Good For Urban Camping, Not For Everest

The brand name of the little ´coat´ and ´pants´ is Mallory and Irvine.

While trying to Google a link to the manufacturers (which I couldn´t find), I discovered that these are the names of two British explorers that disappeared in 1924 while trying to climb the not-then conquered Mount Everest.

They were George Leigh Mallory and Andrew "Sandy" Irvine.

I can´t say that I find this an inspiring or logical name for my featherlite clothes.

They are too thin to protect anyone against Everest cold.

It seems a bit of a disturbing choice for a brand name.

Technorati tag: urban camping

Lighter Than Your Mobile Phone

Hanging out in camping stores doesn´t sound exciting, but sometimes you can find some things.

I found a Montane coat and pants that each roll up into an itty bitty ball (click on 'stuff sac' link).

I love pulling them out of my bag and showing them to people maybe a bit more than I like wearing them, but they are very practical, especially if you want to go to the gym directly from work but haven´t yet managed to find the perfect uniform to let you do that.

I showed them to one of the travel addict couch surfers and he said, "Wow! This jacket is lighter than my cell phone!"

I made a little photo album of them here.

FON is a WiFi Revolution

After my last post about my WiFi desires, my friend Bill sent me a link to www.fon.com:

FON is a WiFi revolution.

Our objective: to build a Wifi world.

Our method: to permit all users to synchronize their access points into one: FON.

Pay for connection at home; connect anywhere.

Join the FON movement!

I haven´t read the whole site but it seems like it is a very new ´movement´ and still needs to pick up momentum.

You can join the network as a Linus, Bill or Alien. I relate to the Linus profile ...

We wanna have free connection everywhere. In the street. In bars. In the park. Internationally.

We share our bandwidth with every user that takes the Linus philosophy as their own.

If you join us, you'll have free connection in the whole FON network, even in Bills access points.

... except I don´t yet have bandwidth to share.

Perhaps that will be something to arrange back at home base.

Technorati tag: urban camping

The Uniform

Get up and go in the global village not only requires a certain kind of gear (nomad pack), it also requires a particular 'garb'.

When I fell out of my urban camping lifestyle, I found myself missing the streamlining that comes from being nomadic.

Obviously, traveling around means you can't take all your clothes with you.

But, streamlining my wardrobe also meant that I kept only my favorite clothes.

I loved wearing my favorite clothes every day for 11 months!

After I stopped moving around, I sometimes wondered how I had slipped so far from the habit.

I'd think, "Why am I wearing this? It doesn't quite fit. Or, it's not really a good color. Or, this is way too high maintenance."

Unfortunately, it's much harder to throw away half of your clothes when you don't need to.

This time I thought I would try to find some kind of perfect urban camping uniform.

I thought maybe I could find clothes that I could wear to the office, and then step off the train and go right to the gym without changing.

I wished we lived in a uniform environment like that of Star Trek.

They wore those same outfits everywhere, no matter what the occasion.

In a somewhat similar vein, I discovered the clothes on Magellan's travel supplies site as well as Title Nine (thanks to my sister, Lisa).

Some of their clothes work in both fancy (little black dress) or casual occasions.

Some clothes never wrinkle.

And they have some very cool multi-tasking shoes.

In the end, I did not order from Magellan's or Title Nine.

Instead, I hit a dance store here in Rotterdam.

Not only is dance clothing very comfortable, it's a bit fancier than regular work-out clothes and often comes without all of the sporting labels.

So, it might even be possible to wear them to the office.

I love these black shoes I bought there. (same shoes shown here in 'white'.)

I haven't found the perfect uniform, but I am pretty much back to wearing my favorites on a regular basis.

PS - I also found these wonderful tennis ball-sized pants and jacket.

Technorati tag: urban camping, nomad, travel, camping, streamline, travel light, uniform, title nine, Magellan's

Get Up and Go Gear

If you wanna get up and go in the global village, you gotta have 'gear'.

Twice, at school, I've passed students in the hallway carrying huge outdoor sleeping bags.

I wanted to pull them aside and let them know the error of their ways.

My urban camping bag is from www.gelert.com.

It's called X-TREME DOWN 600 - SBG 126. It's really tiny and filled with goose-down.

Technorati tag: urban camping

I Slipped Off the Grid!

Ouch! December was a tough month: final exams, work deadlines, and holiday socializing.

Yes, I'm still urban camping, but I would have been here online the whole month if only ...

1. I had my 'one device,' maybe an itty bitty laptop like Sony's VAIO Professional BX Series in my nomad pack and


2. the list of free WiFi spots at www.wififreespot.com would grow large enough for urban nomads to log on anytime anywhere

I'm finally back on the grid.

Technorati tag: urban camping