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You are here: Home / Archives for gear

Review: Steri Pen Classic

April 3, 2010 By Danny

There is no doubt in my mind that this device has already paid for itself simply because we don´t have to constantly buy bottled water when the tap water isn´t clean enough to drink. The fact that it may one day save our lives is an even bigger benefit. There are other, fancier Steri-pen models on the market but we chose this one because it uses AA batteries, which we can recharge easily on the road. The safety features included in this device can make it difficult to use at times, but they’re safety features, so can we really complain?

SteriPen Water Purifier Classic

When the SteriPEN doesn’t adequately clean the water it tells you this with a series of red lights. You know something is wrong and that you shouldn’t drink the water but you don’t know if the problem is a dirty bulb or a lack of battery power or plain old human error. The series of lights usually tell you which it is but it can be difficult to understand; the new models on the market have addressed all this.

Having pointed out the difficulties of using this device I must say that when it does work it works brilliantly. It is surprisingly simple to operate and we´ve yet to get sick, in more than a year of travel, which means we must be doing something right. We use this pen almost daily to clean tap water in cities and stream water in rural areas. The fact that when using this we can drink the water right away and don´t have to wait (like with tablets) to drink has been a lifesaver as well. The only place this won’t work is in dark water as the UV light won’t be able to pass through the water.

Highly Recommended.

Filed Under: Electronics, Featured, gear, Reviews, Travel & Planning, Travel Gear Tagged With: health, travel, Travel & Planning

Tom’s of Maine Unscented Deodorant (Review)

August 12, 2009 By Danny

Your first question may be why purchase an unscented deodorant? That answer is simple, smell too nice and the mosquitoes will come your way. So when I was presented with a choice of Mitchum, which I’d used just fine before, and Tom’s of Maine, I chose to give Tom’s a try.

The deodorant itself did something, but I’m not sure what. The burning sensation I had in my armpits when using this Tom’s Deodorantwas painful and did not go away as quickly as I would have liked. The packaging was also sub-par in that it broke rather quickly and I could no longer rotate the screw at the bottom to make more “stick” available for use. The benefit of this was that it forced me to throw it out and save myself from nasty burning sensations.

Filed Under: Featured, gear, Reviews, USA

Pentax Optio W60 (Review)

August 12, 2009 By Danny

Pentax Optio W60 Digital Camera Gear

Ultimately we chose the Pentax Optio W60 over the Olympus Stylus 1030SW because of the storage medium. The Olympus uses a more expensive, proprietary technology (the xD picture card) that is limited to 2GB of capacity and also limits movies to 10 seconds or less. While there are ways around the movie limit, it is currently not possible to get around the 2GB storage limit.

Enter the Pentax Optio W60. Pentax uses the common SD memory card which has no limit storage limit and I can purchase 16GB cards for less than $30..about the same that a 2GB xD picture card for the Olympus costs. The Optio does not go as deep under water as the Olympus, nor is it impact resistant, but neither camera really works deep enough to go SCUBA diving. The optics are better than OK, about what you should expect from a camera in this price range. The price tag on the W60, in comparison to the Olympus, is far more attractive as well.[ad#reviews]

Cons: Part of the Pentax strategy for waterproofing is not using a lens cover, something that annoys me greatly. Additionally, when shooting in movie mode the autofocus motor is quite noisy and makes a rather annoying clicking sound. This can be removed by turning off autofocus when in movie mode but that can be problematic in its own right. Additionally, when I adjust the ISO or exposure settings these automatically reset to defaults once the camera is turned off, to some people this may be a benefit but for me it is a nuisance…especially when shooting at night. Lastly, neither camera allows the photographer to adjust the shutter speed or the f-stop, something very few point-n-shoot cameras actually provide but something I do long for.

For the money the Optio W60 is a great waterproof option. Chosen by us mostly because of the memory card and its lower price tag, it works better for us than the Stylus 1030SW did. To be honest however, as a standalone camera, neither is phenomenal in its own right…a function of the limits of the technology employed. I look forward to the day when a suitable impact resistant, waterproof camera is on the market that allows full picture control and semi-professional options.

Filed Under: Electronics, Featured, gear, Reviews, USA Tagged With: cameras

Packing for South America

July 13, 2009 By Danny

Our time in the USA quickly came to an end and yesterday we began our trek through South America. While we spent most of the time being stuffed with delicious food (there goes the weight we lost from Central America), we also spent an inordinate amount of time at outdoor equipment stores like REI.  In fact we went to two different REI’s in the Atlanta area.  After four months of use a lot of our equipment had either failed or begun to fail on us so it was time to exchange and resupply.  We’ve added a number of gear reviews to the website if you are interested and as always you can get an up to date list of our pack contents on the gear page.

We traded out clothes that weren’t cutting it, mostly things that were easily torn or didn’t live up to the rigors of travel.  For Danny this was a few shirts and a pair of pants.  Jillian traded out some undergarments and shirts, added a travel dress and took out a pair of capris.

Because so many people have asked about what is in our packs and how much we actually have, we made a video of how to pack a backpack that will give you a visual of how things fit.

Filed Under: Colombia, gear, South America, USA Tagged With: packing, packs, travel

Report Card #1

July 8, 2009 By Danny

So  now we’re home in the states for a week so we’ll take this opportunity to take stock of how we’ve done so far and what it is we need to change.  Overall, it looks like our preparation has paid off.  We’ve rarely been without something we’ve needed and have never been completely unprepared.  Since leaving the US we have not met another backpacker with smaller packs than we have (we do have the added benefit of being able to share a few things) but we have met many with things we wish we did have.

Our supplies have treated us well but we are swapping a few things out that don’t seem to be standing up to the wear and tear we put them through or just aren’t quite perfect enough for our uses.  Mostly this has to do with our  wardrobe…we’ve put several reviews up this week and several more are coming.  Once we’re done with all our trips to REI and repacking our bags we’ll update our gear page and link to the reviews we’ve written.

As for budget, which is what we are most concerned with on a daily basis, we’re spending less than we budgeted but a bit more than  we had hoped to spend.  All in all though we’re not in such a bad position.  Reminder, these numbers are updated each time we finish a country on the $$$ tab.

Country Days Food Lodging Activity Trans Misc* Daily Avg
Mex & C. Amr. 111 $17.76 $10.33 $23.31 $20.50 $7.35 $79.25
Mexico 29 $13.71 $9.57 $21.64 $31.80 $6.50 $83.22
Guatemala 36 $19.37 $10.17 $28.18 $7.69 $6.79 $72.20
Belize 4 $22.17 $0.00 $7.75 $51.35 $14.42 $95.69
Honduras 20 $18.44 $11.23 $27.47 $22.96 $4.12 $84.22
Nicaragua 7 $19.21 $9.31 $13.76 $7.94 $3.03 $53.25
Costa Rica 10 $18.88 $15.28 $12.60 $11.60 $6.25 $64.61
Panama 5 $19.10 $12.00 $28.50 $18.64 $7.00 $85.24

MEXICO:  Our first country so we weren’t so savey yet.  Having said that, we didn’t so do badly.  We did some expensive activities, several of which we would not pay so much for now.  Overnight buses and couchsurfing helped to keep lodging low but those same buses made for some high transportation costs.

GUATEMALA: This is a very cheap country.  We could have lived there very inexpensively, especially given how long we spent there.  Spanish school is the sole reason for this being as expensive as it was.   Additionally, living with a host family proved to be far more expensive than had we lived alone.

BELIZE:  Only went here to visit some family and had a wonderful time staying at their fancy (free lodging) house.  Getting there and back from Honduras, by boat, proved to be a very expensive endeavor.

HONDURAS:  Another cheap country, but we spoiled the budget here by getting PADI certified.  How dare us!  Add to that the expense of transportation to some isolated villages in La Moskitia and the island of Utilia and this country looks more expensive than it really  was.

NICARAGUA:  Not really any cheaper than Guatemala and Honduras, but as we didn’t have any major adventures here we were more on target with our spending.  That being said, this spending still represents a few small splurges.

COSTA RICA:  Really proved to be too expensive for us to do many of the things we had hoped to do…so we visited some monkey infested beaches (mostly free) instead and continued onto Panama earlier than we intended.

PANAMA:  Home to our most expensive hotel room, two overnight (low lodging costs, high transportation costs) bus rides, and finally some awesome whitewater…oh, and a canal!

Filed Under: Belize, Central America, Costa Rica, gear, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, USA Tagged With: budget, spending, summary, travel

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