Had a hankering to be in a field, so hopped onto the train to Dorset again. It’s quite a chill journey albeit about ninety minutes. I didn’t take into consideration that it is a bank holiday weekend before half term, with good weather forecast. Lots of kids. Still, I have noise cancelling headphones, so while they charge around screaming, in between cans of red bull, I’ll just be laying in my tent trying to ignore them. Saw very cool cinnabar moth, and flowers have filled out since I was last here. Had a kinda Mac and cheese with some fried kielbasa for dins, and a nice hot chocolate. Went for a bit of a paddle and a walk, then got myself comfy to test out the two new pillows. This was basically the justification for this trip. I will update you in the morning on how it goes. I’m basically trying to see if the tiny purple nemo pillow is good enough. If it is, that will save a lot of space and weight, as I’m sure the big blue will be comfy, but is huge and heavy-ish.
Also took chair and table. Both are awesome, and glad to have them. I’m also experimenting with a floor to the vestibule, by attaching clips to the silver foam pad to clip it to the pegs.
Anyway, slumbers sweet embrace beckons, so see you all tomorrow.
So it has been a busy week. I think. Actually I’m not even sure, but just seems like ages since I last posted. I ordered so many pillows after going to Moreton, and decided to try them all and gauge which will be my forever pillow.
Trekology £19Trail £8Thermarest small £35Hikenture £21Vango self inflating £13Trekrite £13Nemo fillo ultralight £66Nemo fillo king £115
I went through some fairly extensive grading with all of these, testing for size, weight, comfort. Marked them all out of ten and then added it all up to determine which ones I kept and which ones went back. The top two, trekology and trail I have had too long to return anyway, but the trail is an excellent pillow for the money. Has a strap to keep it on my mattress and is the base pillow constantly. I like a high pillow so I usually use that one and another on top. I used to put both those two into a pillow case and pretend they were a real pillow.
The thermarest was a contender but was really small, I might consider one of their bigger models if I can find one, but that was returned.
The hikenture was pretty comfy, however it was too big for my sleeping bag hood, and more importantly, there is a huge pointy valve that is just too intrusive. This went back.
The vango, apart from how noisy it is, is actually a contender, especially at that price point. The fabric is basically really thick and it feels like you’re sleeping on sail canvas. I kept this, because it wasn’t bad.
Trekrite, basically a small bag with foam in it. Folded down okay but was too thin and small to be comfy. This was returned.
Sooo the two most expensive ones, the nemo fillos. Well the ultra lite is just that, weighs so little and is actually really comfy, if you can put up with the noise. It’s a little crinkly due to the plastic inner, but has a bit of foam covering to make surprisingly comfortable. Kept this so far.
The king size fillo just seems amazingly comfy. Weighs about 300g and folds up fairly small. But lots of foam over an inflatable inner so kinda feels like the real deal. Have kept this so far, pending a sleep in it.
Also picked up a new rucksack, Osprey Atmos AG 65. Seems really comfy but haven’t had a chance to take it out yet. So actually although I’ve spent a small fortune on camping stuff, I’ve not actually been anywhere.
In the garden, Cheech, one of the cherry trees, has been assaulted by Blackfly, and it doesn’t look good. Have sprayed it with washing up liquid and neem oil, so just gotta keep fingers crossed now.
Otherwise not an eventful week, but I’m sure I will keep you updated. In the meantime here’s some flowers.
As I sat in the garden this morning having a cup of tea I heard the throaty crackle of machine gunfire from the neighbours garden. Reaching for my browning high-power I put nine rounds down range and ended up winging an alien that had infiltrated the neighbours shed. We argued over who got to keep the body, but I ended up putting it in the garden waste bin that was picked up this morning.
In other news, the roses have come out and I have tried killing all the slugs with biological warfare.
So the night felt colder than I expected, but I guess because I wasn’t completely cocooned in my bag as I would be when it was really cold. When I woke, the birds were giving it all they had and there were no other sounds. Until the trains started.
When I fully regained consciousness, I assessed the tent to find all the slugs that had crawled all over the tent during the night. I also spotted a wee fella making his way across the roof vent.
No idea who he was, but the first thing that sprang to mind was that he was a leech. Everything was soggy but it was a bright morning, so made a cuppa and started getting packed up.
Hopped on the train and it was already sweltering. Instead of changing trains to go one stop at the end of my journey, I decided to walk home by the lakes. It was a fairly enjoyable walk, but the heat and weight of the backpack made it tedious pretty swiftly. I did get to see goslings and cows though, so it was totally worth it.
Got home, ordered pizza and called it a day, it was an exciting 24 hours, and front garden flowers are looking amazing.
Sunny day and two new pillows to try out, guess I better go camping then. Definitely seemed like quite a light pack, especially as everything was inside the bag, with the exception of the foil mat and a cool bag with some frozen sausages. This time I was headed to Moreton, famous for the Top Gear episode where they set light to a caravan.
Longish train journey, but only one change, so quite chill. Campsite is about as close as you can get to the train station, and great people running it, dude wandered about with me helping me pick a pitch. Tent up and had some Mac and cheese, as I’d forgotten breakfast. Mug of hot chocolate for dessert, and went off for a wander. Met a cat on a leash, lots of cute doggoes, and saw part of a deer. Had a cheeky splash through a stream too, mainly to see how waterproof my new shoes were.
Got back to tent and cooked my sausage and mash. The mash was portioned and vacuum sealed over a year ago, so hoping I survive eating it. Dollop of brown sauce and I was done.
I have done all the washing up, got ready for bed and got myself comfortable, so obviously I now want a pee. I will let you know how that worked out in the morning.
So the weather has been on and off for the rest of the week. I had forgotten that it was a bank holiday weekend so my plans to go camping unfortunately were cancelled. Bank holiday is too expensive for taking out the tent. Had a week that was mainly buying equipment rather than using it, but it’s only a matter of time.
Cute new lightweight cutlery arrived, along with a new water bottle, compressed towels, and a cute little bag of very discreetly wrapped piss bags.
Did bare minimum gardening and way more chilling and relaxing, when the weather allowed.
Chimenea disposed of most of the old plant beds, and perfectly good excuse for bread and cheese.
Another unexciting week tbh, but it just means that next week will be twice as exciting. See you then.
Nothing really that exciting to update, however, finally have strawbs on the go. Have also planted out the tomatoes into new troughs. Have a load of plants for the front garden too, and a couple of lavender plants, as the last ones did not survive the move when the old beds were taken down.
May have enjoyed a glass or two of cider while planting the strawbs, which may end up being named after Jacob’s sons. So I either have to get two more strawbs, or Joseph and Dan get left off the list.
There was not much to fill this post, however, I felt the flowers alone made it worth the effort.
So after very limited sleep, mainly due to a deflating sleeping mat, I actually felt pretty good and very much enjoyed my morning cuppa. I managed to use the cooker under the awning setup, and launched into my breakfast.
I had packed sausage, bacon, black pudding and hash browns into a cool bag with a freezer block. They were all frozen when I left the house. So hopefully stayed within safe temperature by the time I cooked them this morning. It was a stunning brekkie, but was too much for a camping breakfast I think. I just wanted to sleep when I finished it.
Quick shout out to my awning setup here.
I have tied para cord to the door flap, run it out to a peg you can see in the distance, and then run back to the tent, to another peg that I could tie it off. This means that without leaving the tent I could pull the door out like an awning to cook, and then untie it to close the door afterwards.
After eating and washing up, there was a rain pause, so I started packing up. Had to cram tent into a bag as got close to train time. Made it to station just as train arrived. Was pissing down with rain when I got off the train. Seemed like a very long, cold, wet, windy walk home.
Good news was that after checking the mattress for leaks, although it was the valve leaking, it turned out that it seemed to have a small thread through the stopper. I think this was causing the air loss, so will hopefully be fine.
I’ll end with a pic of the pitch and how surrounded with water I actually was. I was half expecting Shrek and Donkey to start shouting at me to leave.
So here we are again, another field, another tent, and yet another bad life choice. So I had debated hitting the canvas on Friday, but after a rough week, felt a day doing nothing but lazing was probably on the cards. I had packed bags though, so when I felt the call of the wild, I was nearly ready to jump straight in. However, I had planned to use a different bag, so by the time I was supposed to head trainwards, I had decided that it wasn’t gonna work. So one quick repack later I was aiming for the next train. As has been my previous experience, as I got if the train at Ashurst, it started drizzling. As per usual, it waited until I climbed the stile into the field leading to the site until it bucketed down.
Gave up on waiting for it to stop. Headed out to pitch. As I unrolled the tent, I realised I’d brought the wrong damn tent. This has to be the world’s smallest tent. Originally managed to pitch where there was a huge puddle just outside the door, so had to shimmy the tent a few feet to avoid falling in a pond when I left the tent. Currently everything I was wearing is soaked, and although I managed to cook, I still feel hungry, and it’s nearly impossible to cook as there’s no vestibule.
To clarify my accommodation, I have decided to name the tents.
Vinny the vestibule
Vinny was who I meant to bring, as its huge dry vestibule means it’s perfect for rainy camping.
Johnny Underpants
So-called as it looks from inside with both the doors open like the view if you’ve got a pair of Y-fronts on your head.
So waking up was a bit of a nightmare as it was ridiculously early and bloody cold. I heated up the penguin water and went back to sleep for a bit. Breakfast was eggs sarnie with black tea, as I had not brought any milk.
I went for a wander to take pics of trees and any available horses, but felt that my home bed was calling.
I left the forest to commune with my pizza and nap, but got another great ass pic on my way out.
This is a fairly short post add I feel I have covered most of my week in the other posts. Stayed tuned for next weeks instalment.
