Date: 2014-10-06
To: Zumsteg house--Florida
Miles today: 0.0

Hi Friends and Followers, I missed you, so I thought I'd write this last wrap up entry.....actually my mother shamed me into it! I'm 56 years old and still my mother knows best! My flight home went very smoothly. Friends Bobbee and Marie; mom, Nancy; and husband ,Albert, met me at the airport with hugs, smiles, yells, balloons and signs. Al really was doubly excited because he saw that I was carrying home Maine lobsters for dinner! I felt great ¢ a little tired but very content. Our golden, Winnie, went nuts.... literally nuts.... on her back kicking nuts! She looked and felt beautiful so I went nuts too! I received notes, flowers, messages and Chilly Willy (a woman who just knew me through trail journals)cross stitched an AT map for me. Now Hobo is the gear expert, I personally just want gear to do what it's supposed to do. I don't enjoy shopping and researching gear. But so many strangers helped me out when I was preparing for my thru hike, so I really felt as if I should do a gear review. With that said, here's my gear review!Sleeping bag ¢ Western mountaineering 20°. It was light, it was expensive, it was silky, it was not long enough for me. I'm 5'5" and move around a lot. I think I would have liked to have had a slightly longer and wider, maybe a man's bag. Cocoon style made it hard to sleep on side with leg up. I liked the bag best when it wasn't really that cold and I used it like a blanket. There's no way that bag would keep you warm at 20°. I got a thermal light liner and that really helped me to keep warm.Backpack ¢ ULA Circuit. Customer service was great when I needed to purchase a new smaller hip belt. Hip pockets were handy. Don't overstuff though, I did and broke the zipper. I looked like a dork carrying my bottles in the front of the pack.... but it worked great for me. I'm not technically savvy so I had fears that a bladder might burst, freeze or get moldy. I wanted to keep it simple. Although I was fitted by a professional, the small pack was not right for my long torso ¢ no problems exchanging. I lined it with a compactor bag which worked great. The pack didn't like when I went over 30 pounds, so it helped keep my pack weight in check. Hobo had a Cuben fiber Hyperlite Mountain Gear pack, 2400 Windrider Pack. She loved it,although, she said it started looking like a dirty diaper and she wished she had the bigger size. Zpacks were cool too-They make Cuben fiber tents, stuff sacks, packs....Cuben fiber seems to be the way to go. Pack cover ¢ Granite Gear. Just a piece of crap. For some reason it stopped repelling..... maybe it was something I did wrong. I don't know. I ended up having to slit a compactor bag and put it over the pack and then put the packcover over that to hold it into place.Tent-Big Agnes SeedHouse 1. Hobo and I noted my ground cover was soaked when we packed up and of course Hobo's was drier than a bone. I wasn't staking sides out enough so I was really getting a lot of condensation. Over the trip, it held up fine ¢ zipper, poles, pockets ¢ nothing broken or torn. It was light. Everyone who has a hammock loves them-they call us ground dwellers. Pillow-inflatable cocoon pillow. Fine when I wanted to prop my head up when pecking away at my trail journals but when it was time to sleep, forget about it. It felt like a mini water bag and would run away from me. I scammed Hobo's Cuben fiber stuff sack pillow and that didn't work either. Hobo had huge success with both pillows. Not fair! I ended up balling up my smelly down jacket and using that for a pillow.Raingear-Columbia jacket and REI pants. They worked okay, but let's face it, no rain gear really works. In certain temperatures just a garbage bag rain skirt worked best. Smart wool long underwear-awesome.Darn Tough Socks are the way to go.Plastic collapsible cup-it held a peculiar weird odor that wouldn't go away. I was happy when it started leaking so I could throw it away.Titanium spork-I should have purchased the long handle one. I lost my small Spork and was fine using plastic utensils.Knife-lightweight single blade knife. I threw it away by accident at mile 600 and didn't miss it a bit.Snow Peak stove-I conned Hobo into doing most of the cooking but this was a great little stove. No problems, but Hobo kept talking about all the virtues of the Jet Boil stove. Clothes-don't get too uptight about this. You'll be sending items home and you'll be picking things out of hiker boxes.... You'll look like hiker trash in no time.Boots-The Merrell Moab's worked good for me. They were comfortable right out of the box. And that was a good thing because I went through five pairs. The rubber piece on the tip of the boot would catch on roots and start ripping off. But my feet liked the Merrills so I stayed with it.Hiking poles -Ridgeline FL135Helinox-expensive but really loved them because they were so lightweight. They really are great when you're scrambling on rocks and have to hold onto your poles with one hand as you maneuver over the rocks.Will I do another long distance hike? I really think so but keep it a secret, I haven't told my family yet! I'm so happy that I've inspired some people to get up and get moving! I had no idea what I was doing-one step at a time-and I made it, and you can too!Oh, Hobo's brother-in-law, Bill, made a YouTube video watchable only on PC(because of the music ownership). The search is Mount Katahdin Hunt Trail Hobo Cadi AT Finish. Check it out, he did a great job!