Chair repair

Hannah had a blue chair that helped us through the renovation at Arthurton Rd. It ended up covered in white paint, so to compensate for the months of abuse it received at the time, we're going to strip it back to bare wood.

The original plan was to give it a new lease on life with a funky new paint job -- maybe some sort of organic design -- but now that we've seen the bare wood we're tempted to leave it as is.

What do you reckon? Should we repaint it, or leave it nekid?

Who Can? You Yang!

We had a great walk up the You Yangs on the weekend.

One thing is for sure: 3kms up rocky paths is harder on your knees than 3kms on the flat. The view is certainly better though!

Bag Of Holding

OK, we've got our bag of holding sorted out. We'd initially been looking at the Macpac Utopia but, while it was a damn nice bag, it was just too heavy for what we needed. We're aiming to carry around 9kgs in total, and the Utopia was well over 4kgs by itself.

We've gone with the Aarn Featherlite Freedom, at 1.8kgs (including two front balance packs). If you're into long-distance hiking, these packs are well worth looking into. We've loaded them up once or twice with weights and they're really comfortable. The balance packs are waaaay cool -- instead of a single back that clips to your chest, this pair of packs clip to either side of your chest so you can see where you're placing your feet. These guys have thought of everything!

We've also got the sleeping bag situation sorted. The Western Mountaineering Summerlite is supposed to be able to handle 0 degree temperatures... something I hope we don't have to test! Brrrrr!!!