Merrell Jam

I had to nip into my local town so paid a visit to TK Maxx and found a pair of Merrell Jam trainers. They're a sort of rock shoe/trainer cross with a nice sticky Vibram sole. I got them for £29, have to be worth that, I think the rrp is around £60

.

Trip to the Mournes

I'd never been to the Mournes until recently which is quite strange as I live in Northern Ireland. I always stayed around the Antrim hills or went over to Scotland, usually Fort William or Glenmore. I went do the Mournes a few weeks back and I'll definitely return. It's nice to see something different, I felt like a child on Christmas morning. I don't want to spoil it by going back every other weekend though, the area's too small and I want to savour it. I only stayed one day and opted to try Slieve Binnian (keeping the big one (Slieve Donard) until last. Thankfully I was blessed with good weather.

This shot was taken from the North summit Tor on Slieve Binnian. The distant top is Slieve Commedagh, 765m (2nd Highest after Slieve Donard, 853m) the near mountain is Slievelamagan, 704m and the blue lough is in fact the 'Blue Lough'

Looking North from Slieve Binnian over the Ben Crom resorvoir, the slopes of Ben Crom just creeping in from the left followed by Slieve Bearnagh

Backpacking Stove/Cookset pt 2

I finally sorted out the Swedish set but I've come up with 2 problems that have made me look to something else. The first problem is the weight, the 2nd is the fact that it doesn't split down well if I want to leave most of it at camp and take a basic set on the hill. One thing I'll miss about it though is the shape, oval seems to fit in a rucksac better than round so why doesn't anyone make lightweight oval cooksets? if they do I've never seen them

The gas cartridge, Tibetan Ti Spork, Tibetan Ti knife and teaspoon all fit into a 450ml Tibetan Ti mug

.

The mug fits nicely into the main pot together with a Trangia pot lifter, the Outdoor Design stove, Primus gas cartridge tripod base, hanging wires, a small sponge in a sealeable bag and a small lighter

With the lid fitted the set fits into the windshield.

As I wanted to use the lid as a pan I made a lid from aluminium sheet

All in all I liked the way it all worked out but my next set is going to be based around an Alpkit Mitymug

Backpacking Stove/Cookset pt 1

A while back for some unknown reason I bought a Swedish Army Alcohol (Meths) cookset. I found that being oval rather than round meant that it packed well into a rucksac. That got me thinking about using it with a gas mini stove rather than the Trangia type burner. I managed to come up with a design that not only provided a windshield but allowed me to use it as a hanging stove.

I opted for an Outdoor Designs Mini Stove from Backpackinglight.co.uk and with a bit of experimenting sorted out a system that worked reasonably well.


The windshield attached to the burner using 4 short lengths of tubing which slide through the holes in the windshield and over the pan supports on the stove. The hanging wires were made from 1.5mm s/s wire and crimped with brass and alloy tubing. The wires attached to the windshield using 2 short lengths of alloy tubing and 2 split pins. The wire spreaders I made from 2mm x 10mm alloy flat. The pics show should illustrate the general concept.

I ended up using a tall gas cartridge as I found that it fitted pretty much perfectly into a Tibetan Titanium 450ml mug (bought on ebay from Trek-Lite) The full kit consisting of mug, folding spork, folding knife, teaspoon, stove, Trangia lifter and gas cart fitted into the pot. In addition I added a Primus Gas Cannister Tripod Base which also fitted into the pot (I needed the tripod base as the gas cart was pretty tall). The only thing was that the hanging kit needed to be packed sperately.

The stove in use, albeit with the 2nd generation simplified stove attachment method

Using 2 trekking poles to suspend the stove.

Some detail shots of the 1st attempt at a hanging system

New Longboard

Just been out today trying my new surfboard. I actually bought it 2 months ago but a 'Flu' type bug together with poor surf kept me out of the water until today.

The board? it's a Circle One 9' 2" Heritage longboard, I had been using a Sunride 7' 6" Minimal for about a year so what with a 2 month layoff and a new board things were a bit sketchy.