From The Trail
During the first half of April 2020, as we were all starting to conform the life under the "shelter in place" order due to the COVID-19 outbreak; we ran a little contest:
We asked you to send us stories about your best day on the trail from 2019, so we can all get a little inspiration. We had a host of stories that were really great to read. After many internal debates (we were not allowed to share our opinions with each other), we have selected 3 winning stories.
This year, Cnoc Outdoors is honored to support Friends of the Columbia Gorge, the only non-profit organization dedicated entirely to ensuring that the beautiful and wild Columbia Gorge remains an unspoiled treasure for generations to come.
A few years later I moved to England and joined the local outdoor/climbing/running community as part of my career. During that time I got introduced to the idea of barefoot running - it was very popular and cool - so I tried it, and loved it.
With the thru-hiking season around the corner and rain and snow still very much part of the PCT landscape, the repeated question around water filtering comes up. When you are out in the middle of nowhere, in the backcountry, getting water from a stream, do you really need to filter that water?
To jump to the conclusion: yes, you need to filter water on the PCT.
We often hear how much people love their Vecto and how it has made water collection so much simpler for them. Lately, though, we have seen a number of conversations that look something like this:
"I have a Sawyer bag/Smartwater bottle water and know that I will need something to scoop water with.... I don't really want to buy a Vecto bag now. What do you use to scoop water?"