Adventure 16 Blog » Gear

A friend recently asked me how to clean out his Platypus hydration bladder. He filtered some water on a recent trip and now he said it smells, let’s say, “organic.”

Thankfully the folks at Platypus have an FAQ on how to clean out and disinfect a bladder. Basically you can wash it, boil it or use household bleach to disinfect the bladder. The same techniques can be used to clean out MSR Dromedary bags too.

Here are some easy steps to making your bladder squeaky clean:
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A friend of mine recently camped near the summit of Mt. Baldy. He said the ground was so hard and rocky that he couldn’t even stake down his tent.

Staking a tent on hard ground can be a challenge. I once watched a friend of mine work up a sweat while pounding his stakes so hard into a rocky ground. His stakes started to bend and he was on the verge of yelling at the top of his lungs.

There’s an easy solution to this problem – and it doesn’t even involve jackhammers or drill bits.

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I rarely use bug spray when I’m out on an extended trip. I’d rather swat at mosquitoes and deal with itchy bug bites than cover my skin with sticky, thick, acid-smelling bug repellant.

There is a bottle of repellant in my pack, but that’s for emergency uses only. If I were ever blanketed in pesky bugs, I may just bust out my bug spray.

ExOfficio may have solved my dilemma with comfort and bugs. This Spring, ExOfficio introduces an improved line of BUZZ OFF apparel, a line of shirts, pants, sweaters and shorts treated with an invisible, odorless natural insect repellant.

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I’m always looking for a way to lighten my pack. Currently, I carry about 25 pounds for a three- to four-day trip. The heaviest culprit in my pack is my MSR DuraLite cookset, weighing in at 16 ounces (one pound).

The DuraLite is a good set for car campers or quick trips where you can carry a lot of food to cook, but on extended trips, the set can get heavy.

So I’m going titanium with the MSR Titan Tea Kettle ($49.95). The Kettle has been out for a while, but until recently, I didn’t think the price justified a lighter pack. Boy does it make a difference.

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A friend called me the other day while he was gearing up for the winter season. He asked me the difference between a 3-season and 4-season tent.

“The only difference looks like the price,” he said.

None of my friends (who are all backpackers) who were in the car while I took the call knew the difference between the two types of tents and I only knew a few of the differences.

So I called Jim Sapere, manager of Adventure 16 in Torrance, to get the low down on 3- vs. 4-season tents. Sapere provided a few key differences between the two types of tents and some things to think about when buying a winter tent:

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Adventure 16’s web host, DreamHost, is carbon neutral! They purchase renewable energy certificates that offset the carbon emissions generated by all of their business activities.

There’s more detail on their site, beginning with: “DreamHost is carbon neutral. We’ve calculated the impact of everything that DreamHost uses and leaves behind in the course of our daily work. All of the resources that we use - paper in the office, electricity for our servers, even the gas in our cars that bring us to the office - leaves behind some kind of soul-sucking residue in the world.” - Click to continue

For many American families, summer vacation means a lazy week lounging on a beach. Others head for a cruise ship or theme park. But like the McQuaigs, who are on an activity-packed, five-night ‘multisport’ camping tour of northwestern Montana, a growing number of families are choosing a more adventurous option.”- Adventure travel for families snowballs (USA Today)

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