I had some new gear I wanted to try out and there was a winter weather warning for Austin Sunday night. Perfect! Oh yeah, in Austin that just means that it gets ballpark close to freezing so we're not talking harsh winter weather here, mid 30s and rain. I dodged rain showers on my 4 mile bicycle ride to the wooded creek bottom where I was camping and set up fairly quickly after all the recent practice, thought, and fine tuning my rig. The biggest new bits are a War Bonnet Traveler hammock and a Hammock Gear 20° Phoenix under quilt. You can see it under the tarp there. UQs used to give me an Invasion of the Body Snatchers vibe. I'm sort of getting used to the idea.
The hot water bottle thread made me think my 40oz stainless Klean Kanteen inside the insulating sleeve from a County Comm MOLLE water carrier might work. It was a revelation! Boiling hot water in the bottle was comfortable against bare skin once it was in the sleeve.
Cuffing the insulating sleeve keeps the bottle from sliding out in the hammock, but still lets heat out the open top in a fairly controlled fashion. As the bottle cools off, it's easy to unfold the cuff by feel so the bottle can be slipped out for increased heat output.
I can't express just how sublime it was to hang in that hammock in the cold wet woods, rain pattering on the tarp, cocooned in down, feet in cashmere socks on either side of a hot water bottle in the foot of my 3 season bag! It was the most comfortable I've ever been camping. Actually "comfortable" doesn't get it... It was utterly luxurious! I'm hooked.
Here's a video of cold rain on taught Cuben (Thanks Law Dawg!)
The next morning I was so comfortable and busy playing with my tarp suspension between stints warming up in the hammock that I had a hard time getting out of the woods. I was using clam cleats and s-biners to attach and locate my tarp on my ridge line. Worked like a champ in the garage, but in the wet and cold they slipped in the night.
The biner seems to be keeping the cord from seating completely, so I thought I'd try the slimmer, but heavier, steel version. Same same on the wet cold ridge line. I'm still using a pair for my ridge line organizer.
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