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I'm going to carry a large metal coffee tin, the type I use to get MJB in. I don't know if they still make them, coffee now seems to largely be sold in bags or plastic, but I bet I can find them at thrift stores.

I put stuff in the coffee tin in my pack (IE first aid kit, spare socks and underwear, etc.) - find rapid running water part of stream, rinse coffee can, fill coffee can from the well oxygenated rapid flowing surface water, and then put the pickup for the filter pump in that.

That should be good enough without using iodine to refill a water bottle.

dv wrote:

Some1 wrote:

Wouldn't it make more sense (taste-wise) to add the iodine, then filter, then flavour?

Do you think there'd be any advantage to filtering twice? (Before and after the iodine treatment)

The more I think about it, I suppose there wouldn't be. At least assuming the filter is good enough to get what it's going to get the first time around, and assuming that the iodine will kill anything, no mater how much is there.

But my belt-and-suspenders hindbrain is telling me I would want to do it that way.

I meant iodine before filtering, and not filter before adding the iodine. Wouldn't the filter remove much of that lovely chemical taste after the iodine had done its job killing everything?

well, I haven't bought it yet, but it's a start -

I bought myself a new lumbar pack with a stainless steel water bottle, at REI :



The lumbar was because I'm tired of using a backpack.
The water bottle was bought separately (also REI though) - I'm tired of the plastic ones.

The bottle will fit a Katadyn Pocket Filter ($289.95 at REI !!)
There are cheaper filters, but that one really looks like the one that serious people use, and also looks like it will fit nicely in my lumbar (though I may need a smaller first aid kit. I think I need a smaller one anyway, all I've ever used is bandaids and neosporin cream, the latter being my own addition to the kit), but I'll see when I actually buy the filter.

Hope this thread wasn't too much of a zombie.
But when I bought the bottle, I made sure to buy one that fit the filter system I plan to buy.

I probably won't buy the filter until April, when I *hope* to do a backpacking trip in the Cascades (looking for a remnant population of Shasta County Cascades frog, they are almost gone).

I'll be backpacking south of Shasta, between Lassen and Burney.

jkahless wrote:

you should add a sizable supply of some serious painkillers to your first aid kit. Useful for if you get injured and have to reach help hiking out on your injury.

I'm renting a PLB for that trip.
Me and pain killers produces hallucinations and lucid dreams, not a good idea to use where I need to be alert.

A PLB is much more reliable.
It broadcasts your location to the satelite channel used by search and rescue, does so for 24 hours (the model I'm looking at anyway), is extremely water resistant, etc.

They are a bit pricey to buy ($300 and battery only lasts 5 years, so it's $60 a year) and buying is probably better if you are a regular backpacker but they aren't that bad to rent, especially if you share rental with your partner, if you only occasionally are going to where there is a low chance of being encountered by another backpacker in an emergency situation.

The problem with the cheap models, you fall down a ravine and they may break or you fall into the river and their electronics are fried. Now you are cold and wet and fighting off hypothermia and you can't get help.

Good old cospas sarsat. Those new 406/121.5mhz beacons can be a lifesaver for sure!