Birthday Gear

Today is Ryan's 24th Birthday! He is finally older than me as I have been turning 23 for the last 3 years in a row (no snide comments please). So in going along with our theme of going outdoors to lose weight I got Ryan some sweet hiking gear for the special occasion. In doing some research and using my sneaky ninja skills, I was able to creepily get Ryan's measurements and get (what I hope to be) appropriately fitting gear.

First I started off with his hiking backpack, the Kelty Coyote 80 in forest green. I bought this at the local Cabela's rather than online as I wanted to be able to see it in person. I probably could have purchased his backpack online for much cheaper but as I really know nothing about backpacks, buying in store rather than online also gave me the piece of mind that if it wasn't the right size or if he didn't like it, he would be able to take it back. The nice thing about this bag is that it has the adjustable torso range of 17.5-21" so it was a pretty safe guess that it would fit. The backpack holds 80 liters which 4900 inches cubed. It is medium weight at 5.5oz, so it's not the lightest pack in the world but it's not the heaviest either. It also has a ton of compartments/pockets to hold our various things. I don't yet know what these things will be as neither of us has backpacked before but I'm making an educated guess that they will come in handy. The other nice thing about this backpack is that is hydration compatible which leads me into Ryan's next sweet item, his Camelbak Antidote Reservoir.

I just started off with the bladder or reservoir so that when backpacking, we won't have to carry an additional backpack for the bladder specifically. I chose Camelbak over a cheaper version because I have used a hydration pack before and with the cheaper versions, there tends to be the icky plastic taste when you drink the water and even after time, it never seems to disappear. The reservoir is 3 Liters or 100 oz. It is very lightweight and has a nice wide 1/4 turn open/close system, and has an integrated dryer system and not that I am necessarily concerned, but it is also made from BPA-free materials. You can get hydration reservoirs at any outdoors or sporting goods store. I happened to buy this one from Scheels only because at the time Cabela's was sold out. 

While perusing Scheels, I wandered into the camping section and picked up some random things that I figured would be useful when backpacking. I grabbed him a set of 3 diddy bags, a nylon repair kit for the hammocks, a little metal canister for matches, and a bear bell. 

To round his backpacking gear out, I got him a Hiking Montana book from Hastings, a nice orange The North Face pull over and some Cabela's brand hiking shorts, because after all, how are you supposed to project being a good outdoorsmen that goes on many adventures if you don't have the appropriate clothing? Plus he just looks so darn handsome in it.