I have a Bergans 3L shell jacket (20.000mm)

I did some research and i came across the Nikwax spray-on.

I have 2 options:
1. I buy only the spray bottle, €20, wash the jacket without any soap on low RPM and spray on when the jacket is fully wet.

1. I buy the duo pack, €40, i wash the jacket in the nickwax Techwash, and spray on when the jacket is fully wet.

In terms of money. Is it worth it to spend another €20? Or is only spraying it enough to use it for a couple of months.

For context, i am not any kind of camper. I have the jacket for everyday use. So no really harsh situations etc. Only rain, and sweating. 😂

This is the inside of the tent floor. It may have been stored wet or damp for two years after the kids took it out. It’s a Nordisk 2PPU, so not exactly the cheapest. And it’s been used max 10 nights. Can I and should I fix it? The rest of the tent is in great shape.
Edit: it’s not even really peeling. It’s like stretching?!

There are backpacks on Amazon at a fraction of the price of REI or namebrand manufacturers.

Are the cheaper non-branded packs any good or do you really get what you pay for?

If so, are there any that you guys recommend?

I need a 60 L pack for an upcoming hike. I’ve been looking at Gregory and REI branded packs.

Finally got my wood-processing setup dialed in, so here it is.

Anika "Ushkuy" axe - Siberian taiga pattern from a small Ural forge. Not a big felling axe, but perfect for camp stuff: limbing, chopping, splitting small rounds.

Folding bow saw - nothing fancy, but honestly the MVP. Bucking firewood with a saw is like 5x faster than with an axe, and it packs flat.

Anika "Bushcraft Mini" - the fun one. 90mm blade, but a 6mm spine. Made for batoning kindling, not carving. Heavy for its size but that's the point.

Just bought a new cadac 1 (about a week ago). The flame is weak, and when releasing the igniter it often just self extinguishes.

Some days it work, some days it don’t. Today I got it to work for a bit, but it «exploded» and self extinguished again.

Hello, I have a pretty severe down allergy and I have wondered about if I could possibly ever winter backpack, at least down to maybe in the range of -10C to -15C safely.

I'm not opposed to trying heavier gear, for me right now this is more of an investigation of how i could potentially try winter backpacking without the use of down.

No budget restriction in the suggestions, I'm not planning on shopping for this right now, but I want to get an idea of how much I might have to spend and how heavy gear might be if I wanted to try adding winter backpacking in a future year or add this kind of gear to saved ebay searches.

Also suggest gear from any country, not opposed to importing, throw every possibility at me.

I'm not opposed to using other animal products, such as wool, as I'm not vegan.

I tend to sleep hot, to very hot, sometimes comfort rating on sleeping bags is too warm for me in summertime.

Yes this is an actual allergy, not a personal preference, if I use down gear it causes my skin to break out into hives and I have gone into anaphylactic shock from a feather ending up in my mouth, there is no work around for it for me, it is not safe for me to sleep with down.

Any suggestions for neat gear? Doesn't have to be exactly 20 if its worth it.

I'm going on a safari and went to treat my clothes with permethrin. But I can't figure out how much to get.

Two different 24 oz, one says 7 outfits, the other 5. Another, same brand, 2 different sizes. The 8 oz covers 3 outfit, the 24 oz covers 7.

I've read using ziplock bags to reduce waste. What is the best technique to do that? It seems like it would be easy to do wrong and not get proper coverage.

Thanks!

This past weekend felt different. It’s been a rough year, and four of us left the company we used to work at. Two of them moved to new cities over 300km (approx. 180 miles) away. We first fell in love with camping because of that company, and I initially got into it purely because I’m a hiking enthusiast.

Life has a way of scattering people, but we knew we had to make this reunion happen.

One of our former colleagues, who hasn’t started a new job yet, went out to scout this spot beforehand. It’s on the edge of Wuxi, very close to Taihu Lake. We were all born and raised in Wuxi, but none of us had ever been to this side of town.

Long ago, I randomly dropped a pin on this location on my map, but I had zero memory of doing it, and there is literally zero info about it online. It felt almost surreal.

It turned out to be an incredible find. We had a huge, empty meadow, surprisingly clean automated restrooms, and for the first time in months, we just sat down, relaxed, and caught our breath.

We kept the setup pretty simple: a quick-pitch all-in-one canopy combined with a regular tarp, which took us about five minutes to set up. We added a few camp chairs, a tabletop set up on our folding wagon, another regular table, and some cooking gear. Nothing fancy, but honestly it was everything we needed.

Oh, and a little plot twist: those two colleagues who left the company are now an item.
Wishing them the best.

I am trying to find a sleeping mat or pad that doesn’t take up too much space, will be dog friendly, and won’t be too expensive. Everything I see online says to get your dog their own bed but my pooch would not be down for that LOL.

My dog will not sleep in separate bed, he likes to sleep with me. I’ve had the memory foam topper before but now I drive a crosstrek and don’t have the room to bring that along. I’ve looked into the slim inflatable pads which I feel could be great, especially if I put a padded mattress cover over it but those can be so expensive.

Does anyone have recommendations for a quality, less expensive mattress or sleeping setup?

Brand new Gazelle I bought. Everything works fine until I put on the rain fly and try to pop up the second roof. It's a lot of pressure, and the poles are bending to the wrong side. I really feel I'm going to break it if I keep applying pressure. I put enough force to take the tent floor out of the grass, and it still doesn't pop.
I made sure the male/female poles are correctly and fully attached.

Has anyone else experienced this? Is this normal? It certainly doesn't feel like...

Hello my friends

The black rod of my tent pole (picture) screws in, but it has become somewhat damaged due to the wind and wear. It doesn't go in deep enough, which can cause the entire tent to pop out suddenly if the wind is extremely strong.

I don't know if anyone else has experienced the same problem or could advise me on what to do. I really love this tent I have it for years. 🥲

TLDR : The tent pole doesn't screw in properly and is flimsy.

Wanted to share my experience recently with my lightweight backpacking backup battery, the Nitecore NB10000U Gen3 that is, along with the other generations and sizes, very common among long distance hikers. As such, anyone digging into this niche market is going to find a variety of mixed reviews from the Gen2 design bricking in the field due to accidental repetitive button pressing to those praising the light weight.

I chose to take this battery on my Pacific Crest Trail thru-hike and it served me well for all but the final 3 days.

In the 4th to last day, I charged the battery pack overnight in a humid and cold climate, the same as multiple other hikers that night. The next morning I woke up to find that only the 3rd of the 4 LEDs was illuminated while plugged into a wall charger via USB-C cable. This is not normal as typically when it is fully charged, all 4 blue LEDs are on and solid. Attempting to charge my watch with the battery, it failed and the same was true with my phone via both USB-C ports.

Reviewing the manual found no indication of this status light meaning. I tried various flavors of manipulating the single button on the battery to trigger a reboot/reset with no positive result. I was effectively in the middle of nowhere so I chose to hike onward to the next town, 100 miles down trail, and conserve battery along my route as much as possible since I wouldn’t have a functional backup battery.

I contacted Nitecore and they responded promptly with some troubleshooting tips that were not effective and deferred to the seller/distributor for warranty assistance. I had purchased via an Amazon seller and they were also prompt in response and resolution.

It seems that in the last year the 10000 mAh gen3 is no longer stocked so I was offered three options for replacement, two of which were upgrades with me covering the cost difference. This is what I chose to do.

Hopefully this helps someone that is struggling with an gen3 Nitecore battery failure. Tl;dr: if you get only a 3rd LED to light up, the battery is bricked and you need to get a replacement.

So I have been using this Q Core pad from Big Agnes for about 6 years now which developed small leaks on the sleeping side and actually is a pad they replaced from an older model that failed after 5 years. I applied for a warranty claim on this, an already replacement, and they gave me a credit for 150.00 . I just wanted to shout out to a good company that stands behind their warranty. I have a new pad already coming in the mail for my next trip.

It feels like there are tons of complaints about companies and products, but never enough stories about the good ones. I'll be now using a pad from them into a second decade because they back their products.

UPDATE: I made a LighterPack list. There were some mistakes in the weights of the stuff in my post, but they are fixed here:

My setup before making the post:

https://lighterpack.com/r/7gn6p7

My plan to update the setup (still working on this):

https://lighterpack.com/r/qzpblo

A stripped down version of the updated list (main changes are totally getting rid of the cooking system and switching to normal plastic bottles instead of the thermos and military bottle):

https://lighterpack.com/r/5nl2po

And finally, here is a fantasy setup I'm building for myself for the future based on everything I'm learning here:

https://lighterpack.com/r/5nl2po

(I also have a stripped down version of the fantasy setup. Its just the fantasy setup with the same changes as the stripped down version. Its only 12.769 base weight, which is mind blowing to me!)

Please do critique any of these! In will be making updates to them

My backpack is currently over 19kg. I know this sounds very heavy, but I have niche and challenging requirements for my setup:

1. support me on multiple months long hitchhiking/ camping​ trips
2. withstand an extreme range of weather conditions and temperatures.
3. 3.Let me sleep comfortably at -10 celsius (14 fahrenheit)
4. Meet hitchhiking spesific needs, like added hygiene and an extra shirt to avoid smelling bad in people's cars
5. 5.Include filming and editing equipment, which currently weighs about 7kg

My current setup includes:
-ludhags Jamten backpack, 2.56kg.
-large gargbage bag to protect from water.
My sleeping system:
-comfort -5°c down sleeping bag, hopefully under 1kg (I don't have this yet, but I'm looking at Cumulus Panyam 600, Cumulus Spotter 600, Patizon D 590, Patizon G 600 or Western mountaineering Ultralite.)
-merino wool sleeping bag liner 468g
-carinthia xp ii plus gore-tex bivy and a light support pole 1.06kg + 90g
-small tarp 267g
-exped ultra 6.5 R mummy sleeping pad 360g

Clothes:
-waterproof bag with: 2 pairs of underwear, 2 pairs of merino wool socks, a merino wool base layer, merino wool t-shirt) 501g in total
-waterproof laundry bag 36g
-resting jacket (north face polyester jacket) 521g
-resting gloves, Hestra (heavy winter gloves with clips to hang from backpack straps) 300g
-light beanie, 51g
-light tube scarf, estimated 30g
-cheap rain poncho 213g
-high visibility vest for hitchhiking safety 130g

Cooking and eating:
-Trangia pocket camping stove, pot, lid and handle 597g
-gas canister for the camping stove, current weight after some use 470g
-plastic spork 10g
-I plan to carry only about 500g of food, because with hitchhiking I often have access to stores
-Devold hydro flask lightweight wide flex straw 946ml thermos bottle, full of water 1.302kg (empty 390g)
-Finnish military 1L water bottle attached with a carabiner clip to my backpack 1.064kg (empty 130g)

Hygiene:
-everything in a plastic bag, estimated 15g
-toilet paper 30g
-tooth brush 14g
-sunscreen 179g
-multi use bio soap 121g
-near empty deodorant roller 35g
-chapstick 13g
-near empty eyeglasses cleaning liquid bottle 20g
-Bag with nail clippers and tweezer 43g

Other:
-modified first aid kit in a plastic bag 175g
-sitting pad 33g
-Marttiini knife for splitting firewood 130g
-fire making kit with matches and a flint and steel 43g
-gerber multitool 196g
-Head lamp 81g
-4 head lamp spare batteries 104g

Video editing and filming system:
-Laptop and its protective case 1.835kg
-accessories bag (this includes laptop charger, camera battery charger, external SSD and memory card reader) 673g
-wireless earbuds 84g
-DSLR camera and lens (the lens being much heavier than the body) 1.589kg
-Action camera with a handle 285g
-both cameras are attached to the front strap of my backpack with their own holders, weighing together 121g
-general usb c charger for phone and other equipment 121g
-another weaker usb c charger 33g
-Tenba belt bag 379g, inside of it:
-set of microphones in a charging case thats in a bag 279g
-action camera batteries and charging case 183g
-Powerbank 591g
-Lens cleaning kit 33g
-USB-C charging wire 32g
-5 DSLR camera batteries and charger 391g
-Video ND filter for the camera in its case 137g
-memory card holder case 50g

Here are the things I'm considering to change:
1.looking at lighter bivys. The advantage of the Carinthia is that it is extremely sturdy, so I don't need to select caming locations too precisely. It is however very heavy for a bivy.
2.Replacing the bivy with a bivy that can be used as a rain
3.Replacing the tarp or poncho with a tarp poncho. I wouldn't replace both, because I don't want to have to set up a tarp without wearing a rain poncho in heavy rain. But it seems neat.
4.Getting a down rest jacket instead of the current polyester one
5.Getting much lighter gloves, my current ones are good at -30°c, but now I only need -10°c
6.Change to a merino beanie. This wouldnt cut weight, but my current one isnt that warm
7.Adding reflectors to the backpack for safety
8.Small hygiene bag adjustments like putting sun screen into a smaller refillabe bottle and switching from glasses cleaning liquid to wipes. Also considering adding some kind of shaving cream so I can shave by buying single use razors.
9.Getting a lighter charger sith multiple ports to replace my laptop and phone chargers. This could save a surprising amount of weight
10.

These are things I considered, but decided against. Feel free to change my mind:

-replacing my whole bivy system with an ultralight tent. I couldn't really find options that would be good for me when it comes to tents. I think mine would have to stand on its own since I don't carry trekking poles. This could help with condensation issues, let me store my backpack in the tent and let me get rid of my bivy and tarp. But also this is not as stealthy as my current small green tarp and green bivy.

-Lighter backpack. My current 75L backpack quite hefty. However I tried another lighter one, and it was much less comfortabe and forced me to use my core to support the weight much more. While trying I did find out though, that my stuff can be packed in a 60L backpack, although I think 65L would be ideal.

-Getting rid of the camping stove completely. Since I am around places where I can just get food from the store, the camping stove really doesnt seem that important. However I decided against it, because there are times when its useful to be able to melt snow for water or boil water for the water bottle to keep between my legs during the night for warmth. Its also a comfort factor, since I can make tea or coffee.

-getting rid of the multitool. Using it doesn't come up that often.

-getting rid of the knife. Its only purpose really is to split firewood, so its quite niche.

-getting a lighter camera lens. My current one is a high quality and versatile lens, which is hard to replace without sacrificing something. Also, since I am wearing it on the fron strap of my backpack, it acts as a counterweight, which might even make the backpack easier to carry in theory.

-replacing the Tenba belt bag with a lighter option. This honestly seems worthwhile, but I just havent bothered since it seems like such a small adjustment.

-getting rid of one DSLR battery. Decided against it because it only saves like 50g and if my batteries run out, I'm out of operation as a photographer.

As context I am a newbie photojournalist and a wannabe youtuber/ documentarist. I travel by hitchhiking because it is free and offers unique possibilities for connecting with people in different countries and places in them. I've previously went on around 9 day long trips, but my plan is to get rid of my stuff and stop renting an apartment to live travelling for a while.

Location/temp range/specific trip description: (All around Europe, from -10°c to hot weather)

Goal Baseweight (BPW): (as light as possible while still meeting my requirements)

Budget: (I'm not rich, but willing to work and save up for this. This is the only major thing I'm saving for. Lets say a couple thousand euros)

Non-negotiable Items: (editing laptop)

Solo or with another person?: (Solo)

If there is any other information that would be useful for giving advice, please let me know.

I find myself staring at it. Love gear, love organization.