Gear Review ~ Trekking Umbrella

I've been intrigued by the idea of hiking with an umbrella for many years (I think it started out as a Ray Jardine technique and then got picked up by the lightweight backpacking crowd in general to the point where trekking umbrellas are now readily available and you don't have to fashion your own).

I hadn't owned an umbrella since I was a little kid (I always figured, what's the point?). Then C got me a Totes trekking umbrella for Christmas, and I bought a euroSCHRIM Lightflex trekking umbrella before our trip. I had expected we'd need the umbrellas more for sun shelter than rain, and had intended to get a silver one, for better UV reflection, but there were none available at the time I ordered. As it turned out, we got at least as much rain as sun, and the umbrellas got a workout in wet weather

Pros:

• I was surprised to find I really liked hiking with an umbrella, especially in the rain. It creates like a little micro-rain-free-environment (did everyone else already know this?).
• Both umbrellas were light and not too wide or unwieldy. I preferred the Lightflex for its slightly lighter weight and more comfortable handle, and the fact that it's not collapsible (for some reason that extra step annoyed me).
• When we were hiking in on-again-off-again rain, I didn't have to dig my raincoat out of my pack and put it on and then take it off and then put it on again (or hike in a sweaty plastic coat between downpours), but rather just pop the umbrella up and then down and then up.
• I didn't have a noisy, crackly hood over my head when it was raining.
• The umbrella provided some (but not total) protection to my day pack and camera.
• It made for a handy little shelter both in camp and during trail-side rest stops.
• I was able to take pictures under it during a light rain.

Cons:

• The umbrella does not take the place of rain gear in a downpour. At the Sand Dunes, I walked to the camper registration booth and then stopped in the bathroom on my way back to our site. While I was in there, the skies opened up and by the time I got to our campsite, a few 100 yards away, I was soaked from the armpits down--the umbrella kept dry only the part of me that might be carved into a marble bust if I were an important historical figure.
• It's one more thing to pack and carry. Sometimes I did, sometimes I didn't.
• It didn't provide as much sun protection as I'd hoped. I picked a light color thinking it would be more reflective, but a lot of the sunlight shined right through. Before going on a serious desert or mountain hike in an exposed area, I would get a silver one.
• It takes up a hand. There are hacks people use to attach them hands-free to their backpacks. I didn't try this with my day pack, and I'm not sure if I'd want to lose the ability to control the direction of the umbrella.

Overall: I'm a convert. Just the convenience and elimination of annoying hood noise alone was enough to convince me. I can't wait to try it on a longer backpacking trip.

Gear Review ~ Sleeping Quilt

Before we headed out on our trip, I made myself a sleeping quilt.

Oddly enough, there are no photos of me sleeping in my sleeping bag, so we'll just rerun this picture, shall we?

I made it from a kit designed and sold by Ray Jardine, lightweight backpacking guru. I made the 1-Person Alpine version in purple. I write a little bit about the making process here.

Now, as far as the sleeping here's what I found:

Pros:

• It was so comfortable. I loved the light, soft nylon, which was silky and much less crinkly than some sleeping bag nylon. I It had enough weight to it that it wasn't like sleeping in the open (which I hate) but was still super light and put no pressure on the body. I also loved the puffiness created by the batting being tied, rather than quilted or baffled.
• I loved that it has no zipper. There was none of that confining claustrophobia of being zipped in. The quilt drapes over you and I would just cozy my feet into the foot pocket and tuck the free edges, including the loose flap of fabric ('draft-stopper') under myself. (My sleeping mat is a Thermarest with a smooth, canvas-like texture; another type of sleeping mat might have been less pleasant to sleep directly on).
• There was no annoying velcro or drawstrings to get stuck to or tangled up in.
• Light! I finally weighed it: just over 2 1/4 pounds. By comparison my old down bag is: 4 pounds!

Cons:

• The only downside, was that I got cold the night we were in the Sand Dunes. I looked up the temperature data and the low that night was 43 degrees F. This quilt is supposed to be good to 28. But I am a cold sleeper and I was wearing summer pajamas (having expected summer weather--and forgetting that we always took our winter coats camping in Colorado when I was a kid). I found a pair of yoga pants and a long-sleeved shirt in my suitcase and wore those, along with socks on subsequent nights and was much warmer. (Ray Jardine has a whole chapter in his book about sleeping warm in a lightweight bag...guess I better reread that!).

I still have plans to make more for my other family members, but I want to try it out in more camping conditions first.

Gear Review ~ GoLite Shangri-La 5 Tent

It's a bit pointless to review this tent, since the company that made it went out of business not long after I bought it, but I figure I should let my voice be heard in case some other company is thinking of riffing off a similar design and the feedback would be helpful.

I bought this tent for one reason only--it was the only lightweight backpacking tent advertised to hold five people. I ordered it just before our May camping trip last year, planning on trying it out car camping before backpacking, but it didn't arrive in time, so we applied another layer of duct tape to the poles of our dome tent and used it. Then, when we went backpacking, we had a lean-to and didn't need a tent. I planned to set it up in the yard to test it out, but never got around to it, so we broke one of the cardinal rules of camping this past May, and took a tent we'd never set up before. By then GoLite had gone out of business, and I was terrified the tent would be missing some vital component or have a major defect, but it was fine, and we really put it through its paces during our 17-day Colorado road trip--of 16 nights, we spent 12 in the tent.

The pros:

• Super easy to set up--I missed out on the first half-dozen or so set-ups because I always seemed to be delivering our camping registration while C was setting it up, but when I finally witnessed/helped with a set-up, I was amazed. No fussy pole sleeves, velcro tabs, color-coded webbing, or other engineering nightmares associated with free-standing tents--just stake out the corners, slide in the one aluminum pole, slip on the fly and boom, you're done.
• Great design--I love the pyramid shape (I call it "Giza"). I've been watching "The Crimson Field" on PBS and I see echoes of this tent in old military tents. People passing by comment on its tipi appearance.
• Waterproof--I was doubtful about this tent's ability to withstand rain, with the thin nylon of the fly, but we got rained on almost every night of this trip and not one drop came in. Even when it didn't rain, and the inside of the fly got coated with condemnation, the droplets somehow stayed outside of the internal screen shelter.
• Windproof--on our last night at Rocky Mountain National Park, the wind whipped all night long, while our tent barely let out a flutter. All the next morning, we watched other people's free-standing tents toss and buck in the wind (one woman's tent lifted up onto two stakes), while ours sat as solid as if it actually were a pyramid. (We did add guy lines and stakes that did not come with the tent--but the guy line points were there).
• Color--The gold of the fly does not cast a sickly light inside like a blue or green tent does.
• Lightweight--while ultralight backpackers would scoff, at five pounds, this tent is a little sausage next to our previous two-person backpacking tents, and divided over five people, it weighs only one poundeach (granted, we haven't actually backpacked with it). 
• Ventilation--on all but the hottest, most humid Iowa camping night, the tent always felt full of fresh air without being drafty.

Cons:

• To say this is a five-person tent is quite a stretch. We had to do some fancy finagling to fit all five of us, and there was no room for our duffel bags inside, so we had to run out to the car for a change of clothes (which would not be an issue backpacking, since you use your clothing stuff sack as a pillow--and take a lot less stuff). Plus the pole in the middle limits the possible arrangements. I had kids encroaching on my pillow and mat all night long. I can't image five adults sleeping in it comfortably. Maybe five dwarves who sleep mummy-style (not windmill-fashion like three of our number).
• The door opening required a long crawl/reach through the "vestibule" area to get out. this was the only time the tent would get you wet, either from rain or condensation, when the door flap flopped on you. The last day we figured out we could unzip it from the top and step over the lower part, which eliminated the awkward crawl, and might even reduce the wet flopping.
• Is that metal pole in the middle a lightning rod?

Overall, it's a great tent and C and I were both wishing we'd bought a second one before GoLite went out of business. I hope it's durable enough to last for the next eight years, until we don't need quite so much room in our tent anymore.