Steve wrote: "Packing a kayak for camping the first time is similar to putting a Klepper together the first time. Incredulity (This all can't fit!) followed by trial and error (Should have put this in first) followed by logical thinking in 3 dimensions (OK, so the space behind the skeg box must be about...but the space alongside the skeg box is only...) followed by amazement (Dang! It did fit). I'd suggest doing it for the first time in your garage, not on the beach." This is a photo taken during our first serious packing of our Klepper, as we're off to paddle round Skye, Scotland. Ann-Christine, my wife, didn't believe that it all would go in, but it did, (minus one or two big items that had to be strapped to the deck). That's her sitting in the background, already having given up ... http://foldingkayaks.org/gallery/Skye%2C-Scotland%2C-2004/Almost_ready_to_go_with_tent_at_the_stern_and_stove_and_folding_stools_up_front --------- Craig wrote that many NW paddlers love their Hennessy's Hammocks and the Trangia cooking sets. I have used Trangias since I was a kid, but they did have one design flaw, originally, and that was the burner, that only ran on denaturated alcohol (heated whiskey is said to work, too, but kills the burner eventually). So, if you didn't use every drop of fuel in the burner it leaked into the pots and pans, making the food taste really bad (no screw cap on the burner in those days). And then I went on a winter expedition: really, really cold, and the darn fuel didn't really produce enough heat - boiling some water took maybe a half hour! Cooking was possible, but took ages! Most of the others had modified their Trangias for kerosene burners, and cooked faster than lightning! So I bought a compact Optimus burner, but that darn thing ran only well on white spirits, which is harder to find than elephants on Madison Avenue, if you are in Sweden, that is! So then I switched to a MSR XKG, running on kerosene, and I have never looked back! I still used the Trangia pots and pans, and adapted the set for a Whisperlite, but eventually switched to MSR pots and pans, but kept the Trangia frying pan, and the Trangia grip (nicer than the MSR, I think)! Trangia also used to have a slightly bigger frying pan, with a folding handle, and a lid, which was superb, alas no more available! Trangias with butane burners came years later, as did the present generation with a coating that is said to be the hardest there is - similar to MSR's, I guess .. Older-style Trangias are available in the UK for a pittance, by the way, becoming surplus when the Swedish Armed Forces started to mave away from a conscript army (when I was a younger lad, almost all men did their conscript service, now just a few tens of thousand do it, plus as many female volunteers there are - a total no-no in my day). Tord -- Want an e-mail address like mine? Get a free e-mail account today at www.mail.com! *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Apr 21 2008 - 01:50:47 PDT
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