[pct-l] Jansport D-3

[Georgi Heitman]

Hi, Tortoise...How ya doin'?
As a matter of fact, my ex and I carried a Svea...don't remember the number, 
he got custody.  He who'd never get caught with a backpack on again yearned 
to be in Boy Scouts, but alas, we had girls.  I couldn't do anything about 
the lack of boys (til we had an Italian AFS student named Paolo with us for 
a year), but one phone call had Bob involved in Boy Scouts, Cubs, actually, 
but he grew into Webelos and then eventually into Scout Master and a 
reasonable authority on Mountain Medicine and High Mountain Medicine.  We 
did High Adventure Backpack Training with the local B.S. council's High 
Adventure Team, I in my usual position as the token female. Oh, and I 
believe I may still be in possession of an aluminum Sigg fuel bottle tho if 
I still have it, I'd have to check re the metal stopper...somehow I think it 
didn't have.  I'll look.  No Sigg pots, most of mine were picked up at Good 
Will and Army Surplus stores...we (my Girl Scouts), were a poor inner-city 
troop, they made do, I made do too.  Our packs and sleeping bags were the 
only things we didn't economize on...but we shopped very carefully.  REI's 
broken, incomplete or returned goods sale, annually, after the first of the 
year? was great if you were among the first 50 in line.  I picked up my 
Eureka Timberline tent there for I think, $35.00, because it was missing a 
pole, which I was able to purchase over in the pole section of the store for 
a buck or too.  It had a vestibule tho...and I went back the next year and 
found another E.T. tent that wasn't that much more...it was missing a 
vestibule!...Picked a second one of those up a year or two later.  I agree, 
it would be interesting to see someone do the trail with the equipment the 
first stalwarts used back in what? 1967 or so?  Mad Monte, still got any of 
that stuff?  Or even  like 1945, 46 stuff.  I may have a pack that would 
come close to qualifying...I carry a Dutch Oven in it.

Cc: <cmkudija at ca.rr.com>; <pct-l at backcountry.net>
Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 4:20 PM
Subject: Re: [pct-l] Jansport D-3


You ain't an "old timer" unless you've carried and used a Svea 123 or
similar stove. Also helping to qualify are Sigg aluminum bottles,
especially with the metal stoppers, and Sigg potts.

My pack is still an A-16 frame circa 1971 with a replacement bag from
??? both of which I got at Sierra Equipment in San Francisco on Polk St.


Now with all the people doing ultralite runs of the PCT, how about
someone doing it with post WW2 gear.

----------
Tortoise

<> He who finishes last, wins! <>

I switched to Mac OSX rather than fight Windows
Using Mozilla Thunderbird  http://www.mozilla.org/products/thunderbird/

Georgi Heitman wrote:
> Ceanothus...
> I think you're on the money...my pack 's wings were looped, in fact, I had 
> a thing-a-ma-bob that had a clothes closet rod hanger on one end and a 
> clothes pin on the other.  I could hook the thing over the bottom loop, 
> and clothespin my wet socks or whatever to it.  Dry in no time.
> And we certainly are wallowing is something, hopefully the past, and yes, 
> these are the Model T's of todaý's world.  They were the forerunners, the 
> link between the old wooden? packboard backpack frames from WW2, maybe?  I 
> remember when I told my ex that my G.S. troop wanted to learn to backpack 
> and that our two daughters and I needed sleeping bags and packs, he said 
> we were crazy, there was no way we'd ever get him out there with one of 
> those 'instruments of torture'  that he wore in the army.  He was amazed 
> when he saw what we brought home...my first pack was a Camp Trails that 
> was a comfortable fit,...before surgeries, but not after.  I started 
> borrowing packs from Boy Scouts in the neighborhood.  The Jan Sport that 
> Swen Wedigen lent me was the answer. The leather alone on mine must have 
> weighed a pound, and around the Twin Lakes area of Lassen N.P.,  I had to 
> hang it to keep the local skunks from nibbling on it. And the leather that 
> held the wings in place just may have
 creaked...I'd forgotten that.
> These early good packs proved that comfort was possible while wandering 
> thru the woods, after that, making them lighter and able to carry weird 
> stuff, like skis, climbing gear, etc, was about all you could do in terms 
> of innovation.  Lighter weight fabrics that wore as well as cordoba cloth, 
> and shed water w/in reason was a good place to start. These packs are like 
> the Alpenlite packs, the old Eureka Timberline tents, the Gerry Sleep 
> System,  the  MSR Whisperlite stoves and Frostline Kits.  They set 
> standards for designers at The North Face, The Granite Stairway, The 
> Marmot Mountain Works, Sierra Design, etc. to strive to improve upon.  I 
> marvel at today's equipment, things like my neighbor, Bill Davis has shown 
> me.  He gets his gear mostly online from Backpacking Lite.  But my old 
> pack fits me just fine, and if it's a Model T that's  fine too.  I'm 
> almost old enough to be a Model T myself so we go together well.  And this 
> past summer, two section hikers came through wearin
g Jan Sports, newer, lighter, fabric as well as the frame.  And they were 
smaller clones of mine.  So...if it ain't broke, don't fix it.  It's a good 
pack.
>
> Georgi, ramblin' on....
>
>
>