“In the predawn hours of July 10, 2014, the son of legendary Alaskan explorer Roman Dial walked alone into the untracked rainforest of Costa Rica’s remote Pacific Coast. ‘I’m planning on doing 4 days in the jungle,’ he wrote his father before leaving, ‘it should be difficult to get lost forever.’
Then he vanished . . .”
This would be the last communication from Roman Dial’s son.
Continue reading The Adventurer’s Son: A Memoir — My Book Review
Where has Nick been? I haven’t posted in a while. Been busy installing a new patio roof. And now it is time to plan our next camping adventure. Here’s an update of what I’ve been doing. What I have been doing is the consequence of a dumb decision I made four years ago.
Yeah, I had a Senior Moment four years ago when we had our home solar system installed. My “moment” was my poor decision to install the panels on our patio roof. It was a mistake. In this story I’ll relate several steps that can be applied to many decision making situations; even for backpacking or camping. It has to do with researching products.
Continue reading Been Busy After a Dumb Mistake — Time to Plan our Next Adventure
Imagine. You’re at a campsite with no water available and your camper is getting low on water and you still have a week of your trip ahead of you. What can you do?
One option is to close up the camper and drive to a water source: pack up any loose items inside, retract any slide outs, roll-up your awning, disconnect any items such as a propane grill, hitch up the tow vehicle and drive to a water source. Once your campers water tank is full, you will drive back to your campsite and set up everything again.
There’s a better way.
Continue reading New World 45 Gallon Fold-A-Tank: 10 Year Review
Organizer all my backpacking, camping, boating and other gear has always been less than ideal. The biggest issue was the bins were large and it was a hassle to locate the one item I needed.
As it turns out, the solution was simple.
Continue reading Organizing Backpacking Gear and/or a Camper
Cuben Fiber (now called DCF) is a non-woven laminate fabric developed by the Cuben Tech Corporation in the early 90’s for the sails on racing yachts. In 1992 America3 won the America’s Cup Race using sails of Cuben Fiber.
In the mid to late 2000’s a few cottage industry backpacking gear companies started selling shelters and backpacks made from Cuben Fiber. The fabric has high tensile strength and is extremely light. But it has some important disadvantages. Most of which is my concern that it really isn’t very durable and has a short lifespan.
So the question becomes, is DCF worth the cost?
I’m not throwing away my DCF gear, but when items wear out, which they will, I will be replacing them with something else.