Been keeping an eye out here in the forums but mostly have been quiet--I remember a saying that goes something like, unless your words improve the silence, stay quiet, so that what I have been doing. It's been fun watching everyone doing their thing. Reading, learning how people solve problems, but I seem to have been bitten by the experimenting fiddle bug--not quite to the DYI phase yet, that'll be coming along in time, I am sure. I just started hammocking this spring and have put 70 night in the hammock now--the last 65 have been consecutively. It has been a great ride so far. I started with a cheap $30 hammock from Amazon in April and have not looked back. I learned how to install a ridgeline--and more importantly, why. I found out why an underquilt is the way to go and got a nice one from Arrowhead and it was like magic. Then I got a fantastic top quilt from Hammock Gear--man, it doesn't get much better than that, although, I had to put it away for the summer, but when temps fall again, it'll be back. Just this week, I installed some snake skins--that is just the way to go. I had made myself a bishop bag to stuff the hammock in, but everything got all tangle and twisted, so now, into the snake skins then into the bishop bag--boom, set up is a snap! Last week, I took an old tarp I had in the shed to put over my home encampment and realized, quite by accident, why hex tarps with cat cuts are done that way...light bulb above the head moment. I love and still use my cobbled together set up--it might be I feel a kinship with it all since every part was thought out and installed--added ridgeline, ridgeline organizer, a new cinch buckle suspension, etc. I brought it with me car camping last week, slept like a rock. But the new setup is a Dutch Halfwit--it took me a week to get it tweaked the way I like it--it was pretty hot under that bug net most nights, but last night, I was once again sleeping all night and feeling refreshed in the morning. It seems it takes me about a week with a new setup to understand it right so I do not actually fully wake up when I have a midnight nature call. With all that said, I still felt like a noob in here, and honestly, I still am, I try to have the Buddha’s beginner's mind--and yet, I do feel I have paid my first entry fee and got a new simple suspension from Dutch--it is not his newest, fanciest, but it is something I wanted to try--it looked so simple I couldn't understand if it worked well, but I know it will. I know, this was a little wordy, just talking it out...
dutchware gear.jpg
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