Archive for 2007

OM Sykeside Meet

Posted by on January 29th 2007 in Great Escapes, Lakes Escapes

The OM Sykeside Meet was a cracker. Not much snow about, but the weather was fine and the company was excellent, what more could you ask for? Saturday saw Ella conquer High Hartsop Dodd and Little Hart Crag, and Wansfell was added on Sunday morning. These are her first three Wainwrights, and she was really chuffed with herself. My tally is now 151, which leaves 63 more to do.

Looking towards Sykeside

Ella atop Little Hart Crag

Ella beside Caiston Beck

 

So, how did the new kit fare?

Even though I was starkers, the AD700 was far too warm to sleep in (the nights were very mild even though the wind was a bit blustery) so I used it as a blanket instead.
The Nanok sleeping socks are great for wearing in the tent. It was too mild for me to wear mine under the bag but Ella wore hers in her bag and says that they are great.
The Rab VR Climb jacket was plenty warm enough over just a baselayer top even in the high cold winds on the felltops. It's a superb windproof which withstood driving rain, I neither chilled nor overheated in it.
We had a felltop lunchstop under the TN Bothy4, there was plenty of room for us two and our packs, with space to get the Jetboil going too. Good fun when the wind was really ripping by!

Alpkit Gourdon video

Posted by on January 17th 2007 in Video (YouTube, Vimeo etc.)
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Found the Alpkit Gourdon video on YouTube - excellent!

The Nanoks arrived today

Posted by on January 17th 2007 in Shiny new kit

More kit! 🙂

They're nice and warm, lightweight and they pack down quite small - in the supplied stuffsack they measure about 3" square x 6" long, but they can be compressed to something resembling a bulging 3" cube (although in reality they'll live at the bottom of the sleeping bag and hence get compressed with it). They are an unusual fit - the elasticated top is at mid-calf height, so they feel like they need to be pulled up more, but in reality they want to fall down to ankle-height. It's no problem, though, because I fold them down to the ankle anyway. I like the fact that they don't bind on the inside of the sleeping bag because they don't have the dot-grip or rubber soles that so many hut/bothy/tent booties tend to have.

I reckon that I'll be happy with them. In an uncharacteristic fit of generosity I got a pair for SWMBO as well, so that she's got no excuse for stealing mine.

Sleeping socks

Posted by on January 15th 2007 in Shiny new kit

It's taken me ages to track them down here in the UK, but persistence paid off... I just ordered some Nanok Sleeping Socks from OutdoorCode. I figure that they'll do as tent-boots in winter. No doubt the cold-footed SWMBO will requisition them on our next wildcamp.

Grrrrrrr!!!!!

So, I needed to go out in the car, and some eejut had decided to park across the exit to my driveway, somewhat f***ing stupid if you ask me, as there was only one other car parked at the roadside in the whole of the close, so it's not as if there wasn't room for another 15 cars to be parked in a considerate manner. If you encounter the owner/driver of Ford Fusion FD53CVV, please pass on my two-fingered regards.

 

 

Top marks for Alpkit!

Posted by on January 9th 2007 in Shiny new kit
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It's less than 18 hours since ordering and the AD700 is here! It's "evil" black which looks great but after its travels it needed to go upstairs for a lie down (no pun intended) in order to regain some loft. Looks like I'll be setting up the bivvytent in the garden at the weekend so that I can see how the AD copes - let's pray for a good deep frost on Friday night. Hopefully I won't have to take advantage of Alpkit's 7-day returns policy and change the 700 for a 900.

The Tikes look quite mean too. If they don't keep the bivvytent nailed to the back lawn, nothing will.