|
I also got two nice stickers and another PCT map (I got my first with the PCTA registration), so now I have an extra map to bring to my parents, so they can follow up on my progress easily.
|
Friday, February 28, 2014
Canada Permits are here!
I also got two nice stickers and another PCT map (I got my first with the PCTA registration), so now I have an extra map to bring to my parents, so they can follow up on my progress easily.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Shopping Spree (Wont somebody please stop me?)
OK. I've done it again. And again. (And again).
I was eyeing this very nice and lightweight wind shirt (The Mountain Hardwear
Ghost Whisperer Anorak) at Sierra Trading Post
for a while now, keeping it in my shopping cart. At first I was really excited about this special sale they were
having, offering it with an additional %30+ discount over their usual discount rate (I think it's %25), and then I
decided I don't really need it at the moment (=got vetoed over it at home), and was a bit bummed the sale was
over.
Then I noticed that STP are having sales constantly, each with %25-%35 off on most items, and sometimes even more on several selected ones. So I decided to just keep an eye on the jacket, and see how it goes. Over the past 1-2 weeks I think I once saw "my" jacket for as low as $60, and I didn't buy it at the time. But it got harder and harder to just check it out every day or two, and convince myself that I can manage without it, or at most just buy it as I go along on the trail.
Finally, I decided I will actually get it and be done with it. I might regret it later, but it was on for $65, and the shipping and tax brought it up to ~$80. It's still not bad, considering its full price is $140, though currently even the Mountain Hardwear site is offering it for $107.90.
Then I started looking at the Chrome Dome Trekking Umbrella. I was watching the movie "Tell it on the Mountain" several weeks ago with
my girlfriend and several friends, and one of the things that struck us most was the heat and exposure in the desert
parts of the hike. I don't mind getting wet in the rain (At least, that's what I'm telling myself at the moment),
but I don't want to ruin my skin in the long term, just because I wasn't careful enough in the California Desert. I
am not sure that the umbrella is neccesary, and not just an over-weight luxury item I will be carrying for no need.
But I decided I'd give it a try. It is not too expensive, and at most, I can just leave it at some hiker box and
carry on under my wide-brimmed hat.
Ordering the umbrella wasn't easy, though. The GoLite site does not allow using an international credit card, or PayPal/Google Checkout account, even though my shipping address was in the US anyway. I had to contact their support and ask for instructions, and was told that I can order using an international credit card by phone. It took me several days, but today I finally called them, and ordered the umbrella. The order went surprisingly smooth, except for a mistake in the email address they wrote down, but I have just fixed that by chatting with their online chat support. So that's good.
As a final purchase, I have also just ordered a set of Halfmile maps from Yogi's store. The maps themselves are free to download from his site, which I have. The "problem" is printing all 455 pages... I was trying to print them somewhere in Israel, so I can experiment with double sided and even half size printing, but I failed to find a local print shop that can print on Letter size paper (Over here the standard is A4). I almost found one, but they weren't really answering my emails, and wouldn't give me any quote, even for a 3 page test print.
Even though Yogi is offering the full set for $30, I asked Matt Signore, who is the one dealing with the printing at Yogi's store, for a quote on half size maps (2 per side/4 per page). He offered this option for $18, but at the end I decided I'd go with the full size maps. A small test print on A4 with half size seemed almost ok, but some of the numbers were a bit too small to read, and at the end I decided that I'd rather be a bit on the safe side on this one.
So, three items. I hope this marks the end (apart from some smaller items I'll buy in the US, maybe).
I got all three items shipped to the Trail Angels' house in San Diego, so thanks again for their kind help in keeping my shipping costs to a minimum. It makes a very big difference.
|
| Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer Anorak |
Then I noticed that STP are having sales constantly, each with %25-%35 off on most items, and sometimes even more on several selected ones. So I decided to just keep an eye on the jacket, and see how it goes. Over the past 1-2 weeks I think I once saw "my" jacket for as low as $60, and I didn't buy it at the time. But it got harder and harder to just check it out every day or two, and convince myself that I can manage without it, or at most just buy it as I go along on the trail.
Finally, I decided I will actually get it and be done with it. I might regret it later, but it was on for $65, and the shipping and tax brought it up to ~$80. It's still not bad, considering its full price is $140, though currently even the Mountain Hardwear site is offering it for $107.90.
|
| GoLite Chrome Dome Trekking Umbrella |
Ordering the umbrella wasn't easy, though. The GoLite site does not allow using an international credit card, or PayPal/Google Checkout account, even though my shipping address was in the US anyway. I had to contact their support and ask for instructions, and was told that I can order using an international credit card by phone. It took me several days, but today I finally called them, and ordered the umbrella. The order went surprisingly smooth, except for a mistake in the email address they wrote down, but I have just fixed that by chatting with their online chat support. So that's good.
As a final purchase, I have also just ordered a set of Halfmile maps from Yogi's store. The maps themselves are free to download from his site, which I have. The "problem" is printing all 455 pages... I was trying to print them somewhere in Israel, so I can experiment with double sided and even half size printing, but I failed to find a local print shop that can print on Letter size paper (Over here the standard is A4). I almost found one, but they weren't really answering my emails, and wouldn't give me any quote, even for a 3 page test print.
Even though Yogi is offering the full set for $30, I asked Matt Signore, who is the one dealing with the printing at Yogi's store, for a quote on half size maps (2 per side/4 per page). He offered this option for $18, but at the end I decided I'd go with the full size maps. A small test print on A4 with half size seemed almost ok, but some of the numbers were a bit too small to read, and at the end I decided that I'd rather be a bit on the safe side on this one.
So, three items. I hope this marks the end (apart from some smaller items I'll buy in the US, maybe).
I got all three items shipped to the Trail Angels' house in San Diego, so thanks again for their kind help in keeping my shipping costs to a minimum. It makes a very big difference.
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
A strange pair of shades
Yesterday I got my Fast Find 220 device,
rented from Small-World. It seems like a small-enough
device, and I hope I will never need it.
I specifically chose a device with only an emergency option (No daily updates, or checking in along the trail), because I don't want my girlfriend to be worried if I accidentally forget to check in some day, or if it fails somehow. I will call home every chance I've got, and I believe that will be enough to keep everyone back here at ease.
Well, things are moving along. Scary stuff...
|
I specifically chose a device with only an emergency option (No daily updates, or checking in along the trail), because I don't want my girlfriend to be worried if I accidentally forget to check in some day, or if it fails somehow. I will call home every chance I've got, and I believe that will be enough to keep everyone back here at ease.
Well, things are moving along. Scary stuff...
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
The great map fiasco
There are currently three available options for getting good maps for the trail (that I considered/know of)
- Halfmile's, Postholer's and Eric the Black's. I guess all three of them would "work",
in that I will probably not get totally lost, but I really liked the "open source" feel of the Halfmile project, and
I decided that I will use his maps and notes for my hike. I know that having a free digital copy of the maps is only
half the work, since printing them all (~450 color pages) would still cost money. But it seems like a simpler and
nicer option than ordering a map book from one of the other publishers.
My plan was to wait for 2014 edition of Halfmile's maps, and print them at some local print shop in Tel Aviv, so I can drool over them at home, and also maybe try and arrange them into manageable chinks, ready for future mail drops (Though currently it seems as though I will just have one big chunk inside my bounce box).
I also wanted to experiment a bit with different formats - namely color/black & white printing (To save on printing costs, especially if I decide to primarily use my smartphone for mapping, and the paper maps only as a last resort), single sided/double sided printing (To save weight, but I have to make sure the backside map won't interfere with the front side map), and maybe even printing two smaller maps per page (This will save cost AND weight).
Well, several weeks ago Halfmile finally released the 2014 update, and I immediately downloaded all the files from the site, extracted the pdfs and started moving with my plans. I created a simple 2 page file (The first 2 maps of the trail), so I can test some of my options, and was also relieved to discover Adobe Acrobat can easily print 2 maps per page, with automatically rotating and placing them at the correct size, while retaining the aspect ratio. Before discovering that, I tried to calculate how much I'd need to resize each map to fit two per page (.64, in case you were wondering), all because Halfmile's maps are designed to be printed on Letter pages (8.5"X11"), and not on the simpler A4 format (where it would have been a nice .5 ratio...). Well - Adobe did that for me automagically. So I also created another simple file with 2 pages, containing the first 4 maps of the trail, as an experiment as well.
I then sent those two files to a print shop, asking that each option will be printed once in color, and once in black & white, all on letter paper size, and all in double side (I gave up on the single side option. Seems like a waste of paper/weight).
Yesterday I finally picked up my prints. A complete disaster. All printed on single sided A4 papers, it's
just useless to me. Not to mention the fact that I probably won't be printing the whole set at this place now.
I might try a different place, if I can be sure they manage to follow my simple instructions. But lately a new option has come up - Yoggi is offering a low cost print of HalfMile's maps, that can be sent to the San Diego trail angels for a total of about $40. Seems like a really good price, and it also saves me the hassle of dealing with all those prints myself. The only downside for this is that I can't get the two-maps-per-page option, which I'm still thinking about. I guess I'll have to decide soon enough.
My plan was to wait for 2014 edition of Halfmile's maps, and print them at some local print shop in Tel Aviv, so I can drool over them at home, and also maybe try and arrange them into manageable chinks, ready for future mail drops (Though currently it seems as though I will just have one big chunk inside my bounce box).
I also wanted to experiment a bit with different formats - namely color/black & white printing (To save on printing costs, especially if I decide to primarily use my smartphone for mapping, and the paper maps only as a last resort), single sided/double sided printing (To save weight, but I have to make sure the backside map won't interfere with the front side map), and maybe even printing two smaller maps per page (This will save cost AND weight).
Well, several weeks ago Halfmile finally released the 2014 update, and I immediately downloaded all the files from the site, extracted the pdfs and started moving with my plans. I created a simple 2 page file (The first 2 maps of the trail), so I can test some of my options, and was also relieved to discover Adobe Acrobat can easily print 2 maps per page, with automatically rotating and placing them at the correct size, while retaining the aspect ratio. Before discovering that, I tried to calculate how much I'd need to resize each map to fit two per page (.64, in case you were wondering), all because Halfmile's maps are designed to be printed on Letter pages (8.5"X11"), and not on the simpler A4 format (where it would have been a nice .5 ratio...). Well - Adobe did that for me automagically. So I also created another simple file with 2 pages, containing the first 4 maps of the trail, as an experiment as well.
I then sent those two files to a print shop, asking that each option will be printed once in color, and once in black & white, all on letter paper size, and all in double side (I gave up on the single side option. Seems like a waste of paper/weight).
|
| Botched map attempt |
I might try a different place, if I can be sure they manage to follow my simple instructions. But lately a new option has come up - Yoggi is offering a low cost print of HalfMile's maps, that can be sent to the San Diego trail angels for a total of about $40. Seems like a really good price, and it also saves me the hassle of dealing with all those prints myself. The only downside for this is that I can't get the two-maps-per-page option, which I'm still thinking about. I guess I'll have to decide soon enough.
Friday, January 31, 2014
Solar Panel Part 2
During my short trip in the Carmel recently, I tried testing my improvised solar panel to see if it can charge my
phone. It did not perform as expected. In retrospect I can say it was probably because we were mostly under trees,
and in the shade. Not the optimal conditions to test a solar charger. But when I got back home that day, I felt as
though it's not going to work between us.
After reading many favorable reviews on the Suntactics sCharger 5, I decided to buy a kit, along with an external 6000mA battery. The kit also comes along with a 10 LED usb powered light, which I'm going to leave at home. I really don't see any use for it on the trail.
The price was not so bad, with a sale price of $152.95, and a work colleague of mine was just taking of for 4 days in Seattle, so I took the opportunity and asked him to bring it over for me, after I order it to his hotel. Luckily, this crazy plan worked, and I am now the proud owner of the sCharger 5. Yay for me.
The panel does look much better than my improvised one. Sturdy and simple, just a panel with a USB output. The
external battery also seems like a good deal, with two USB outputs (1.2mA and 2.1mA), so I guess I will be able to
charge both my phone and my camera at the same time (I just need 2 USB cables for it). This will come in handy, I
guess.
I just need to figure out how I can secure the panel to my backpack, so it will be out and open to the sunlight while I hike.
As a side note - after ordering the sCharger, I took my improvised panel for another spin. This time I just put it outside of the window, in direct sunlight, and it charged two phones easily. I guess I was too quick on the gun with the decision to buy a charger. But the sCharger does come with the battery, which is a bonus, and it does seem better than mine anyway. So it was not all a waste of good money...
After reading many favorable reviews on the Suntactics sCharger 5, I decided to buy a kit, along with an external 6000mA battery. The kit also comes along with a 10 LED usb powered light, which I'm going to leave at home. I really don't see any use for it on the trail.
The price was not so bad, with a sale price of $152.95, and a work colleague of mine was just taking of for 4 days in Seattle, so I took the opportunity and asked him to bring it over for me, after I order it to his hotel. Luckily, this crazy plan worked, and I am now the proud owner of the sCharger 5. Yay for me.
|
| Panel with case, battery with its own little case, the LED is hiding beneath the instruction manuals. |
I just need to figure out how I can secure the panel to my backpack, so it will be out and open to the sunlight while I hike.
As a side note - after ordering the sCharger, I took my improvised panel for another spin. This time I just put it outside of the window, in direct sunlight, and it charged two phones easily. I guess I was too quick on the gun with the decision to buy a charger. But the sCharger does come with the battery, which is a bonus, and it does seem better than mine anyway. So it was not all a waste of good money...
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Got plane tickets!
Last week I finally bought my plane tickets. There were many back-and-forth discussions about the best course to
take (tlv-lax and then back lax-tlv, or tlv-san and then back from Seattle...), and many price shifts, and annoying
web sites showing not-current information.
At the end, I used a local travel agency, just to make sure I understand the change policy of the ticket I'm getting, and to have someone to call when I'm in the middle of nowhere and in need of some travel-related assistance. The route itself was something a fellow Israeli hiker was talking about TLV-CDG-ORD-SAN, and the price was ~$1360 (back from Seattle). I can live with that. We will both be on the same flight, and start the trail together.
The date, you ask? I'll be taking off (and landing, actually. Because of the time differences) at April 9th. I guess we will start around the 11th, or maybe 12th. We will see how the jet lag and general tiredness hits us.
At the end, I used a local travel agency, just to make sure I understand the change policy of the ticket I'm getting, and to have someone to call when I'm in the middle of nowhere and in need of some travel-related assistance. The route itself was something a fellow Israeli hiker was talking about TLV-CDG-ORD-SAN, and the price was ~$1360 (back from Seattle). I can live with that. We will both be on the same flight, and start the trail together.
The date, you ask? I'll be taking off (and landing, actually. Because of the time differences) at April 9th. I guess we will start around the 11th, or maybe 12th. We will see how the jet lag and general tiredness hits us.
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Fire Hazard Warnings
I was a bit worried about the snow sections of the PCT, having no real snow experience except for the recent trip
around the Mont Blanc. So I'm a little bit relieved so far, with the current snow levels so low it appears I won't
have a hard time crossing the Sierras even when starting a bit early.
Sadly, this drought also causes severe fire warnings in California, as a recent PCTA blog post announced. It seems open fire cooking stoves will not be allowed in most places along the PCT. So there goes my plan to use the lightweight Caldera Keg System to cook my dinners.
The quest is on, to figure out what stove I'll buy/use on the trail.
I took out my old MSR Whisperlite stove from the gear closet. I bought it back before I
started hiking the AT. I didn't know what I was doing with it, and filled up my fuel bottle with kerosene. For the
first 4 days on the trail, I cooked mainly in open flame burning over small kerosene puddles it created. When I got
to Neals Gap, I went through the "Gear Shakedown", and got rid of loads of stuff I sent back home. I bought an
alcohol cat stove which cooked my dinners along the trail, and I hadn't looked back on the Whisperlite since...
Well, I did take it with me on several 2 day outings here in Israel, and learned how to use it properly with
White Gas, to cook decent meals. I can make it work.
Today I weighed it, and it's around 322gr (11.35oz) for the stove itself, 335gr (11.81oz) for the pot and lid, and about 585gr(20.63oz) for a 3/4 full fuel bottle. That's crazy! I want my alcohol (stove) back!
I will probably replace the pot to some titanium <1L cup. I think will be enough for my daily meals. But that's more money on gear, and more logistics to get it to Israel.
I started looking at MSR/Primus/Jetboil sites for their lightest stove options. Some are really expensive, and some are not that light. MSR have the impressive but expensive Reactor Stove Systems ($190). It is a bit like JetBoil ($160) - an integrated system with a pot stand and pot. They also have the lighter and simpler MicroRocket ($60) and PocketRocket ($40) (be careful - this is also the name of a famous sex toy).
I just got a tip to go to Sierra Trading Post, after liking their Facebook page. That gets you an extra %25 off, until Jan 28th. They are offering the Snow Peak Litemax Titanium Stove for $35, with this sale. Seems like a good deal. Shipping to Israel will double the price, but maybe I can have it shipped to somebody in the US to keep it for me until I get there.
UPDATE:
I have ordered the above mentioned Litemax, and also an Evernew .75 L Ultralight Pasta Pot from TrailDesigns.com. They will wait for me at the Trail Angels' house in San Diego. Can't wait to get there and open all my presents...
Sadly, this drought also causes severe fire warnings in California, as a recent PCTA blog post announced. It seems open fire cooking stoves will not be allowed in most places along the PCT. So there goes my plan to use the lightweight Caldera Keg System to cook my dinners.
The quest is on, to figure out what stove I'll buy/use on the trail.
|
| On the left - Caldera Keg-F system with spare can. On the right - MSR Whisperlite stove with fuel bottle, wind screen and pot. |
|
| My complete Whisperlite kit. The pot is in a pretty bad shape. |
Today I weighed it, and it's around 322gr (11.35oz) for the stove itself, 335gr (11.81oz) for the pot and lid, and about 585gr(20.63oz) for a 3/4 full fuel bottle. That's crazy! I want my alcohol (stove) back!
I will probably replace the pot to some titanium <1L cup. I think will be enough for my daily meals. But that's more money on gear, and more logistics to get it to Israel.
I started looking at MSR/Primus/Jetboil sites for their lightest stove options. Some are really expensive, and some are not that light. MSR have the impressive but expensive Reactor Stove Systems ($190). It is a bit like JetBoil ($160) - an integrated system with a pot stand and pot. They also have the lighter and simpler MicroRocket ($60) and PocketRocket ($40) (be careful - this is also the name of a famous sex toy).
I just got a tip to go to Sierra Trading Post, after liking their Facebook page. That gets you an extra %25 off, until Jan 28th. They are offering the Snow Peak Litemax Titanium Stove for $35, with this sale. Seems like a good deal. Shipping to Israel will double the price, but maybe I can have it shipped to somebody in the US to keep it for me until I get there.
UPDATE:
I have ordered the above mentioned Litemax, and also an Evernew .75 L Ultralight Pasta Pot from TrailDesigns.com. They will wait for me at the Trail Angels' house in San Diego. Can't wait to get there and open all my presents...
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