farting owl and i got out on the salmon river trail in mt. hood NF for a 2 nighter this past weekend. saw a lot of wet & cold weather saturday night... lows around 30 with rain. sunday showed quite a few glimmers of sun- actually outlasting the rain and clouds for the most part.
i was field testing the packa, which worked out well. when it rains... things get wet, no matter what. but the packa did a pretty good job. it was easy to vent while climbing the 1,000 ft. elevation gain, and offered good warmth retention when the temps dipped. *i will say though, the packa is not modular, therefore if your pack is not on you, neither is the packa. and vice versa. farting owl's system allowed him to drop his pack after the 9 mile haul= pack cover protecting his pack, rain shell keeping him dry. hmmmm... the verdict is still out.....
my wb spinn mamajamba performed flawlessly as expected, keeping the jrb bridge, hudson river and incubator dry. i slept warm, high and dry. it's trips like this that make me love the hmmk so much more than that passe notion of a tent.
*note on the jrb bridge hmmk, even as a small guy - 5'8" 160lbs., i still experienced a decent amount of shoulder squeeze. i slid up as far towards the head end as possible, and that seemed to help. while i can get a good, flat lay- especially as a side sleeper, my shoulders cramped pretty bad, waking me up and forcing me to flip sides. the verdict is still out on that one too.....
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