Essential Guide to Walking Kit

We had fun earlier in the year meeting up with Andy from Walks around Britain and Dave from MyOutdoors whilst up in the Peak District. We were already shooting a short video on a walk around Coombs Dale, whilst we were there, we had a chance to shoot the following short video on what sort of gear you might need when starting walking.

 

 

For those of you new to walking, the video gives a great intro to the sort of kit you will need to take when heading out for a days strolling, whether that be in the hills or valleys. We would recommend at least the following gear, as weather conditions can change rapidly when you are out and about.

- Small rucksack of between 15 & 25 litres in size
- Good pair of walking boots, spend the lions share of your budget on this.
- Baselayer to push or wick sweat away from your body, it should be synthetic or merino wool (not cotton!)
- A Midlayer, generally fleece, either heavy or light depending on the weather and a spare one in case of emergency.
- An outerlayer, usually a waterproof jacket, but can be a soft shell which is a water resistant and wind proof layer.
- Good pair of walking trousers and a pair of waterproof trousers if the weather looks bad. Don#’t wear jeans, if they get wet, they are rather uncomfortable, again stick to synthetic options which are hard wearing, water resistant and dry quickly.
- Compass.
- Map (great guide from Ordanance Survey here on choosing the right map).
- First aid kit.
- Food & Drink as you burn a lot of calories out strolling.
- Hat & Gloves (make it a sun hat for summer along with some sun cream).

This is just a basic list, so take in to account if you are doing anything more strenuous, or if you are heading in to the mountains, you may well need more equipment.

What would you consider essential for your rucksack or clothing when heading outside?

Backcountry Boiler in action

We’ve posted up on Facebook recently about a new Stove that got us rather excited in the Webtogs office. A modern twist on the Chimney Kettle, we’ve been following with interest the progress of Devin who has been tweaking and designing over the last three years or so a more lightweight, portable version. Sometimes known as the Kelly Kettle from our Irish fisherman friends, the design has been around for a while and was even used by NZ troops in world war II. They are traditionally large and heavy, so a lightweight version is more than welcome for us backpackers. They are seriously simple in how they operate, as this image shows;

We received ours from the lovely Phil Turner of Lightweight Outdoors as a pre-production sample to get to grips and play around with. First things first, this is seriously light coming in at around 220  grammes. In our humble opinion he has cracked the problem that lots of people had with this design, namely that previous versions were far too big and heavy.

Timing wise we experienced a boil in a fraction over 5 1/2 minutes. We figure as you get more practiced, you can get that time down to below 5 minutes easily. We love the fact you are using real fire to boil stuff up. There is nothing that beats the smell of woodsmoke in our humble opinion, and the backcountry boiler gives it to you in spades. We also love the fact it is great for the environment as burning wood is carbon neutral.

It wasn’t long before we got neighbours looking over the fence with some quizzical and impressed faces, and it was soon cups of tea all round. We took some photos of the boiler in action and a little video that you can see below.

 

Altogether we are very impressed. We are talking to Devin now and hope to be able to stock it later next year. We think it is our favourite stove of the moment, whats currently occupying your backpack or car as stove of choice?

 

 

 

 

Top 10 tips to stop your camping trip becoming a nightmare in canvas.

We’re all fairly avid campers here at Webtogs, camping year round in some fairly gnarly conditions. We’ve been round the block a few times, so for those of you dusting off your tent for your first spot of camping for the year, we asked everyone in the office for their top tip for camping. This isn’t a guide to tents – we’ll cover that in another post, but this is our holy grail of must do’s and don’ts that have been learnt the hard way when heading under canvas.

Keith – “Make sure you know how to put your tent up. Pitching before you head off is a great idea to ensure you don’t struggle when you get to the campsite or out in the wilds. Read the instructions, despite my experience, I always read new tent pitching instructions as they all differ very slightly”

Charlie – “If you have used your tent previously, make sure you check it to ensure it has all it’s pegs, guylines and any repairs have been made. You don’t want to get to the campsite to remember that you have the rip in your tent from last year where someone trod on it nipping to the loo.”

Gareth – “Have a list of everything you need to take camping with you and make sure you check it off. We’ve got a list of basics that we make sure we have for each trip”  We’ve included it here as a text file, and is based on a spot of family car camping (basics only), so feel free to do with it as you will and tweak it based on whats important for you for a good time.

Matt – “Don’t crack out the beers straight away, pitch your tent fully and make sure someone hangs on the tent at all times when windy! Don’t be tempted to leave the guy lines as when the wind hits, you’ll be the guy chasing his tent down the campsite”

Sue – “Don’t pitch on a slope or in a hollow, if you pitch on a slope be prepared to roll on top of one another, or get a headache if your head is downhill. If you pitch in a hollow, you could be paddling in your tent, as that’s where the water will collect.

Ross – “If you are sleeping anywhere near me, you’ll need ear plugs to get to sleep with my snoring. Keep a pair handy for noisy campsites / neighbours / freinds”

Mike “Get organised in your tent, the last thing you want to do is try and find your teddy bear with no light and you can’t remember where your torch is. Have a place for everything and keep it vaguely tidy”

Lucy – “Make sure nothing is touching the outside of the tent as that will bring water in through the flysheet, keep your inner tent away from the fly as well.”

Jon – “Aim to pitch two hours before you think you should, trust me, those to hours will dissapear.”

These are just our top tips for camping, we would love to hear what yours are in the comments below, have we missed anything? What would you have as your one critical tip when camping?

Webtogs team mountain biking trip to Afan, South Wales.

Team building is an incredibly important part of any business which values the welfare of it’s employees. This is mainly due to the fact that it stops you all wanting to throttle each other but it also creates a bond between you and your fellow colleagues. The bond that was made for us, as employees of Webtogs, was made last weekend when we decided to all go to Afan, near Port Talbot in South Wales, to camp for the Friday evening and then do some pretty knarly mountain biking up and down Afan before returning home on Saturday afternoon.

We left on Friday afternoon after work and arrived in the evening around 8ish. Not a bad time considering the slow moving traffic over the Severn Bridge and beyond. We had driven in a car and a bongo van, the car driven by speedy Lavelle Gonzalez arrived early at Glyncorrwg Ponds Camp Site to set up the tents while the bongo van slowly meandered it’s way up the valley only to come to a halt at Afan Lodge where we were to dine for the evening and await the arrival of the rest of the troops from the camp site.

At around 8.30 we sat down to eat supper and chat about the adventure that was unfolding in front of us. The main topic of conversation was to do with the weather because when we left North Dorset it was pretty fair however as soon as we arrived in Wales the clouds rolled up the valley and the rain set in. It didn’t stop raining at all until we hopped back over to England so you can imagine what cycling up a Welsh mountain was going to be like.

In the morning we woke to a grey and wet Welsh welcome so we warmed up with a cup of tea and croissants before shooting off down the valley to pick up some hire bikes and helmets. The hire bikes were great and my goodness we put them through their paces. The bikes definitely took a bit of a battering with some of the guys making friends with trees, toppling off the board walks and landing upside down after rather a steep drop coupled with a sharp bend. We are still here to tell the tail but with less skin and more bruises.

The bad weather did nothing but accelerate our enthusiasm for getting on with the ascent and at first I think we were all, except Keith and Jon Stock our North Face rep, a little taken aback at how technical it was. We soon found our rhythm and with a few tips from the more experienced riders we all made our way up through the twists and turns of the densely forested Afan mountain. It took around 2.5 hours to arrive at the top and then the descent kicked in. An hour and a half of navigating narrow tracks, sharp U turns and board walks. Amazing fun but most amazing of all was that none of us got a puncture, one guy we passed on the trail was fixing his 5th in two days. All 9 of us made it to the bottom covered head to toe in scratches, bruises and mud but all with huge smiles plastered on our muddy faces.

Next stop was to the cafe at the foot of the mountain where Sue, Kuma and a welcome warm cup of tea and some good honest Welsh Rarebit were waiting for us. We all tucked in and shared our favourite and most scary sections with each other and had a laugh, all the while still looking like a team of rugby players after a tough match. Next it was to the showers which were, well, warmish to say the most but a shower non the less. After the showers packing up was the name of the game and all clubbing together to take 6 tents down doesn’t take long, even in the wet.

There are reports coming in from the passengers on board the bongo van that to keep Mike on his toes they were all singing along to the Paul Simon Greatest Hits album to pass the time, I’m not sure how many businesses there are on the planet where the employees are that comfortable with each other that they can perform a full rendition of ‘You can call me Al’ in front of each other? It’s a Webtogs thing I guess.

Another boost for moral on the journey home was the appearance of the sun, who decided to arrive just as we hopped back into England. It honestly felt like we hadn’t seen it for weeks so it was a welcome sight along with another cup of tea when we arrived back at home. A great weekend had by all and I can say that I now have the mountain biking bug along with a few others no doubt.

I thought we’d add a few quotes from the guys to sum up their weekend below so enjoy reading them.

Charlie – “Never had so much fun in the mud.”

Gareth – “Can’t stop the bruising, but I can’t stop grinning either!”

Lucy – “I cant think of anything better to do on a rainy Saturday than to play in the mud in Wales. Cant wait to go again!”

Jon – “Flying squirrels have nothing on the Webtogs crew!”

Ross – “Proud recipient of the Webtogs stabiliser award for falling off every 5 minutes”

Mike -”That’s my idea of a dirty weekend away”

Lee – ” What a roller-coaster of emotion, weather conditions and hardcore welsh terrain – loved it, epic adventure”

Sue – “smelly wet dog is nothing compared to 9 wet and muddy mountain bike riders”

Marmot Rocks North Wales

Eleven of Marmot’s best European climbers recently came together to push their own personal limits on some of North Wales most challenging routes.

The whole week was documented on film by ‘Image Impossible’ who is owned and run by action camera man Ian Burton. Ian is well known for his previous work on the BBC’s Climbing great buildings series and one of the camera men behind The Asgard project.

This short film covers all the best climbing action and some behind the scene footage showing the less glamorous side of being behind a camera lens.

Stealth Camping

Lightweight. It’s not a new mantra, but it has become an increasingly loud one within the outdoor community over the last few years. Whether you class yourself as someone who is looking to reduce their packweight, a lightweight backpacker, ultralightweight backpacker or supreme ultralight lightfantastic godlike backpacker, more and more people are gradually realising that the lighter your pack is, the further and longer you can walk for.

I’m not sure about you, but whereas my pack was getting lighter when solo backpacking, I found that when I was heading off with the family, I was actually taking more and more stuff. Two burner stoves with a grill that could just about cook a marshmallow. A full set of table and chairs. The solid, niche, canvas frame tent that are legends to longevity and stability. A box of toys that would put a small nursery to shame. Whereas at work I would gaze in rapt admiration of the Nemo Obi tents, at home I was looking at the portable kitchen station with space for a washing up bowl.

The end result of this was that I simply could not be bothered to go camping en famille. It meant getting together a load of stuff, putting a load of stuff up, taking a load of stuff down and finally putting a load of stuff away again afterwards. So last August, me and the better half sat down and had the following plan which we called stealth camping.

Our aim was simple. Make camping as a family easier and lighter. Our new mantra was to just leave it all behind. Not to go and buy a load of lightweight gear, but instead just focus on the basics. So unless something was utterly critical, it got binned. We decided that we were not allowed to camp for a long time (weekends only) and could only decided to camp on a Thursday night, to leave Friday night. This, more than any other choice,  has had the trick of really making us focus on the gear that was important.

In the end this is what we got down to, it’s not an exhaustive list, but it pretty much sums it up.

Lightweight family tent. – We’re currently having fun with the Limestone 6P, but we also have a Robbens Double Dreamer.
Trangia Stove – nothing big or fancy thanks very much
4 bowls and 4 spoons, a sharp knife and a spare plate
Cool Box
4 x sleeping bags, 3 sleeping mats and a cot.
1 outside toy for each boy.
Child Carrier for Ellis
Torches, duct tape, penknife, first aid kit
Clothes
Maps, compass and map case

Erm thats it I think.

We tried it out for several weekends at the end of last summer, and just had some of the best outdoor weekends we have ever had. The boys ended up going nuts outside and playing with natural stuff they found, rather than the toys they brought. We no longer stressed about what we had forgotten or not having stuff, and instead just got out and about and enjoyed ourselves. We felt free. We felt liberated. We fell in love with camping again as a family.

This does have it’s limitations, we are limited to camping realistically within a 3 hour radius of home, but hey that means we don’t cream cracker the environment. Occasionally, you may suffer the pitying looks of people who gaze at you from their portable decking with the BBQ and camping chairs, but it’s a small price to pay.

It’s a Thursday today. Nobody has said anything yet. We’re not allowed to you see, but the diary tells me I haven’t got anything on this weekend. Game on?