Nalgene bottles, worth their weight

Never tried a gatorade type with hot water but Platypus is fine with boiling water.

Oddly…after years of not using my Nalgenes due to weight I finally gave back in – I prefer them! They are what I like so I happily carry the extra couple ounces and don't worry about it anymore.

And mine are pretty sky blue with black trees on them. Fashion is so important ;-) (Joking!!)

Hey Joseph, I am of the same philosophy as you and while I carry soda / Gatorade bottles for my water (Along with soft sided Nalgene Canteens and platypus containers) I still hold on to one Nalgene for this purpose and they excel. The Nalgene canteens are rated to carry water hot enough, but in my testing – They do not remain hot very long. I would assume a playtpus would perform equally. The regular Nalgene bottle stays warm much longer. I still carry one, and it's a life saver when needed. In addition…Maybe it's just me but I trust a regular Nalgene bottle containing nearly boiling water in my sleeping bag a lot more than a soft-sided container. Makes for a better nights sleep :D

> I trust a regular Nalgene bottle containing nearly boiling water in my sleeping bag a
> lot more than a soft-sided container.

"nearly boiling water" sounds a bit too hot to me. Wrapped in some clothing?

I wonder whether wearing the clothing instead might work better?

Roger's wife must not possess the feet of death ;-) My husband and I don't sleep with bags zipped up anymore after he got tired of having two icicles sneak over at midnight to his side.

Seriously though – a warm bottle of water is pretty multi purpose. I have carried down socks and booties before – find the bottle to more worth the weight. It is either that or I use the chemical hand warmers made for feet at night. Again, the bottle gets used for more than just warming :-)

Yep…Normally pour boiling water straight into the Nalgene. Works great and stays hot nearly all night. I tried this with one of my Aquafina bottles one time…And well…Didn't work out so well. The Nalgene can be a little hot when placed right on the skin, but placed inside a sock or against clothing covered skin it's awesome. Another thing I forgot to mention is when I tried this with a Nalgene Canteen…Not only was the Canteen way too hot to get anywhere near you (Think burns) it also got cold a lot faster. The regular Nalgene is perfect…Just a better insulator. Enough where it won't burn you, but not so much that you don't feel the heat. For those nights that you just plain get caught out with temps that your sleeping and clothing system can't handle…It's awesome.

When I ditched my Nalgene for a gatorade bottle a few years ago, I was worried that I wouldn't be able to do the "hot water" trick. Only once since then have I wished I could. Okay, twice. But that is out of over 100 bag nights.

not sure about nalgene. but i think 'titan bottle' is worth it. definitely plan to buy one when it comes out in april. google it for more info.

Interesting, but that plastic clip looks like it would be easy to break

Ditto Aaron on the Nalgene!! Never have to worry about a cold night again.

Hi Sarah

Feet of death????
Well, no. And Sue has just added that she confidently expects that I would never let her feet get that cold either! As previously mentioned: if it is cold we snuggle up so we are warm.

More seriously, we keep our heads properly warm at night and never suffer cold feet. In the snow we do carry 'bed socks' – light and very fluffy wool socks which have never seen the inside of a pair of shoes.

Cheers

Carry your Nalgene with pride I say!

Then I might add Roger that you and your wife are not the types to get cold feet. Some of us do quite frankly. And it is pretty rude to casually act like it can be cured by a hat and clean socks!

I wear a hat when I am hiking in cool weather and it is on my head from night till morning year round. I carry bed socks as well – ones that are worn at night.

Yet, I will always have icy feet. That is my body. As well, my BP meds do not make it any easier.

When I took Beta Blockers for a couple years I would lose all feeling in my feet whenever it dipped below 40*. My hands would also go white and all the fat on my butt and legs would be frozen feeling. For those years I was never ever warm from Sept. to June! I could have had on all the down in the world and I would have been cold on my exterior.

A hot water water bottle can be a real life giver for making one warmer. It really helped.

And yeah, I don't backpack with my husband most times due to his job – so it isn't like I have a portable foot warmer with me (rolling eyes).

May you never be blessed with it.

At the scout camp I work at in winter, we give scouts two (or one on warm weekends or with a lot of scouts) 1L Nalgenes full of hot water. We put the bottles in their bags, the go on a hike just before bed, and by the time we get back they are roasty-toasty and so are their bags.

I also had a scout with incredibly cold hands and feet a week or so ago. Although I am not sure of the underlying cause (his hands were dry and not frostbitten), a warm water bottle and a sleeping bag kept him fine overnight.

I do not use warm bottles at camp, and have not been out in winter outside of camp in temps where they might be necessary. My winter hydration system is a 1.5L Nalgene bladder, which has a wide-enough lid to easily pour hot water into. I am taking my girlfriend winter camping in two weeks, and depending on conditions, a hot water bottle for her is always an option.

Other options for warming up extremities include putting on boot liners, wearing dry, loose socks, drinking water, eating some food and urinating, etc.

Hi Sarah

I was not aware when I posted that you are on BP meds. My sympathy about that, as I suspect that it could be the meds which are making your feet cold at night. Sounds as though your BP and whole metabolism goes down too far at night when you are walking. That makes life hard.

A question (as I really do not know): would it be possible to reduce the meds while you are walking? You would need to ask your GP for sure.

Cheers

My wife and I and everyone that I've ever led winter trips with have put a Nalgene of boiling water in the foot of our bags in winter, usually in its foam cozy…nice to wake up to a quart of still pretty warm to almost hot water. Not necessary all the time but down right luxurious at the end of a cold day, and I've had a comforatble night in a damp sleeping bag thanks to hot water! The trick seems to be to fill it right up to the very top to minimize the airspace, and to burp and recap once the plastc lid has softened a bit. Doing this I have never had any leakage.

I even use one at home in bed sometimes…the bedroom is always cold in the winter!

Christian

I use a Nalgene in the Spring and early Summer, when I can fill it with snow. If you start with enough water, you can just keep filling with snow during the day (and not have to bring a filter).

I've read that Gatorade bottles are fine with near boiling water, but have some reservations about it myself. I tested one a week ago and it didn't leak. I may try it in the field, but only after first putting it in a zip lock.

Scott, I will have to try the Gatorade bottle. When I tried an Aquafina bottle it totally deformed though and was not usable in any way shape or form after the test. I suspect that if the Gatorade bottle worked it wouldn't stay hot as long as the Nalgene…Lighter though. Christian is right…Get the Nalgene as full as will go (No airspace) and it will stay hot for hours.

i have used platypus at home and worked fine as hot bottle but have never trusted any flimsy(?) looking plastic topped bottle in my sleeping bag–so for a january 6 day scottish trip i bought my first hot water bottle—a 1 pint sigg—i thought its main purpose would would be keeping me warm but after a few days of sottish weather—mist/rain/sleet/hail/ snow and a sucession of bad camping spots(because of the short days i was looking for camp spots after dark) my s/bag was getting a bit damp and less lofty—-the hot water bottle perked the loft up very well–conculsion–i found i didn t need the hot water bottle but my s/bag did

Not meaning to derail this thread but, Roger you do that to people quite a bit and its really annoying.

You talk to people like your method is the be all end all and anything else is wrong or inefficient, sometimes implying people are just to stupid to understand (maybe not on purpose). I thought Id point that out to you, maybe nobody else has.

It's been mentioned that the Nalgene bottle will hold it's heat longer than a Gatorade or other thin bottle–which is true–at a cost of nearly four ounces. A scrap of thin foam or extra sock would provide equal or better insulation for a lot less weight. I'm not saying the Gatorade bottle is necessarily better as I'm not comfortably convinced it won't leak. I'm only saying that the insulating qualities of lexan come at an almost four ounce cost. (Nalgene = 5.6 oz. vs Gatorade = 1.7 oz.)

I should also mention that we often throw a hot Nalgene bottle in our bed at home on cold nights. I had one spring a leak after filling it with boiling water. A tiny hole on the side of the bottle started squirting hot water onto my naked stomach just after closing the bottle. I now put an inch or so of cold water into the bottle before filling to cool it down just a bit.

I don't carry them backpacking, but they're my bottle when climbing.
Duct tape a piece of accessory cord around them to clip to a harness/pack/etc. and you're good to go…smash it, drag it, bump it, scrape it, drop it, whatever.

Hi Dustin

If that is how I came across to anyone, then my apologies. I am aware that I can be a bit direct at times: I think it may be a cultural difference between Australia and America. The difference between the two cultures has been seen elsewhere on the net, with other Australians.

In this case however, what I said was that WE do take all the usual precaution to stay warm. By implication, we are not super tough or anything special. I was not trying to tell anyone else what to do.

This is one of the problems of email: the words are there, but how are they meant to be taken?

Cheers