On 2/5/06, srbscout@gmail.com <srbscout@gmail.com> wrote:
> I plan to bring a few items to Philmont that will likely require batteries
> (flashlight, camera, GPS).
> I don't want to carry an extra supply of batteries. What is the
> availability of batteries in the backcountry?
>
Essentially zero. However, you don't need them.
The new maps are good enough that the GPS is mostly pointless (I only
used mine to calculate the distance to the top of Baldy from the top
of Phillips - I won't bother to take it in 2007 unless we had up into
the Valle or something). So, no GPS needed and if you do take it,
you'll probably not use it much.
If your crew is on the ball, you'll be getting up at first light and
going to bed at about dark, so you won't need anything more than one
of those tiny coin cell LED flashlights.If you start the trip with
fresh batteries in that, you won't need spare batteries and if you
think you do, just carry a whole extra flashlight since they just
weigh half an ounce (just weighed mine, exactly 0.5 oz). I carried a
high power LED headlamp (Black Diamond Zenix, 4.9 oz with batteries)
primarily in case there was any reason to do first aid in the dark,
but never really used it. I will probably carry it again in 2007 but
will again depend on one of the little LED mini-lights for actual use.
I like the Princeton Tec Eclipse 2 micro-light, because it has an
auto-power-off feature so if you forget to turn it off you won't eat
all your batteries. Having a choice between the carabiner-style clip
and the hat brim clip is nice too. I get about a year of fairly heavy
campout use out of the Zenix so with fresh batteries in that, there
would certainly be no need to carry spares. Don't even think about
taking a non-LED light.
That just leaves the camera. If you have a digital camera and avoid
using the flash (easy because you'll be sleeping when it's dark) and
avoid using the LED display (doable if your camera has an optical
viewfinder), then you won't go through that many batteries. For 2005,
I brought along 3 extra NiMH batteries (2.5 oz each) for my Canon
Powershot G3 but only used one of them, despite having taken 1287
digital photos (average about 1.3mb each) and 80 video clips (average
about 6mb each). Extra compact flash cards weigh 0.3 oz each, so it
really isn't a hardship bringing along enough batteries and memory to
more than cover what you'll need on the entire trip. Since I've got
the postal scale out anyway, the entire camera with battery, CD card
and lens cover weighs only 18.1 oz, and it's one piece of weight that
I would not consider eliminating.
-- T.W. Cook - SM Troop 151/CC Crew 911 - Georgetown, Texas http://www.troop151.org ------------------------------------------------------- Scouting E-mail Discussion Lists @ usscouts.org Subscribe/Unsubscribe at http://usscouts.org/lists/ Listserv Commands at http://usscouts.org/lists/lc.asp ------------------------------------------------------- Send listserv commands to: listserv@troop47.com Send postings to: philmont@troop47.com List FAQ found at: http://usscouts.org/lists/faq.asp List Administrator: philmont_owner@troop47.com ------------------------------------------------------- As you gather around this virtual campfire with fellow Scouts and Scouters, do your best to be trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent. -------------------------------------------------------Received on Sun Feb 5 11:46:25 2006
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.8 : Wed Jul 26 2006 - 11:59:41 CDT