GearFlogger

Condor Rip-Away EMT Pouch

Most first aid kits are boo-boo kits, stocked with band-aids, gauze and antiseptic ointment. Not that there's anything wrong with that, until you're staring at a severed artery, gushing cavity or sucking chest wound. Then you need a trauma kit, and unlike a boo-boo kit trauma care can't wait until you get home. Trauma kits require training, so use the google and find something like the Wilderness First Aid and Wilderness First Responder courses from NOLS.

Condor's Rip-Away EMT pouch is big enough to carry the things you need: a tourniquet, combat bandage, clotting gauze, shears and chest seals. For a good rundown of the individual components, check this out this link. This pouch has plenty of organization options to set up the contents any way you please. There are internal and external keeper webbing points, MOLLE webbing and small rip-and-stick panels for morale patches.

Condor's pouch has one more feature, and it's a big deal: the pouch is attached to a stiff, flat fabric panel covered with a large rip-and-stick patch. The panel has straps to mount it to a headrest or other surface, and then you just press the pouch itself firmly against the rip-and-stick patch to secure it. When you need it, just grab the handle, give it a firm yank and run like hell towards the blood. There are two dimensions to this vital increase in speed: first, the ability to grab and go, and second - and maybe even more important - is that you always know exactly where the kit is. When time is tight and lives are on the line, be prepared.

$22.95 at Amazon

Peak Design CapturePRO Camera Clip

When it's time to jock up, you need to be able to affix gear to your body in such a way that you can get to it quickly, but without compromising security. Nobody wants to see their thousand-dollar camera falling toward its demise. Peak Design builds a lot of stuff to carry your camera, all built to a high standard that ensures peace of mind in the middle of the action.

The CapturePRO camera clip is a devious little piece of metal that clamps onto a belt, shoulder strap or anything of the sort. By affixing one of PD's plates (for binos, Gopros, cameras and lenses) to your gear of choice you can quickly store and release gear on your person or pack. It's a really slick system, especially the lens holder. With two clips you can swap lenses while the camera is still in the clip, making the whole juggling act a little easier.

PD also makes a non-PRO version that has some plastic in place of some of the metal parts, but saves you a few bucks. We'll try to review that one soon to see if it stands up to an adequate level of abuse. The only downside is the cost of multiple clips and plates, but if you've already invested in the camera gear you need to spend a little more to protect it. And you can feel good about supporting Peak Design and other vendors that are working to protect the places we love to go.

$79.95 at Amazon

Arc'Teryx Knee Caps

On the list of things you really want to protect, it goes like this: head, genitals, knees. Generally speaking, of course. Some people might switch the first two. College students, for example.

Whether you're earning your turns on telemark boards, climbing manky rock and ice, or trying to get that perfect photo, if you need to drop a knee then you need to think about knee pads. Arc'Teryx makes a great pair in their Kneecaps. Basically a thin shield of stiff Kydex over a half-inch thick EV50 foam pad, the Kneecaps protect from any incidental contact you're likely to encounter in normal backcountry situations.

The key to a decent set of knee pads is having them flex enough to move with you while not slipping out of place. The Arc'Teryx Knee Caps do as good a job of solving this problem as any knee pads we've ever used. The foam is hollowed out for your knee, and the whole assembly flexes easily so your knees don't get any more workout than you intend. The T-lock buckles hold the Kneecaps in place securely and adjust easily to boot. At just eight ounces for the pair, it won't be weighing you down either. And now is a great time to support Arc'Teryx and other vendors that are working to protect the places we love to go.

$59.00 at Moosejaw

Patagonia Lightweight Black Hole Duffel Bag

It's time we admit it, duffel bags are officially a thing - and have been for a few years now. There are more duffel bag designs out there now than you can shake a stick at. It used to be a plain old army surplus olive drab shapeless canvas sack was sufficient, but now there's even duffels advertised as "bespoke", a code word for waaaaaaay overpriced.

Happily good value and good design are still alive and well, and a perfect example is Patagonia's new Lightweight Black Hole collection. It includes various packs, totes and bags, and we've been reefing on the 30L duffel for a while now. The lightweight series is a takeoff on the normal, burly Black Hole bags, using less material and generally being constructed in a tough but not overbuilt manner. A good general rule of thumb is, if your luggage is traveling on a forty-year-old ridiculously over-decorated bus with chickens, goats and other assorted livestock, some tied to the roof, go with the beefier version. For everyone else, the lightweight series is the ticket.

The 30L tips the scales at just one single pound. That's a lot of storage space for not much weight. The zipper is cleverly designed to open diagonally corner to corner, the extra length giving just a little extra access to contents, and there are plenty of grab options: handles on each end, plus two long adjustable webbing straps that allow you to carry the bag over the shoulder, as a backpack or normally in the hand. We don't recall seeing this simple but amazingly flexible handle setup before, but it quickly won us over with its practical versatility.

The Lightweight Black Hole Duffel stores into its own pocket, and a key keeper does double duty as a handle for it in that configuration. It's just another nice touch on a really thoughtfully designed product. The whole duffel is bomber, with ripstop nylon and extremely water resistant laminate construction. With the durability, flat bottom design and light weight we're really looking forward to using this as a sled bag for glacier travel and big mountain work. The Patagonia Lightweight Black Hole Duffel is a very nice piece of gear that should serve a long time. And now is a great time to support Patagonia and other vendors that are working to protect the places we love to go.

$79.00 at REI

Vapur Bottle and DrinkLink Kit

The great debates of history - Lincoln v. Douglas, boxers v. briefs - must surely be expanded to include hard v. soft water bottles. The trusty and hardy lexan one-quart in all its glorious manifestations on one side, and on the other, the newer generation of crackly roll-ups.

Enter Vapur, whose new bottles bring a few new twists to the soft bottle category. First off the Vapur is available in a number of flashy colors, but also a basic flat black. For mountaineers or anyone using this in a cold climate this has the advantage of acting as a heat sink in sunlight, helping keep the liquid inside in it's preferred state, that is, liquified. Collapsible bottles like the Vapur also tend to store inside a parka more easily since they can conform, more so as they are emptied.

The Vapur has an integrated carabiner clip that folds neatly over the lid when not in use, and which doubles as a keeper loop when the bottle is empty and rolled up. For anyone with a cabinet full of water bottles - mirror, I'm looking at you! - this is actually quite useful. Other features are standard tick-list items: BPA free, freezable, dishwasher safe, and it will stand if carefully placed on a flat surface. Vapur does advertise itself as being easily operated in single-hand mode. We're not sure about the "easy" part, but it is possible.

What's not in doubt is that the Vapur is bombproof. Don't hesitate to bring this bottle into adverse conditions, it will not let you down. And if it gets skanky, just boil it, which you're probably doing to purify your water anyway. Also available is the Vapur DrinkLink kit (on sale now at REI for $10.99), which adds a tube, clip and quick disconnect to any Vapur bottle. It works well and is reasonably priced, what more can you say? Overall the Vapur bottle line is a solid solution if you want to save space and weight.

$12.95 at Amazon