iPod

I travelled for 3 months last year with a tiny MP3 player that weighed close to nothing and at times it was a great pleasure to have some familiar music to listen too. I deliberately bought a player that used one AAA battery so I didn’t need to lug around a battery charger.

There may be lighter or better but I LOVE my Garmin Geko GPS which with batteries weighs 88g. If weights a problem, dump something else and take the GPS !

Here’s a slightly weird possibility . . .
As I tend to travel overseas for extended periods I have to contend with languages and drag around a guidebook. Sony playstation (PSP) which I know almost nothing about but are light and compact can take a memory card and act as a MP3 player. Lonely Planet are possibly putting their guidebooks on PSP discs and can then be viewed on the PSP and in Japan they have a bought out a ‘game’ that is designed to help you learn a language. From what I know, you can speak into the PSP via a microphone in English and it will ‘speak’ back what you said in Japanese. If so, it is the perfect interpretor !
So maybe in the future I will be travelling with a PSP that does 3 jobs and is much much lighter then a guidebook or a language book. Wonderful !

I picked up a new ipod shuffle too…great little gadget. Not sure if it will come with me on backpacking trips, but it’s great for workouts and quick hikes.

The old shuffle was (is) great because of the extra battery pack. I found that with the battery pack (which holds 2 AAA lithiums) I could get almost 50 hours of use before it would die. This was great when hiking the Colorado trail where all I need was a food drop to get new batteries or swap out Ni-MH rechargable ones.
It is the same problem with cameras. Do you use a camera that uses proprietary batteries and has to be recharged (how) or use something that can use throwaways if the need arises.

PS…….an added note to the battery quandry. Petzl recommends to not use lithium AA or AAA batteries in certain of their headlamps. Do you carry twice as many batteries for the same burn time when the regular batteries weigh more than the lithiums and how does that “weigh” versus the shortened lifespan of the LED’s?

Randy

I don't have an iPod, but I've been seriously looking into lightweight cameras and even video cameras. There are quite a few still cameras out now that offer 5 – 10 megapixel resolution for around 5 ounces. Not an UltraLighter's dream, but it's getting better than it was! A couple of years ago any 5 megapixel rig would weigh at least 5 pounds!

If you're a shutterbug like me, it's becomming more feasible to take a good camera along. I'm learning how to jettison weight by reading these forum posts and BPL articles, but one of my pack requirements is some sort of camera. My business involves taking photos and videos so combining what I love (hiking) with what I do is always a challenge.

I'm curious, what would some of you more experienced hikers advise me to look for/ be wary of in a camera for the trail? Goodnatured flaming of this newbie always happily accepted :-)