me that I almost never go out in the rain anyway, and all I really need is a nice poncho with eyelets sewn in so it can double as a shelter in a pinch. I picked up this one from Camp Inn for $25 and change. <\/p>\n

(Betcha didn’t know Camp Inn has been around since 1915<\/a>).<\/p>\n

\"Kleen<\/a>Last thing I picked up: a pair of these Kleen Kanteen bottles<\/a>. I don’t know how much of the concern over plastics leaching into our liquids is justified, but I do know that the plastic taste from Nalgene bottles pretty much always sucks. These are pricey at $17 a pop, but they look like they’d last a lifetime (provided you don’t drive the car over one).<\/p>\n

The screw caps are kind of inconvenient to open every time you feel a thirst, so I ordered a “sport cap<\/a>” that lets you take a sip without unscrewing. Also ordered a sling<\/a> to keep one bottle where I can reach it and avoid dislocating my collarbone trying to get one out of my new pack. Another rationale for the sling: these things are extremely slippery. When you drop one down a thousand-foot gorge, at least you’ll have the comfort of knowing it won’t shatter when it lands. (Might knock a marmot out cold but hey, anything can happen in the wilderness). <\/p>\n

Incidentally, the REI EVent jacket I mentioned (called the Shuksan) is selling like hotcakes — they didn’t have any size larges left in the Saratoga store, the biggest one in the South Bay, on Monday. I was sorely tempted — it really looks like a great jacket — but I decided it’d be more fun to buy a bunch of cheap stuff rather than the Cadillac of backcountry overcoats.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every year my mom mails me a birthday check, which I promptly squander on hiking gear. This way I get to pretend like I’m a smelly, unshaven (but way-cool) outdoors dude who’s so broke he still needs checks from home…<\/p>\n

Read the whole thing<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[34],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2128"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2128"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2128\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tommangan.net\/twoheeldrive\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}