Gear - Miscellaneous

We'll be taking a Suntactics S5-Lite solar panel, and an Anker 13,000 mAh power bank. This is rather an unknown for me - I've never done a trek that relied on solar charging before. During the Annapurna Circuit last year, it was quite common to have power provided in the tea houses, but I've heard this isn't the case for much of the country. I'd like to be as self-sufficient as possible so the solar panel is a necessity.

We'll be taking a Garmin InReach satellite communicator. I've had three iterations of the InReach devices, and they've got better each time. This version is almost identical in functionality but much smaller and lighter than it's predecessors. It uses the Iridium satellite network to send or receive short messages, even when without a mobile network. You can read more about the features on the Communication page. We'll use it to communicate with our logistical assistance company, and to post regular updates to Twitter.

We'll use the Sawyer Micro water filter to clean stream water - it attaches perfectly to the Cnoc Vecto bladders we'll be carrying. It's worth remembering that these filters can be damaged by freezing, so we'll have to store it inside our sleeping bag overnight on the cold nights. We'll take chlorine tablets for 100L of water in case we lose the filter - that will easily take us to the next resupply stop where we can get a replacement filter delivered.

We'll take a small, light USB adapter to recharge all our devices and power bang when mains is available. Some small 5g ESBIT fire starting tablets will come in handy when building a campfire. The Opinel knife we'll take is all we need, and incredibly lightweight. We'll also take 10m of 2mm Dyneema accessory cord (the same as I've used as guy-lines on the tent).

Dental floss and a sewing needle is useful for repairs to gear. Nitecore NU32 headlamps are a great light source, recharging from USB. We'll organise all the misc gear in a Zpacks DCF dry-bag.

I'll be using Black Diamond Distance Carbon Z hiking poles, which are a great lightweight non-adjustable pole.