Equipment apprehensions are nothing new. It's in my nature to second guess things, and I'm now without an income that will allow me to easily swap gear in and out.
Most of the gear I've chosen has been field tested on one or several camping and hiking trips. All but two, that is.
First off is my new ZPacks Duplex tent. From all accounts I've read, this is one of the most badass ultralight tents out there. It's made of cuben fiber - possibly my new favorite thing ever - and more spacious than my MIA Tarptent ProTrail.
My Tarptent ProTrail was one of the first purchases I made when I decided to embark on this journey, and I'd done a lot of research at the time. I'd almost chosen a ZPacks tent, but the high prices put me off. Instead I opted for this bivy tent, low profile to be easy to find places to set it up and uses my trekking poles instead of tent rods and all that crap. And it was easy to set up!
That tent went with me on all my camping trips - paired with a cheap $20 pop-up dome tent I found at WalMart that I used to store my gear in (a luxury I was aware I wouldn't have on the A.T.!) - and I generally liked that tent a lot. I even had it professionally weather-sealed. It was a big investment.
But several months after returning from Greylock I was going through my gear... and my Tarptent was nowhere to be found. To this day, it's still gone. I'm 98% packed in my cramped little quarters, so there's nowhere here it could be. The only thing I can think of is that it must have somehow got left behind in Lanesborough at the Greylock Campsite. But since it was so long after I'd actually been there, I doubt a call to them would have made a difference.
Wherever my Tarptent is, I hope it's being used and enjoyed. Though I enjoyed that tent, it was wanting for space. To bring my gear in with me made for a lot of reshuffling every time I moved or wanted to access anything. It was a pain in the ass. Still, given the expense of a new tent, I would have lived with it had the tent not gone missing and forced my hand.
So now I have that ZPacks Duplex, which is even lighter at 19oz and also uses trekking poles for support. I just haven't used it yet. I haven't even set it up yet. Since I got it just a month or so ago, it's been all rain, snow and ice here. The few clear days I may have managed to attempt it, of course I procrastinated.
There's still time though, and I figure at worst I can set it up at the cabin I rent the night before I start the hike. There'll be plenty of room to do so, and we can get it on film. It should be a laugh. I'm not too concerned about it.
The other is water filtration. For some reason, I just haven't been able to get myself to try any of my water filters in the wild, save one - which is a single cup filter system that's neat, but not in the least bit efficient.
I'm not sure how to explain this anxiety, but it's real. Similar to times at my former job when asked to make certain phone calls, I just lock up and can't seem to get the impulses from my brain to my muscles to activate them. It's like a mental misfire.
On every camping trip I've gone on, I've brought my water filtering systems. I never used them. I had access to clean water, so I wasn't forced to use them. I'm thinking that's the key.
I may not be able to explain the why of it, but I do know how to conquer it: Force myself into a situation where I have to use the damned filters, or I just don't get to have water. Period. What better place to do that than on a thru hike of the A.T.?
On my gear list you'll see both a life straw and the Katadyn BeFree gravity filter, but since posting that I have also placed an order for Aquamira treatments as a third backup in place. If I'm not fully testing all this crap before I go, at least I can have backups in case one of them fails me. I know it's not ideal, but it's one of the first mental illness related challenges I'm going to face on the Trail, so in a way I'm kind of looking forward to it!
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