Backpacking Gear I Regret Using

hey y'all Dixie here today I want to go over a few gear items that I regret using for one reason or another and before anybody gets their panties in a wad I'm not saying that you shouldn't use these items or that they don't have certain applications but I'm just saying that they didn't work out for me personally for those of y'all who have been watching this channel for a while I'm sure that you know that one of these items has to be packing boots when I began my thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail I started with a pair of Lola leather boots like your typical what you think of when you say I'm gonna go hock in and I need a pair of hiking boots and they did not work out for me they ended up causing me some tendinitis in one of my Achilles tendons when I flexed my ankle it kind of felt like cotton pulling apart just that ooh feeling that you know like bat and cotton or buying a t-shirt anyway that's what it felt like when I would flex my foot and that Achilles would kind of pull so I knew quickly I was gonna have to switch to something else and I went with trail runners and have never looked back not only did they cause me actual physical harm but they just felt clunky and uncomfortable especially after I started using trail runners now that doesn't mean that there isn't an application for boots if you do need ankle support you know that you have ankle problems and it's suggested that you should have boots then of course that makes sense or even in winter backpacking or maybe even if you have to stomp through some really brushy area that's just all grown up and not a cleared well-maintained path then you might find that's a good application for beats but for me personally on a trail that's partially maintained even and is in three season weather I'm sticking to trail runners the next thing I regret using on trail is a cheap pair of waterproof gloves I bought a pair of waterproof gloves at the gas station go figure at Snoqualmie past while I was in Washington during my PCT through hike and I needed something to keep my hands warm and dry and I had dropped the ball on ordering anything from Amazon and having it sent out or getting something sent from home and so last minute I realized hey the weather is going to be kind of bad for a few days and I really should have something to help keep my hands warm because that is miserable hiking with cold hands it's painful and of course when you're hiking in inclement cold wintery mixture whether it's good to keep your body as warm and comfortable as possible so anyway about probably a couple miles or so or maybe about an hour after wearing these waterproof gloves I realized that they weren't very waterproof and now not only was i toting a crappy pair of gloves but they were a crappy pair of waterlogged gloves that were not waterproof so anyway don't wait till last minute to get your gear while you're on a thru-hike have those things planned out and oftentimes with backpacking gear you can kind of skimp but when it comes to something like this you get what you pay for the next gear item I regret using is the Sun tactic solar panel charger the s5 I started off on the Pacific Crest Trail with the solar panel charger in hopes that it would help me save some time while I was in town so I didn't have to worry about stay in places and charging my battery banks overnight and I just thought that while I'm in the desert I might as well get some free energy from the Sun and use it to charge up my electronics while I'm hiking so I had the plan of using the solar panel during the day with a little lipstick size backup battery and then charging my phone and other electronics at night and I just thought that this system would work well but it seems that I used my phone so much that it really didn't work out for me using the solar panel was a little inconvenient in that section because I couldn't record as much and I had to limit my phone use because I wanted to make sure I had my battery for a gut hook but luckily in that section I did find a public bathroom in a camping area I camped there allowed my backup battery to charge and my phone fully and then when I got to the next town area I made other arrangements and had a larger backup battery sent I know that there are people who have had great luck with the Sun tactic solar panels so I'm not saying that it's a bad quality product it just didn't work out for what I wanted to do so if you're somebody who doesn't find yourself using your cell phone or other electronics a lot while you're on the trail you're going to be hiking in an exposed area and you don't want to if you're on a thru-hike have to pop into town and stay a while to charge your electronics then that system might work well for you probably the biggest gear fail I've had while on trail is the therm-a-rest NeoAir uber light pad because not only one crapped out on me the first night but two this past summer y'all might remember that my mom and I went out to the Pacific Crest Trail to fill in fire closure areas and thankfully the first section was just a one overnight deal so we were only uncomfortable one night but we had set up in a well-established camp area there was flat ground there was nothing that I could see as we were setting up that would be pokey or anything that could have popped the pads especially not two of them but I contacted therm-a-rest through their customer service page like submitting a form through their website and also through a phone call I reached kind of a dead end when I was told that there was nothing that they could do it would be a four to six week wait after I sent the pads in for evaluation and for them to get back to me and after I expressed to them I couldn't do that I couldn't wait because I had only a two month period to get these hikes done they kind of you know put their hands up and said well that's all we can offer you four to six weeks Happy Trails so I reached that dead end until my video came out of the episode where I talked about the pads going flat and then I was contacted by therm arrests to try to make this situation right but at that point I had already fallen back on my x-lite that I had previously used and my mom got a new sleeping pad from REI but anyway I will continue to use therm-a-rest products I really do love my x-lite I hate that the uber Lite did not work out but I do appreciate them reaching out and apologizing and trying to make it right the person I emailed with said that they do actually offer other options for sending out one of the foam pads and and not expecting it to be returned and overnight options etc but they do want to look at the pad before they just refund somebody which makes sense to me and if I had been offered those options I certainly would have taken one of them they also suggested that people should test out their sleeping pads before they go out on trail and while I think that's a great suggestion I also think that a come that has people buying products that are around $200 should probably test them out before they send them to their customers so that's all I have to say about that so I think the best thing that you can do to not end up in some kind of pinch is to get these products through REI who will guarantee your happiness in them for up to a year after purchasing whether they're used or not there are a couple of other items that I won't be as dramatic to say that I regret using them because they didn't cause me any sort of struggle or inconvenience the first one of those is the Platypus gravity works water filter when I first began my Appalachian Trail through HACC I started with the Sawyer squeeze to filter my water and after a while I just got tired of the constant like squeezing and replacing the little bladder bags that come with it and I saw my friend Riga using her platypus water filter that was so convenient because she could just collect the water hang it up into the tree and let gravity do the job for her and that was nice after a long day of Hawkins so I decided to try that out but they cost over a hundred dollars way ten point nine ounces and when I figured out that with the Sawyer squeeze I could just put it on to a water bottle and it weighs three ounces a smart water bottle weighs around one and a half ounces or so so for 4 and 1/2 ounces which was what 6.4 ounces less I could have something that worked just as easily as allowing gravity to do the work also you can find ways to rig up a Sawyer squeeze to allow it to be a gravity water filter depending on how you do it I'm sure it would weigh something close to what the platypus ways but the Sawyer squeeze cost around $40 and then with additions to turn it into a gravity system it probably still comes in a little cheaper than the platypus system now the platypus system would probably be useful if you were hiking with a group or say you had two of your kids out and you just wanted a way to filter a large amount of water really quickly and maybe your kids don't want to drink out of the Sawyer squeeze and you don't feel like filtering all of their water for them by squeezing it through then that might be a good solution and a good application of the system for you and finally Gators I had a pair of Dirty Girl Gators when I started the Pacific Crest and I'd heard folks ranting and raving about them I did like that they added a little spice to my shoes a little color but as far as keeping dirt and debris out of my shoes I really didn't notice a difference but I think it depends on people's gait and how much trash is thrown up in their shoes it probably depends on the type of shoes you have there are a lot of things that might go into that but I just didn't really notice a difference to make it worth it to deal with something else plus a little sticky deal that came with my shoes didn't stay on my shoes and at the time I was using Salomon trail runners so they just were kind of a pain and something I didn't want to deal with and so I didn't but I did notice that when I switched to ultras they had a little Gator trap that probably would have helped with the attachment issues so if I had seen a difference in the amount of trash that was coming in my shoe then I probably would have had them sent back out to me to use with the ultras since they have that Gator attachment however if you are one of those people who are finding little sticks and debris and dirt in your shoes and you're having to stop frequently to dump that out then you'd probably benefit from Gators well those are all of my items what are some of the items that you all have that you either regret using or you don't find yourself wanting to use again and why if you don't mind sharing just leave that in the comments below because I know that not all of us are interested in going out and buying a bunch of gear and testing it out so we can learn from each other on why things work for some people and why they maybe don't work for others just a reminder if you're not following me on my Instagram and Facebook pages I usually make daily post there so going over and check that out thank y'all so much for watching and we will see y'all next time

Channel: Homemade Wanderlust

Views: 697,468

Rating: 4.8477697 out of 5

Keywords: backpacking, gear, thru-hike, thru-hiking, thru-hiker, hiking, travel, nature, mountains, buyer's guide, appalachian trail, dixie, pacific crest trail, continental divide trail, cdt, pct, camino, footwear, water filtration, sleeping pad, thermarest, uberlite

Id: b0B9SmoUaK4

Length: 10min 38sec (638 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 29 2020