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Guest
Guest
I am 100% with Turtle on this one, especially the pet peeve of people wearing headlamps, inadvertently giving me the “Ve-haf-vays-of-making-you-talk” third degree around the campfire. What the heck do you need with a headlamp while seated around the fire? Even funnier, and less annoying, are folks wearing a bright headlamp while crouched a foot away tending the fire.
Seriously, you need a headlamp to look down and stoke the fire? I’m not sure you really comprehend what all happens when you burn wood.
There is a longstanding anti-headlamp tradition among the folks I camp with. When we are seated around the campfire approaching newbies wearing headlamps are startled by the immediate chorus of “NO LIGHTS!”.
I have one of those little LED clip-on too, but I don’t always wear a brimmed hat, and the alligator clip hurts my nose.
For small amber light I use an old Apache Fingerlight. Similar to what fighter pilots once used, it is smaller than a well-smoked cigarette butt and Velcro’s around a finger. It is bright enough I can walk with it at night on groomed trails and it doesn’t kill my night vision. It is also easy to lose or misplace, and takes specialty batteries. Almost every other battery op thing I carry now uses AAA’s, so I only have to carry one type of spare batteries.
For brighter light I use an ancient Princeton Tec Attitude in a Nite Ize or Jackstrap headband. The Attitude is an LED the size of a cigar, “waterproof to 100 feet”, and takes 4 AAA’s. We bought a family four of them years ago and they are all still going strong.
They are plenty bright enough for me. Sometimes too bright; for illumination control I stick my finger partially over the 1 inch wide Attitude lens to reduce the single-setting to the desired dim glimmer.
The Attitude is a single function light, but the on/off requires a mean-business twist of the lens end, so it can’t be switched on accidentally. I killed the batteries in a too cool new multi-functional, two-lamp, three-setting, two brightness or flashing fancy LED a few weeks ago by stuffing it under some gear. That light has a raised/exposed control button and I managed to accidentally turn it on with the illumination hidden from view.
So nay to any flashlight/headlamp that doesn’t have a positive protected switch. Oft times simple is better. How many times have I actually used the flashing setting on a light? (Answer, once, guiding some night arrivals to the campsite landing, and they could see the come hither campfire glowing in the trees at a distance anyway).
The Nite Ize strap is a simple head strap, with an elastic side-band that holds the Attitude or other small flashlight. The simple Velcro strap is easier to adjust than multiple straps on some headlamps. How did these straps get all twisted? Dammit, I need a flashlight to fix my headlamp straps.
But the real benefit for me is that the flashlight and strap still fit comfortably in my pocket without the excessive bulge of many headlamp designs. Since I use a flashlight only when really needed it lives mostly in my pocket. I would need cargo pockets for many headlamp designs.
If I need the light aimed down (for cooking or etc) I just adjust the position of the strap on the back of my head to angle the light. (The Jackstrap has two flashlight positions, one horizontal and one at a downward angle; I never bother to change the position)
http://www.niteize.com/product/Headband.asp
Even with the Attitude in the headband strap I use it mostly in hand. I much prefer the handheld ability to direct the flashlight beam up and back the trail, or off to the side, without having to aim my head.
Think I hate headlamps? Don’t even get me started on the ubiquitous Coleman 2-mantle gas lantern.
I am generally anti-regulation, but Coleman lanterns should be required to come with an opaque shade on one side to prevent blinding the not-afraid-of-the-dark folks camped at the site next door. Gawd I hate those things in campground situation.
