Archive for August 2008

Well, not quite, but I did finish my very first sewing project today. I decided to start simple and knocked out a ripstop stuffsack. I figured I'd start with a small one so I wouldn't waste a lot of material in the event it was a failed exercise. I actually thought that was how it was going to turn out but thanks to some encouragement from the folks at Hammock Forums I kept going. Here's how it went down.

1. Measure and mark.
It's hard to tell but I used a fabric pencil to mark things up. Sadly, I learned that you can't just follow the lines in the ripstop and expect things to come out square.



2. Marvel at your cutting job



3. Get stitchin'!



4. Stitch the sides



5. Stitch the bottom



6. Add a reinforcement patch and add a manual buttonhole.
This is where the drawstring will come through the fabric after creating a channel for it to run through.



7. Giggle with glee at your finished product.

Uncinched


Cinched


The Whole Shebang


I really wanted to use black paracord for the drawstring but all I had left was camo. Oh well.

Well, I didn't get much training in last week. TS Fay kept my pretty busy. I was the acting Emergency Coordinator for the county so I spent Wed-Fri managing the emergency communications between the EOC and the Red Cross shelters as well as staffing one myself.

Hopefully training will pick up again this weekend.

After hiking the local bike trails a couple of times I had a painful realization. It donned on me that I wasn't really training for the type of terrain I'd be hiking in Sept and Oct. The sections of the Florida Trail I'll be doing have a good bit of sugar sand and they're out in the open. Hiking regular dirt trails under the cover of trees isn't really a good simulation to get ready.

So today I decided to change my training regimen. I hit the beach! What better place to find fine sugar sand with no cover/protection from the searing Florida heat? I waited for the heat to kick up a few degrees, drove to the beach, geared up, and hit the "trail". You'd think people had never seen anyone with a full pack hiking down the beach. :-D

I used my Pacific Crest pack today instead of the GoLite. When I packed the GoLite I must've done it wrong because I just couldn't get it to carry right. I needed to try out the PC anyway, though, so it worked out fine. I have to say that for an inexpensive pack I'm pretty impressed. It's a big pack (4000 cu in) but I didn't have it full. The number of pockets is a big improvement over the lack of flexibility you have with the Jam 2. The full hipbelt and improved padding on the back and shoulder straps made a big difference. It did increase the weight by about 6.5 lbs but I almost think the comfort was worth it. As long as I kept the weight on my hips I barely felt a thing. It was wonderful! My only real complaint is that the hipbelt doesn't lock enough. I had to re-tighten it several times throughout the day. However, this wasn't any major issue.

I packed right in at 30.5 lbs of gear. I hope to be in the same neighborhood if not a little lighter for the actual hikes. Since this was the first hike with the new pack and in a new setting I wasn't sure what to expect. I'd planned on a quick 2 mi hike but it was going so well I kept going. I ended up at 3.7 mi. I'd hoped to get to 4 mi but hit a drainage area on the beach that I didn't want to walk around. As it turned out this wasn't a big deal. It started to rain about the same time. Fortunately the PC has a built in rain cover so I just hiked on back to the truck without a care in the world...except for the lightning. :-) My total time was about 2:20.

I'm still going to try packing the Jam 2 to see if I can get it as comfortable as the PC but we'll have to see. I may end up dealing with the extra weight. If I can shave those pounds, though, it should make for relatively simple hikes.

Well, it's been slow in the hiking arena. I have gotten a little spur of interest in a new area, though. After checking out sites like hammockforums.net and diytactical.com I'm really keen on learning how to make my own gear. I'm waiting for a book to be available at my local library. It's "How To Make Your Own Lightweight Camping & Hiking Gear" by Vick Hines.

I've also done something I never thought I'd do. I bought a sewing machine. :-) I went looking at some industrial machines last Saturday. Since I'm not an experienced sewer (?) by any stretch of the imagination I certainly didn't want to spend the $950 they were asking even though it was for a complete setup with machine, table, and electro-servo motor. I called another store with a 60s Singer for $150. I was looking for an older machine with metal gears to put up with the rigors of sewing heavy material like webbing, Cordura, etc. I ended up finding an 80s vintage Singer Merritt 2404.

I've done a bit of practicing on ripstop nylon and cotton webbing. The ripstop is a little hard. I really need to get some fabric glue to hold it in place. The stuff slides all over. The webbing caused it's own issues, though. My intent was to make some longer tree huggers for the hammock. When I folded the ends over to make the seam the foot didn't sit flush. I finally figured I could use another piece of webbing to get started and that seemed to work well. I got two 72" huggers made. However, I'm going to do them over. Cotton isn't really a good material since it'll stretch when wet and eventually rot. I'm on the hunt now for good polyester webbing. It'll hold up much better and isn't as affected by UV either. At least it's giving me practice.

Eventually I'd like to try my hand at making a DIY hammock. Or, at the very least, buying a Speer kit.

I'm still getting ready for my upcoming hikes. Yesterday I ordered some USGS topo maps of the areas. Hopefully they'll come in soon. I also had a training revelation. Since most of the Sept hike will be through sugar sand, it doesn't make much sense to be training on trails that are dirt. So Sat I'm headed to the beach. I'm sure people will be wondering why this guy is walking down the beach with a pack but who cares? I used Google Earth to lay out various distances so I can watch the street signs at the beach access points to know how much ground I've covered. I think that's going to be my new training regimen.

Well, that about covers it for now. See ya on the trail!

Well, this has definitely been an active summer when it comes to hiking & camping. We were supposed to go to Juniper Springs this coming weekend but some other things have come up so we'll have to do that later. I'm in the planning stages for a church outing to Gold Head. Really had a good time there and I think it'll be a good time for the group.

The "big" hike is coming up the following week. We head to Gold Head 9/19 and then I'm off to a 3-day hike through the Ocala National Forest on the 26th. I'm really looking forward to the 3-day. It'll be the first time on a multi-day outing in the backcountry since I got out of the Scouts. I've got a lot of new gear I've been trying out, and a lot of new weight/age that I have to carry. Should be, um, interesting. :-)

Well, not to sit too idle I'm also planning another 3-day with a co-worker. This one will be towards the end of October and we'll be hiking about 25 mi of the Osceola National Forest.

I have to say that I'm pretty disappointed in the maps I've bought for the Florida Trail. They're good for a high-level view but they're not always real clear and the data book is very important. However, I just spoke with their trail coordinator and come Sept 15 when the maps are updated I'm going to buy the map CD. It's actually based on ArcInfo GIS mapping data with overlays and that sort of stuff. Should provide a much better view of the trails. And for $60 I bet it'll be well worth it.

So that's what's going on. Hopefully I'll have some more planning info up before too long.

After long last I was finally able to get out in the woods again. I headed back out to Hanna Park by myself and spent about an hour jumping from trail to trail. I had a fun time and only had moderate problems with skeeters. I don't think I got any bites, though. I'm digging the Skintastic spray I'm using now. Even smells good. :-) At the end of the hike I decided it was time to get a nap in.

Step 1: Get Hennessy out of the pack.



Step 2: Hang between two trees.



Step 3: Setup hammock and fly.



Step 4: Climb inside.


Step 5: Sleep.



I was really enjoying the HH today. I think I found a very comfortable sleeping position so I have no doubt she'll work like a dream on the hike. I do want to order the 96" tree straps, though. I have no idea why the 42" straps are standard. I almost had a tough time today since the trees were just a hair too far apart for easy use of the 42" straps. Guess I'll get those on order this coming week.