Backpacking --- Resources ---

Useful backpacking resources.

This album contains links to useful backpacking resources.

I've built lots of LED lights. One is built right into my climbing helmet (look at pictures of the red Cassin Mercury helmet from September 2003 to August 2007). In 2001 I built a red LED headlamp and created a complete set of instructions for anyone interested in duplicating it. I don't use this headlamp much these days, but the instructions are still quite useful.

Check out a riff I wrote about my tent in response to a question from a friend.

This is something I wrote about water purificaton that people often ask me to resend.

Around 1999 I started getting into ultralight backpacking. Got my pack weight, not counting food and water, to under 10 pounds for three season travel. Eventually, I found my comfort suffered. Mostly in terms of the pack and sleeping pad. Where I once used a thin foam pad, now I use a 3" thick Exped mattress (which only weighs 29oz). Where I once used a 12oz pack, now I carry my old, heavy Dana Bomb pack. I find the Dana is more comfortable at a total weight of 14lbs than the ultralight pack was at 10lbs. And the Dana has the capability to carry 35 or 45lbs, which an ultralight pack can't do at all. My ultralight pack was the GVP G4. While I no longer use it, I still do think highly of it. This is a review of the GVP G4 that I wrote for a friend.

One thing about being an ultralight zealot... you weigh all your gear. And if you think I'm a freak for collecting this information and making it available on the web, just think what a freak you are for looking at it.

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