Free Gift

I got to reading some 'professional' hiking blogs recently and there is a lot of reference to TGO magazine, Trail magazine and Outdoor Obsessive Nerd Weekly (coming soon to a stationers near you!), and I thought I'd go have a look at what they have to offer.

I currently subscribe to a well known photography magazine and just recently I seem to have lost the will to read them and have several copies still in their plastic wrappers. Given that it is clearly time for a change I thought I'd cancel my existing subscription and replace it with something 'outdoorsy' - so its win win really.

I bought a copy of Trail on Sunday and July's issue was timed perfectly as they ran an article on the merits of going lightweight. Clearly this is the work of the Gods, destiny calling if you will, and so I went and looked at a subscription. As an incentive to buy (so now I'm skeptical about whether or not the publication is any good?) they are giving away a Multimat Superlight Compact 25 self inflating mattress, which claims to be the lightest self inflating mat in the world! This wasn't the reason I eventually bought a subscription but given that my Robens Lite mattress developed a leak since returning from the Hay on Wye trip, it was clearly another sign from the Gods (and who the hell am I to argue with those guys).

I wouldn't of ever considered buying a short (122cm) length mat to save weight as I expect a good level of comfort on my trips. Given that this is free I will give it a try and if we don't get on as sleeping partners then I've not lost any money and my pack will be 350g lighter for that one trip! I'll let you all know how I get on with that once I get chance to use it.

I had a update on my Big Agnes Seedhouse SL 2 today. It has reached the UK and cleared Customs so Parcel Force should be delivering it over the next 48 hours! My giddy aunt, I'm excited about this little purchase and secretly I think Paul is too. Annoyingly I won't get to test the tent or the sleeping mat until I return from our holidays. I'm not grumbling about the holiday (for Charlotte's benefit) its just its an exciting, new piece of lightweight equipment! Paul and I are hoping to get away for the weekend of July 25th but that is an age away. Actually, thinking on my feet here, Charl and I are returning from our Italian retreat through the south of France and we will be camping each night as we work our way north back to Calais.......you can see where this is going! "Oh Charl, I seem to have packed the new, smaller but really really light tent instead of our spacious, luxurious six berth, damn it"! Charl, if that happened by some silly error on my part, just so I know, how angry might you be on a scale of 1 - 10?!!