littlegrunts.com

LifeStraw Go

by Paulina Dao September 17, 2014

written by Paulina Dao

I first got wind of LifeStraw when bloggers were reviewing them left and right and sharing all over social media. I didn’t really get it. As hikers, backpackers, adventurers, we’re used to carting water all across the wilderness. But what if we didn’t have guaranteed reliable water sources to slurp from? The straw is useless.

I was so excited to see that LifeStraw sent some of their LifeStraw Go bottles to Idaho for #HellHikeAndRaft. Thanks to Tara’s lightning quick snatching skills, I was able to get my hands on one of these babies. I can easily say that this is my most favorite piece of gear from the trip. It’s so easy to scoop water and not have to worry about filtering it! I’m a wake-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night-because-I’m-thirsty-and-or-hot type of person, so this was great to have for ultimate laziness.

The bottle holds 650 mL (22 fluid oz) of water for on the go use. The plastic is BPA-free, with a soft, rubbery, flip top bite valve for comfortable drinking. The filter has a lifespan of about 1000 liters of water, and filters down to about .2 microns. It will remove 99.9999% of waterborne bacteria and 99.9% of waterborne protozoan parasites. If you’re an average adventurer in the North American backcountry, this should be perfect for you. But elsewhere? You’ll need to be wary of viruses in your water.

I found that the straw had a tendency to leak if placed upside down or on its side. This wasn’t isolated to my own bottle, which is quite a bummer. The carabiner is a little flimsy, and the gate tends to pop out past the nose. Not really a deal breaker, just annoying. There’s no lid or cover for the mouth piece. If you’re traveling through a dusty area, or if you’re prone to rolling around in dirt like me, your mouthpiece is going to get dirty.

Lastly, the biggest downside, once you’re at that 1000 liter mark, there’s no way to replace your filter! Granted, the average weekend warrior will go through 1000 liters of filtered water pretty slowly, but once you’re there, you need to buy a new bottle. It’s not cost or waste efficient. But maybe by a thousand liters, they’ll have replacement ones.

Update: The folks over at Eartheasy have let me know that replacement filters are now available for $18.95! Wahoo!

All in all, I think it’s a pretty nifty product. I don’t quite have anything like it, and never thought of picking up anything like it. Now that I have it, I’m super excited about it. And as an additional bonus, for every LifeStraw product you purchase, you help deliver clean, drinkable water to kids in Africa. A product that is good and does good gets a million points in my book.

Buy through LifeStraw or Amazon for $34.95.

September 17, 2014 1 comment

#HellHikeAndRaft Day 1: Goat Pass, He Devil, Shelf Lake

by Paulina Dao September 15, 2014

written by Paulina Dao

I’ve been dreading the writeup of these #HellHikeAndRaft posts. It means it’s really over! And I don’t want it to be over. Without getting too sentimental, this was one of the most fun trips I’ve ever been on with some of the coolest people I’ve ever met. Thanks Tara, Russ, Scott, Val, Trevor, Shannon, Jes, Annie, Wendy, Adam, Jeff, and Becky & Parker at America’s Rafting Company!

Now for the nitty gritty… Monday morning, we woke up bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Our guide, Marshall, picked us up from the Meadows Valley Motel in New Meadows and carted us off to Windy Saddle in the Seven Devils Wilderness. We met up with Rick, our other guide, and John and the horse team and into the wilderness we went.

We quickly began ascending up the Goat Pass trail until we hit the ridge. We were rewarded with views of the Tower of Babel and Mirror Lake. We paused and snapped some photos. From there, we traversed across and began our descent to our lunch destination. The trail was steep and slippery with a bit of scree skiing at certain points. Sheep Lake was the reward, and we stopped to refuel.

Post-lunch, we hiked around Sheep Lake, marveling at its cool, clear waters until we reached the junction to head up to He Devil or head to camp. Tara, Jes, Annie, Russ, Rick, and I decided to tackle He Devil; the rest decided to mosey off to camp.

Our adventurous group began the ascent up, but quickly realized that there was no real trail. Up and up, we went, but as we reached the ridge to reach the summit, we decided to stop. It was late in the day, clouds were rolling in. All signs pointed to safety rather than summiting, and we began our descent and headed to camp.

Shelf Lake was our home for the night! Coming into camp was like arriving at an oasis! A kitchen was set up, a fire was burning, the lake was pristine and clear. I set up camp and started to drink wine. Little did I know, guacamole, chips, and salsa awaited, and there were fajitas to be had.

I slept very well that night.

Total mileage for the day was 4.39 miles with about 1,657′ of elevation gain. This does not include He Devil.

Stay tuned for the other five days, and don’t forget to check out everyone else’s content!

September 15, 2014 4 comments

Adventures Hiking

Stanislaus National Forest: Rainbow Pools

by Paulina Dao August 29, 2014

written by Paulina Dao

If you’re on your way in or out of Yosemite, take a break and cool off at Rainbow Pools off Highway 120 in Stanislaus National Forest. This is a little oasis with a picturesque waterfall, an inviting rock, and refreshingly cool water. The water level was a tad lower than the last time I was there, but still swimmable and jumpable. I thought it would have been engulfed in flames from last year’s Rim Fire, but things are still lush and green!

During hot summer and fall days, it gets pretty packed with people swimming and jumping off the rocks. At night it’s a little more quiet, save for the sound of bats swooping around above the water.

This is a destination you can’t miss if you’re in the area, even if you’re only stopping for a little while.

August 29, 2014 0 comments

Adventures Hiking

Hiking Clouds Rest, Yosemite National Park

by Paulina Dao August 27, 2014

written by Paulina Dao

Half Dome lottery permits are nearly impossible to get. That hike can be unnerving for those afraid of heights. If you missed out on clambering up the cables, don’t fret. Hiking Clouds Rest out of Tuolumne Meadows is just as much of a thigh-burner, and perhaps, even more stunning than the iconic granite dome.

August 27, 2014 1 comment

Gear

Narrative Clip

by Paulina Dao August 26, 2014

written by Paulina Dao

Have you ever wanted to be able to passively capture all the memories in your life without the bulk and distraction of a camera?

The Narrative Clip is a tiny, 5 megapixel camera you clip to somewhere on your body. It captures a photo every 30 seconds, or when you double tap the clip. It goes to sleep face down on a table or in a dark pocket and wakes up when you shake it or expose it to light.

You upload photos by plugging it into your computer via USB and can save it to the cloud and/or desktop. By downloading the app on your phone, you can also have access to your photos in the cloud on the go, and you can share via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or email.

Though the idea is super neat, the Narrative Clip, app and software definitely have room for improvement.

I discovered that the Clip requires some forceful tapping to take the photo. Tapping as if you were on your smartphone will not register, leading me to think that the camera was defective for a good few hours. I think that an on/off button would be pretty useful since I couldn’t actually tell when the Clip was off. I had some photos of my pack pockets when I checked. I found that the battery lights on the side of the camera weren’t indicative of actual battery life. At the end of my trip, I had one light blinking at me, but plugging the Clip into my computer said I was still at 67%. Using the Clip also requires a test run before you actually begin capturing. I thought the spot that I had clipped the camera to would suffice, but I captured a lot of footage of my hand and trekking pole.

The Narrative app is not very user friendly. With any camera constantly taking photos, you will have more garbage shots than non-garbage photos. There’s currently not a way to batch select photos you’d like to delete; instead, you have to sift through each one by one. The app itself is pretty buggy. Photos aren’t actually deleted; it crashes while deleting photos; stock, placeholder photos are displayed; “moments” appear to be duplicated. Sharing to Instagram doesn’t allow you to position the photo. I’m annoyed that there isn’t a way to share images via text message, as that’s the most common way to share individual photos privately. It all makes for a very frustrating user experience.

In short, the idea of the Narrative Clip is pretty cool, but delivery fell a little short. I may consider purchasing future iterations once features are more robust, but right now, I’d say it’s a pass.

Buy the Narrative Clip with a 3 month subscription ($229) or 12 month subscription ($279) to the Narrative cloud.

The Narrative Clip was sent to me for three days as a part of the #outdoorsio experience challenge. From here, it is heading off to The Weekend Warrior who I challenge to reach a climbing/hiking high point. Sign up to be a part of the adventure here.

August 26, 2014 1 comment