ananda

The Feathered Friends Toucan concept is great. I've been using a similar setup with Western Mountaineering (WM) Mitylite (+40) for most of the year and the Aspen (+25) for winter with a homemade summer coupler that was only 5.5 oz, and patterned exactly as the the WM coupler that weighs 16oz. Superlight, super roomy and works perfect. It's nice not to have the mummy bag zip in the middle which you will get with two mummys.

Thanks Barjor. Our camp was on a small ridge outcrop left ~150-ft of the main south climb trail as you're going up at around 6600'. It's at the apex of a prominent rock ridge, and SE about ~300 yards of where the south climb trail makes it's first typical stream crossing. The camp is dry, has a circular rock wind block and great veiws. The follwing are photo's from camp and a map with coordinates.

A Western Mountaineering mitylite sleeping bag (aqua green) with a custom made summer coupler was left at camp near the Mt. Adams south climb trail near 6600-ft on May 30th. It was in a black North Face stuff sack. The coupler took me at least 10-hours to make. I'd be great if I could get it back. I would even give a reward of choice for it's return. Thanks

I arrived last year at 8 am. Waited in line for about 2 hours. The ski selection was not very good. They had super long and super short skis. They had a lot of apparel and non-ski stuff. I probably will not go again, but would recommend you show up at like 6 am and wait for the doors to open at 8 am if you want a ski selection after standing around in line for two hours.

I've posted previously on my good experience with the BD Lighthouse in heavy rains (do a search). I don't have any incentive from BD and am not employed by the gear industry in any way. If you buy one and it leaks like a sieve, just return to black diamond on false advertising, since they advertise it to withstand all but the heaviest rains - or something to that effect. I trust that BD is in business to make money in the long term. If they sell a product that flat out doesn't perform as they say I won't hesitate to return it and I'd certainly be cautious about being a future customer. So far I'm happy with the tent. I wouldn't want to set up any light tent in extremely strong winds. Bivy or select a protected site. I suspect the lighthouse tent is not as wind worthy as the Ahwahnee because the fabric is so much thinner and lighter.

Forget to add, the space (volume) savings is huge between the BD epic and Todd Tex tents. The space savings might be more than the weight savings.

Condensation seems to be more of an issue with BD's new tents that water coming in from the outside. On the ID/Bibler tents the "paper towel" like inner surface soaks up the condensate and so you don't think it's there (but it is). Both BD epic and Bibler ice up on the inside when it's cold enough inside the tent based on my experience, and the Bibler icing can be worse because the frozen water is so well bonded to the fuzzy thick tent shell material. The difference is the shell material. The epic is super thin and light and Todd tex is relatively heavy and thick. I would have to guess the Todd tex is stronger since it's thicker and laminated, but I really don't know for sure.

The heaviest rains were in the Olympics at about 2000-ft in early March. It was dumping rain very hard and consistently for at least 12 hours (I would think it rained several inches that night). The tent was under trees so big drops and snow bombs were falling on it too. My Sil mega mid, which is not seam sealed, was leaking. The seam sealed Lighthouse was not.

My experience with the Lighthouse has been that it keeps me warm in dry during heavy rain events. It weighs about 3.5 lbs though, not less as BD advertising may claim. I would prefer the Bibler for high wind resistance, just because I think the material on the biber is stronger than the thin Epic.

Excuse my ignorance, but does this mean they were both useful, or not? And about the fixed line, did you guys use it? Does the rope seem reliable? Thanks in advance. We're headed up this weekend and I'm stoked.

I've been pretty impressed with the epic on my Lighthouse. It has kept me dry on several downpours, including about 12 hours of heavy dumping rain in the Olympics. I have sealed the seams.

Re: the topo program. I drew the route and it shows 12.75 mi. one way, with +7300 -3420 = +3880 (again one way.)

Are there any running water sources near the camps near the Turtle? Or should I prepare to melt snow and ice?

The Stubai's have served me well. A friend of mine has had problems with the Camps. The Camps have a flat aluminum piece connecting the front piece with the back piece. When using crampons with flexible soled shoes or boots, this flat piece should flex with your shoe. The Stubai's use a steel piece here which is flexible, the Camp's use an aluminum piece which is brittle. Jim at PMS replaced this center piece on my friends broken Camps with steel pieces, like those which are part of the Stubai's. I assume though, that the aluminum portions of both these crampons would probably fail in a brittle manner if over stressed. Steel crampons would likely be ductile if over stressed.

The snow is extremely wet unconsolidated mush. Of the 30+ plus times I've been out this year, this was by far the worst snow for skiing. See the TR at turns-all-year: http://www.turns-all-year.com/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=tr0405;action=display;num=1086106728;start=0

Actually, former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O'Neill says similar things with regard to Bushes vision to invade Iraq. PBS even aired a documentary about the lead in to the most recent Irag war that mentioned many of the same things too (I can't recall the name of it but it aired about a year ago +/- a few months). Much of what Clarke says has been said by others.

Alpinfox, No water came through the silnylon or epic fabric. In my experience with silnylon, with ID tarps and a megalight, it is waterproof and not at all breathable. The Silnylon is definitely more waterproof than the epic based on my assesment of fabric breathability. I'm not sure the exact technical nature of how either fabric works as a water barrier, but I think it's a silicone impregnation rather than a DWR. I'm sure you could find out doing a web search. Wild Things touts the benefit of epic over DWR in that with epic you clean it to restore its water repellency rather than add a chemical treatment. Not sure if the same applies to silnylon. My tent weight, 1543g (3lb 6 oz), is after seam seal. Though, I was very careful to avoid a sloppy seam seal job and only place enough to function and no more (I probably used less than half the supplied tube, but needed 3 syringes, due to the time consuming nature and me taking breaks). If you paid attention to their website, the older advertised weight (up to mid Jan 04) was less than 3 lbs or right at. After I questioned and commented to them on actual v. advertised weights they did adjust their marketing to reflect closer to the truth (perhaps my added seam seal is equal to 4-6 oz?). Also I think their packaged weight is just the tent and poles - nothing else. In any event, a user would probably want to end up seam sealing. Both nights I was out in the Lighthouse, conditions were anything but calm. I trust the epic to keep me dry as much as I trust Tegral Tex. One other thing, the Lighthouse has excellent ventilation.

I have used the Lighthouse twice and love it. The first night was at about 5000' ft and it snowed a about a foot with probably 2-ft drifts around it. The second time was near 3700' and it snowed some but mostly rained (rain was dumping). The night it was dumping rain my friends in my ID MK III got soaked (not sure they paid enough attention to ventilate or what), anyway we in the Lighthouse stayed perfectly dry. The epic fabric appears waterproof to my eyes, water easily rolls off. I did seal all the seams very carefully, which took a lot of time. The real benefit is how small it packs down compared to a Bibler or ID tent. The only potential drawback I see is that with a thin fabric pay attention not to tear it, just like any superlight product (WM Flight, BD Megalite, etc). From my experience so far I have no reason to worry about a lack of waterproofness. The difference I do notice between the epic and Todd Tex/Tegral Tex is the Tex has a fuzzy surface which absorbs condensation and helps it to stick to inner tent wall where as the epic is smooth so frozen or unfrozen condensation tends to fall off the wall easier rather than build up. Why would BD sell a tent, claiming waterproof in all but the worst downpour, if it truly leaked like a seive? I guess I have some faith in the company and their desire to keep happy return customers. It weighs closer to 3.5 pounds than 3 as advertised. Finally, there are some other user reviews posted on the web in places: http://forums.backpacker.com/thread.jsp?forum=4&thread=33471&start=0&msRange=15