The Gear That You Must Have in the Outback……probably Pretty much everybody in the Hiking, Camping and Shooting community knows about the main tenants of: “The Rule of 3”, “Leave No Trace” and the “4 Rules for Handling Firearms” (and we’ve written blog posts on all of them), but there’s one other tenant that we haven’t talked about - because it’s a little less agreed on; “The 10 Essentials” from The Mountaineers.  Since they say it best – here’s a passage directly from the Mountaineers website about this topic; “What Are the Ten Essentials?” “The Mountaineers Ten Essentials™ dates back to our climbing courses of the 1930s. This widely respected safety and packing system was formalized in the third edition of Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills, released in 1974. Each of the nine editions of Freedom, as it is affectionately known, was written entirely by volunteers and reflects the collective wisdom of hundreds of outdoor skills instructors. The list has always sought to answer two basic questions: Can you prevent emergencies and respond positively should one occur? Can you safely spend a night (or more) outside? The Mountaineers Ten Essentials was formalized in 1974 when the iconic list debuted in the third edition of “Mountaineering: The Freedom of the Hills.” The ninth edition of “Freedom” presented a thorough modernization to prepare today's mountaineers for adventures. Learn more about what to bring on your next trip and a limerick to help you remember all ten. Certain equipment deserves space in every pack. Mountaineers will not need every item on every trip, but essential equipment can be a lifesaver in an emergency. Exactly how much equipment “insurance” should be carried is a matter of healthy debate. Most members of The Mountaineers take along carefully selected items to survive the unexpected. Whatever your approach to equipment, a checklist will help you remember what to bring in the rush to get ready for a trip. But remember that The Ten Essentials is a guide that should be tailored to the nature of the outing. Weather, remoteness from help, and complexity should be factored into the selected essentials. The first seven essentials tend to be compact and vary little from trip to trip, and can be grouped together to facilitate packing. Add the needed digital and physical maps, the proper extra food, water, and clothes, and you’re ready to go. This brief list is intended to be easy to remember and serve as a mental pre-trip checklist.”  The most recent “10 Essentials” list espoused by the Mountaineers includes the following gear:
The Mountaineers even have a limerick to help remind you what the 10 Essentials are: The Mountaineers Ten Essentials Limerick By Steve McClure To navigate, head for the sun With first aid and knife on the run Bring fire and shelter Extra food is a helper But water and clothes weigh a ton The Mountaineer’s website has a 10-page article that discusses each of the 10 Essentials in detail – so we won’t go into them in this blog. If you want to read the Mountaineers’ article you can find it here: What Are the Ten Essentials? https://www.mountaineers.org/blog/what-are-the-ten-essentials If you want to watch a short video covering the 10 Essentials you can find that here: Ask a Ranger: 10 Essentials Personally we always wear hiking boots and carry a day pack with some type of headgear, navigation aids, hydration, food, raingear, a First Aid kit and emergency supplies. You can see all the details on our Hiking page and its subpages. So what’s the controversy? Well, as with most things in the Outdoor community lots of people have different opinions as to what is essential – and as technology improves other items grow in prominence. For example, there’s a good article from Backpacker that discusses this topic in detail. In the article Dr. Nicholas Daniel, the associate director of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Wilderness and Austere Medicine Fellowship (located in Lebanon, New Hampshire) wondered whether there was any data to back up the Mountaineers gear list: “You hear it over and over again: ‘Were you prepared? Did you carry the Ten Essentials?’” Daniel says. “I thought that was a very interesting concept. As someone who practices wilderness medicine, has a scientific background, and spends a lot of time outdoors, the intersection between the recommendations and facts seemed important to me.  Even though the 10 Essentials list has been around for over 90 years, no study had ever been done to analyze this gear’s impact on a hikers’ adventures. So Dr. Daniel and his colleagues set out to determine if the 10 Essentials items improved hiking outcomes and which items were most critical to a hiker’s safety. To collect the relevant data the team interviewed 961 day hikers at Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire (a rocky hike that we have done several times) asking them what gear they carried on their hike, what adverse events they experienced (1,686 were reported) and how satisfied they were with their hikes. The study’s main conclusion was that “Carrying more items did not translate into improved satisfaction for day hikers, but was associated with fewer events for which the hiker was unprepared.” Based on their observations, Dr. Daniel’s team suggested that it may be possible to cover the majority of adverse events with for day hikes with 4 of the 10 Essentials: water, food, extra clothing, and a medical kit. However, since day hikes - similar to climbing the reasonably well marked shady trails of Mount Monadnock - may be less dangerous than multi-day trips, the researchers also recognized that the other 6 Essentials (navigation, headlamp, sun protection, knife, fire, and shelter) may be needed more often on longer hikes when more adverse events may occur. Dr. Daniel also opined that there’s one more essential item he recommends hikers always carry, something that the original 1930’s Mountaineers list, and even the 1974 list could not have included – a cell phone. You can read the entire Backpacker article here: How “Essential” Are the Ten Essentials? A New Study Finds Some Help More Often Than Others https://www.backpacker.com/survival/survival-gear/ten-essentials-less-important-than-you-think/  Dr. Daniel’s research team published a detailed paper detailing their efforts in the American Journal of Emergency Medicine. You can read it here: Rethinking hiker preparedness: Association of carrying “10 essentials” with adverse events and satisfaction among day-hikers https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0735675721005003 In addition, if you search the web you’ll find that almost every organization has their take on the 10 Essentials – with many of them adding their thoughts, additional information, essential item #11’s (such as insect repellent, a trash bag, etc.,) and alternative lists (to include lists of the 10 Essentials for hiking with dogs). We think that most of the discussion is valuable since being prepared with the right gear is always a good thing. Here are a few links to some other credible sources: National Park Service: Ten Essentials https://www.nps.gov/articles/10essentials.htm American hiking Society: The Ten Essentials of Hiking - Ten Things You Should Bring on Every Hike https://americanhiking.org/resources/10essentials/ The Sierra Club: Ten Essentials https://angeles.sierraclub.org/outdoors/ten_essentials The Boy Scouts of America: The Scout 10 essentials: Items every Scout needs in the outdoors https://scoutingmagazine.org/2013/02/the-10-essentials/ The Boy Scouts of America: The Ten Essentials for Outdoor Activities https://scouttroop116.com/10-essentials.html The Boy Scouts of America: Scout 10 Essentials: https://www.scouterlife.com/blog/2021/4/26/scout-10-essentials REI: The Ten Essentials https://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/ten-essentials.html The 10 Hiking Essentials You Need to Safely Hit the Trail https://www.freshoffthegrid.com/10-hiking-essentials/ The Ten Essentials for Hiking https://www.iheartpacificnorthwest.com/blog_post/ten-essentials-for-hiking/ 10 Essentials for Hiking with Dogs https://www.sierra.com/blog/snow_sports/10-essentials-for-hiking-with-dogs/ 
0 Comments
Neck and Face Protection That You Need for Many Outdoor ActivitiesWe’ve all been there, out in the wind, the dust, the sun, the cold, the bugs and the glare off the water. And we all know that you really need to protect your face and your respiratory system from the elements. So we’ve always been big advocates of bandanas, shemaghs and reusable N95 masks to make sure that you can breathe in whatever conditions Nature throws at you. Over the past couple of years we’ve also become an advocate for neck gaiters – especially in windy conditions – and with the COVID-19 craziness the number of neck gaiters on the market has exploded. Their uses are pretty obvious and include:
 Given the amount of new products on the market, in all sizes, colors, patterns and materials (e.g. polyester, spandex, microfiber, merino wool, fleece, synthetic, etc.,) we decided to replace all of our old neck gaiters with new ones before Winter arrived. You might think about doing the same since the new products have come a long way. If you want more details about neck gaiters – here are a couple of great articles discussing their uses, versatility and evaluation considerations for different environments: The ultimate neck gaiter guide https://www.broamer.com/gaiters/neck-gaiter-guide/ All the ways a neck gaiter is a multifunctional wonder https://www.popsci.com/story/diy/how-to-use-buff/ Neck Gaiters: A Noteworthy Face Covering https://www.mcrsafety.com/blog/neck-gaiter What a Spectacular Fall We’ve Had Here in New EnglandNormally all of the leaves have been knocked off the trees here in New England by this time of year by the rain. But not this year. This year the conditions were perfect for a long beautiful Fall – a relatively wet summer, giving way to a drier Fall with brisk temperatures but no heavy early snow. Knowing that this beauty wasn’t going to last - we took every opportunity that we could to hike far and wide to see the beauty that Nature had to show. Here are a few photos of the amazing late Fall colors that we saw in New England this year. (click on any photo to start the slideshow): McDavid® Hex™ Knee Pads Participating in outdoor activities can take a toll on your hands and feet and the rest of your body – so you need to protect it as appropriate with the right gear like gloves, shoes and clothing. In some situations you need even more protection which might include eye protection or hearing protection. Over the years we’ve found that you also need to protect your knees since they do a lot of work for you while hiking and participating in many shooting activities. Luckily there are lots of knee pads on the market to help you solve this problem. When looking for the right knee pads to meet your needs you should consider the following three main areas:
Because we want to protect our knees with padding, but don’t spent a considerable amount of time running and then “hitting the dirt” or crawling around on the ground, we like the lower profile, lighter weight knee pads than the heavy duty “tactical” knee pads that are used by many outdoor enthusiasts; especially tactical shooters. Consequently we use McDavid® Hex™ knee pads which have individual hexagon shaped cells that conform to and move with your body to balance comfort and protection. Although these knee pads were primarily designed for playing basketball, football, volleyball and other court, field and impact sports, they work well for our shooting and hiking activities. Their compression sleeve holds the knee pad firmly in place – but they are still lightweight and breathable. Since we wear them under our pants when shooting, the fact that they don’t have a more durable “hard cap” isn’t an issue for us.
If you want more details about the McDavid® Hex™ knee pads you can find it here: https://www.mcdavidusa.com/products/hex-knee-elbow-shin-pads-pair Walking in a Fall Fantasyland Our Columbus Day weekend had bright Fall weather, so we went for a drive and a hike in the local area to take some photos of all the beautiful colors. Then Wednesday, since it appeared that it might be the last good weather day before some rain arrived and the Fall leaves really started to drop off the trees, we got out and spent a few hours hiking to some of the more out of the way places near us. As if the Fall leaf colors weren’t enough, we even saw a group of turkeys out for a stroll. It's always funny. We see the turkeys in October and early November - but the week before Thanksgiving they all seem to disappear; I think that they have that week marked on their calendar and go hide out. “Leaf Peepers” travel from all over the world to see New England’s amazing colors in the Fall - all we have to do is hike in our town and the surrounding areas....... Here are a few photos that attempt to capture the breathtaking beauty of nature. (click on any photo to start the slideshow): The Ultimate Pest-prevention Guide: How To Deter Insects From Overruling Your Person, Outdoor Gear, and Home Although the Summer months have just passed us by - here in New England that doesn’t mean that all the insects have disappeared yet. Far from it since October and early November are still prime time for mosquitoes and ticks in our neck of the woods. As always, there’s lots of information out there on the internet – as long as you have the time to search for it. Fortunately for us, last week Thomas from pests.org dropped us an email with a link to an article of theirs that they had recently updated for 2022: “The Ultimate Pest-prevention Guide: How To Deter Insects From Overruling Your Person, Outdoor Gear, and Home”  Their article covers the following insects:
We really like that the article has three sections with detailed information about each of the pests listed above:
In addition to this great article on pests that traditionally plague hikers and campers, the website also has a ton of information on how to get rid of:
 So if you’re looking to learn more about how to deal with a wide variety of insect and wildlife pests - you might want to check out “The Ultimate Pest-prevention Guide” and the “DIY Pest Control” page that pests.org has online. They are great sources of information – all in one spot. 28 Days in Greece, Turkey and Venice Well, we’ve been back from our European trip for a few days, so we’ve caught up on our sleep, unpacked, sorted everything out and taken some time to review our adventures. During the 28 days we hiked 198.75 miles (419,757 steps – an average of 7+ miles each day) – seeing marvelous sights every step of the way.  We visited 5 of the 13 Greek peripheries (e.g. provinces/states) - which included 7 different islands:
We visited 9 cities in Turkey where we saw a wide variety of “Classical” Greek, Roman and Ottoman sites:
And we got to end our trip by spending three action packed days in Venice where we visited all sorts of fabulous sights to include:
Needless to say every day was filled new wonders. To me some of the most amazing were:
There was so much to see that it was almost overwhelming....... Here are a few photos from our trip. As always, I'll post more photos on the “Adventures/Europe” page when I have a chance to review and edit the 4,700 photos that I took. Athens, Greece (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Syros - Agios Nikolaos - Patmos, Greece (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Corinth - Mycenae - Nafplion - Knossos - Heraklion, Greece (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Delos - Mykonos - Santorini - Rhodes, Greece (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Pylos - Corfu, Greece (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Turkey (click on any photo to start the slideshow): Venice, Italy (click on any photo to start the slideshow): North American Rescue Combat Application Tourniquet (C-A-T) Last week I got into a discussion with a friend of mine who’s an EMT about the type of gear that you should have for emergencies where a victim is severely bleeding, and we spent a fair amount of time discussing the importance of tourniquets. Because the data (especially the data from the US military in Iraq and Afghanistan where IEDs were prevalent and body armor decreased the number of immediate deaths) shows that using tourniquets can have a significant impact on saving the lives of wounded people, I thought that I would lay out the facts in this blog. For years the approach to treating people in trauma situations was ABC (Airway, Breathing, and Circulation), but over the past 20 years the priority order for lifesaving treatments in emergency situations has transitioned to MARCH (Massive Hemorrhage, Airway, Respiration, Circulation, Hypothermia/Head Injury). So these days, upon arrival as you evaluate the person for trauma, the most notable, life-threatening condition is massive hemorrhage. Massive hemorrhage can kill people faster than an airway complication, because we don’t have much blood in our bodies in the first place (~5 liters is the average). Depending on the location of the wound, direct pressure, pressure dressing, wound packing (with or without a hemostatic agent) or tourniquets are the immediate field solutions to the problem. “The breakthrough paper that resulted was published in a 1996 issue of Military Medicine and ushered in the dawn of Tactical Combat Casualty Care (TCCC). TCCC launched a total reassessment of best practices in casualty management on the battlefield because of the penetrating wounding patterns found there. With 60 percent of preventable combat deaths identified as extremity hemorrhage, 33 percent as tension pneumothorax—a life-threatening chest injury— and 6 percent as airway obstruction, TCCC shifted the treatment priority from the standard prehospital protocol of airway management first to controlling the massive hemorrhage due to extremity trauma. This change meant that something as simple as applying a tourniquet could potentially save many lives on the battlefield. Military research began to focus on identifying a standard-issue tourniquet that was safe, effective, easy-to-apply and ruggedized for austere environments.” - North American Rescue - Winter 2012-2013 by Ricardo Flores Following the discussion with my friend I happened to have another similar discussion with a Navy Pararescue specialist. He reiterated the points covered in my previous discussion and emphasized that at the shooting range and in the back country it is imperative that you carry a tourniquet; and the only one that he recommended was the Combat Application Tourniquet (C-A-T) by North American Rescue - which is now the standard in the US military based on years of studies. “In 2004, the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research (USAISR) conducted a study of seven commercially available, off-the-shelf tourniquets for their effectiveness in stopping blood flow with the least amount of pain during application. Three of the seven were 100 percent clinically effective in occluding blood flow. However, USAISR recommended the C-A-T as the primary battlefield tourniquet based on its overall performance—less painful, easier to use, as well as smaller and lighter than the other tourniquets evaluated. In 2008, a study of battlefield data from a combat support hospital in Baghdad published in the Journal of Trauma validated the earlier USAIR conclusions. The C-A-T was identified as “the best combat tourniquet” In 2011, another study published in Military Medicine further validated the earlier studies and continued to hail the U.S. military’s primary tourniquet, the C-A-T, as the safest and most effective combat tourniquet requiring 30 percent less pressure to achieve success.” - North American Rescue - Winter 2012-2013 by Ricardo Flores Because of this discussion we updated our gear by purchasing a C-A-T tourniquet to replace our older gear. The CAT currently on the market is the 7th generation of the tourniquet and is recognized as the fastest, safest, and most effective prehospital field tourniquet available. It has proven to be 100% effective in occluding blood flow in both upper & lower extremities by the U.S. Army’s Institute of Surgical Research. The C-A-T comes in both black and orange. We purchased the orange version so that we can very easily locate it in our kit in an emergency situation.  As with all tourniquets the main thing to remember if you have to apply one to a victim is to place it “high and tight” – high above the wound to stop the circulation above the point of bleeding and tight enough that you cannot put your fingers under the band; even if this is painful to the victim. Once in place do not ever remove the tourniquet unless you absolutely have to so that you can make it tighter because the bleeding restarts and you don’t have a second tourniquet to place adjacent to the initial tourniquet. With respect the C-A-T, “The Gen 7 CAT utilizes a durable windlass system with a patented free-moving internal band providing true circumferential pressure to the extremity. Once adequately tightened, bleeding will cease and the windlass is locked into place. A hook and loop windlass retention strap is then applied, securing the windlass to maintain pressure during casualty evacuation”. Here are the high level instructions for using the C-A-T tourniquet.  It should be noted that tourniquets should normally only used for extremities (arms and legs) when the bleeding cannot be stopped by the use of direct pressure alone, if direct pressure cannot be effectively applied for any reason, or if it is clear that the injury is so massive that attempting to use direct pressure will fail and only waste valuable time. There is an intermediate option of “wound packing” that can be used if applying direct pressure is not sufficient to stop the bleeding and the wound is on the neck, armpit, shoulder or groin. Because of the critical internal organs - the only viable field solution to wounds to the chest, abdomen, lower back, pelvis and skull is applying direct pressure. The nominal order of the steps that you should take to “stop the bleed” is:
If you want more details about the C-A-T Combat Application Tourniquet you can find it here: https://www.narescue.com/combat-application-tourniquet-c-a-t.html Here’s a great presentation by North American Rescue on “Small Limb Hemorrhage Control” that covers all this material in detail: https://www.narescue.com/education/cat-tourniquet-education/small-limb-hemorrhage-training-ppt.html In addition, other CAT Tourniquet Educational Materials can be found here: https://www.narescue.com/education/cat-tourniquet-education.html Just remember – with respect to traumatic bleeding – If it won’t quit - - - Tourniquet! Latest Side-by-Side Comparison from Sport Fitness Advisor Well today’s the first day of Spring here in North America – so I guess it’s time to get ready to get back outside in the great outdoors; and we all know what that means – Gear Preparation. To get ready for the Hiking and Camping season everyone has their own routine. What we do is take out all our gear, check it over for usability, clean up anything that needs a little tender care and evaluate what we have against the newest gear available to see if our gear has either “aged out” or if there are new products on the market that are significantly better than what we have. This allows us to make sure that the gear we take with us works when we need it in the outback, and keeps us up to date on the latest items on the market. Checking over all of your gear at the beginning of the season doesn’t’ sound like a lot of fun – but trust us – it’s better to find out now that you need a new piece of gear rather than the day before a trip, or even worse, on the trip. To compare our gear against what is currently on the market we always head to our local outdoor stores (to see as many items as possible in person) and to the internet to read the great gear reviews that are online. Of course, many items don’t change that much from year to year (we doubt that we’re ever going to replace our Council Tool Woodcraft 24" Pack Axe, Gerber E-Tool Folding Spade, Buck 110 or Army Survival Knife), but we always like to keep current with what’s out there “just in case”. While we were checking our gear for the 2022 Spring/Summer/Fall season we were contacted by Jillian, an editor from Sport Fitness Advisor about a comprehensive guide that they had just published about the "Best Backpacking Stove".  Since our site focuses on the specific gear selections that work for us, and our specific situation, and provides our evaluation criteria and rationale for selecting our gear, we don’t provide detailed side-by-side comparisons of products. That doesn’t’ mean that we don’t read a lot of the websites that provide side-by-side product comparisons – because we most certainly do – we just find that many of these sites do this better than we would (because of the size of their staff and budget). So our HCS site has direct links to many of the sites that do specialize in detailed gear reviews, just in case you want to see the side-by-side comparisons. Of course, we love it even more when a site that has evaluated the latest gear reaches out to us to let us know about a comparison our readers would be interested in; like Sport Fitness Advisor did. We really liked the "Best Backpacking Stove" article because it was comprehensive in covering what features you need and why you need them. And, as all of our readers know, we think that providing you the most important evaluation criteria is vital since it allows you to assess if your situation equates to the evaluators when you make your gear selection decision. If it does – fine. If it doesn’t - then you can use the detailed information to make a gear selection that better fits your specific situation. Here’s what the Sport Fitness Advisor article covers:
For comparison’s sake our evaluation criteria for compact hiking/camping stoves include:
The 10 stoves that Sport Fitness Advisor covers in their article include:
We don’t want to give away their conclusions, so you should go read the "Best Backpacking Stove" article for yourself; it’s worth a few minutes of your time. In addition to their recent article about the “Best Backpacking Stove” Sport Fitness Advisor has numerous other articles related to Hiking and Camping. You should go take a look. https://www.sport-fitness-advisor.com/?s=hiking https://www.sport-fitness-advisor.com/?s=camping If you would like to see another expert opinion on what the best backpacking stoves currently on the market are - you should check out Clever Hiker’s latest list of “Best Backpacking Stoves”; he’s always got great insight into the gear you need. Great Article from loveholidays.comSince we’ve had a considerable amount of snow here in New England over the past two weeks, we’ve been thinking about our next outdoor adventure – and for us that means heading to a National Park if possible since they contain so many beautiful sights to see. Coincidentally, this week we were contacted by Liam, from loveholidays.com, a travel agency in the UK, about a detailed article he had written titled “An Essential Guide to Enjoying US National Parks Responsibly”. Since we were relaxing inside (after shoveling all that snow) we read Liam’s article. That got us even more motivated to think about planning a trip, so we decided to take a look at where all the US National Parks are located and compare that to the list of those that we have already visited. As always, the internet is a wonderful source of information. So here’s what our research found. There are actually 424 locations that fall under the National Park Service; 63 National Parks, 85 National Monuments, 76 National Historic sites, 58 National Historic Parks and 142 other locations categorized in a variety of different ways.  Here’s a good map of where the 63 US National Parks are located (from morethanjustparks.com) and another showing all 424 locations under the National Park Service (from nationalparkobsessed.com) – which is marvelously interactive on their website:
Part of our problem is that we’ve been so many places (admittedly a good problem to have), and the vast majority of the US National Parks are located West of the Mississippi (although there are lots of other NPS sites in the East) – so we have to travel a good distance to get there. Here’s our list of what we’ve visited so far looks like. So I guess that we really need to head back to the Northwest US next.  So, back to the article that started all of our research. Liam’s article is quite extensive, covering the value of spending time outdoors in US National Parks (including a look at why we feel so good outside), why US National Parks are some of the most amazing outdoor spaces and how to enjoy them safely.  Since there’s so much information included in the article it’s been structured into four main sections, each with a wide variety of facts, details and links to other online sources.
 Some of the detailed information in Liam’s article that we appreciated was:
 As an aside, Liam’s article cites the statistic that the average American spends 87% of their time indoors, 6% of it in a car and just 7% of their life outdoors. Thankfully we are nowhere close to that……... Because Liam’s article has some great information, we thought that we would pass it on to all of you. Hopefully you enjoy it, and find its content as useful as we did. Here's the link again: https://www.loveholidays.com/holidays/enjoying-us-national-parks-responsibly/ |
What's On This Page?Here's where we post reviews, questions, answers, thoughts and other information that's of general interest to our followers in a blog format. Categories
All
Archives
March 2025
|
RSS Feed