November 9 2013 I did my first solo hang. Due to a recent, 8 weeks, surgery on my Achilles tendon I decided that though I wanted to experience Big Sur, I did not want to hike far. Good thing I did this because the .5 mile walk from car to camp site with my pack had my ankle begging for mercy.
After some research on hf, youtube, and anything I could google I decided I would head to Botcher's Gap in Big Sur.
I ended up having the 12 site camp mostly to myself, a few sites away was a single couple from the Bay Area. We ended up having coffee in the morning together, because though they remembered to bring coffee, they did not have a way to heat it, and there are no fires allowed in Big Sur right now.
I was concerned about being cold and prepared my sleep system for 30 degrees, what I got was closer to 50.
I learned quite a bit, I learned I can follow internet directions to make amsteel blue whoopie slings tie them to my hennessy and not fall in the night. I was quite concerned with this since I effectively took a brand new hammock with perfectly working suspension and replace it with my own home made system. Having never done this, I felt confident that I could get it right, but was unsure about how many tried it would take. This caused me to wake in the middle of the night dreaming I was falling, though I never did. I learned that though I do like hammock sleeping I have much more tweaking to my setup, I need to add an underquilt to my system and stop using the thermarest. I of course will have to use the mat until I can find the funds for a UQ. I CONMFIRMED that I prefer to camp in colder weather, the summer is nice, but there is something awesome about knowing that you are smart enough to put together the right things in the right order to survive freezing, even -9 or -19. I once sat on the snow, at 13k feet in Austria, a snowboard on feet, a cell phone in helmet talking to a buddy in New York, it was -14 outside and I felt toasty warm. I could have done without the 10k foot drop to my left that I could not see due to a snow squall giving me a white out, hence sitting on the snow waiting it out.
Anyway check out my first YouTube ever, give me feedback on how I have my fly and hammock hung.
Thanks
http://youtu.be/F_ajefsJcrs
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