When I was using the bag for hiking, I was surprised at how much I could fit in the bag – it looks a little on the small size but you can really pack a lot in there. I was able to fit in two large water bottles and rain jackets, food, and an SLR camera. One of the best features of the backpack is that it’s waterproof. This proved invaluable in both hiking and commuting.

There is a pouch against the back of the backpack, which held my laptop really well. If you have a laptop with a screen bigger than 15 inches, then it may be difficult to fit in the backpack. Other than that, this backpack is great for commuting – it has more pockets than I knew what to do with so there was a spot for every cable and USB device that I take back and forth to work.

Currently this bag is serving as a go bag for me. My bag is not equipped with everything traditionally in a go bag as I live in a city and might not need some of the elements more essential for wilderness survival. Currently my go bag is packed with the following:

• 2 liter water bottle
• Iodine tablets
• Clif Bars
• Folding knife
• Multi-tool
• First aid kit
• Rain jacket soft shell
• Thermals
• Matches
• Flashlight
• Rope
• Blanket
• Cell phone charger

Fortunately, the Rush Moab 10 has a ton of pockets – I found spots for all of the gear listed above and still had leftover pockets.

Pros

• Tons of pockets
• A lot of storage
• Changeable shoulder strap (so you can put the bag on either side)
• Water resistant nylon which is extremely durable and rugged
• Super durable YKK zippers

Cons

Unlike many backpacks, there is no strap around the hips to keep the backpack stable and centered while you are running

ATAC A2 Flashlight

The nice folks over at 5.11 Tactical were nice enough to send over an awesome flashlight for me along with the backpack. They sent over the ATAC A2 Flashlight. This light, much like the backpack, is very rugged and is built to take a lot of abuse as it’s built out of aerospace grade aluminum.

I was really impressed by how bright the light was – it was significantly brighter than my Maglite or my small LED flashlight. The ATAC A2 is claimed to put out 162 lumens on the high setting and 15 lumens on the low setting.

It was a bit tricky to figure out how to change between the three settings (high, low, strobe), but that could be because I didn’t read the documentation that came along with the light. That said, after a few minutes, I had it figured out – to change between the settings, tap the button on the back and then press it all the way down to lock in the setting you want.

One of the things I really liked about the flashlight was that it’s powered by 2 AA batteries, so it is really easy to find replacements.

The Survival Knife

If you’ve ever seen the movie “Rambo”, you already know exactly what a survival knife looks like. Issued by many military branches, the survival knife is an essential for any serious outdoor adventurer. Typically, their blades are locked in place, thick, and sturdy to prevent any possibility of breakage. Because they don’t fold and must be portable, they’re generally only about 4 to 6 inches long. But don’t let the relatively compact size fool you. Survival knives are exceedingly sturdy, and with their serrated edge they can be used for cutting wood, gutting and skinning animals, making traps, and even self defense (for the military folks only). If you’re going on a long, grueling outdoor trip and need an all purpose knife, the survival knife is the way to go.

The Multi-Tool

Also known as a “Swiss Army knife”, multi-tools are unique in that they always have more functions than just acting as a blade. Brands like Leatherman, Wenger, and Victorinox have cornered the market and continually up the ante in function. Today, most multi-tools come with a blade, pliers or scissors, several types of screwdriver heads, and a can opener at the very least. While all these tools do their jobs, the trade off for having them in one convenient place is that they are often tougher to use than full size versions. Best for light work, multi-tools are perfect for tasks around the campsite.

The Fillet Knife

If you plan to fish on your next trip into the outdoors, then a fillet knife is a real necessity. Usually fixed blade and between 4 and 9 inches long, fillet knives are thin and flexible enough to skin just about anything accurately and efficiently. Determining which blade length is right for you is as simple as considering your game fish of choice. If it’s crappie, bluegill, or bass, for example, then a fillet knife closer to 4 inches is more practical than an extra large 9 incher. Whatever specific fillet knife you go with, be sure that the blade is made of stainless steel and maintain a high degree of sharpness to keep your cuts clean and effective.

The Hunting Knife

Designed with a fixed blade and a high degree of sturdiness, hunting knives are generally made to be two knives in one. The last third of the knife is typically curved backward to aid in the animal skinning process, and the two thirds closest to the handle are straightened for precise cutting. It’s important to bear in mind that, as the namesake implies, a hunting knife is best used for hunting purposes only. Its non serrated blade and relative inconvenience in carrying makes it impractical for much utilitarian use.

With the proper knowledge in place, you’ll be ready to find a good knife that can tackle nearly any outdoor project imaginable. Just remember to keep it sharp, and keep on cutting!

The Poison Dart Frog

These little, admittedly cute frogs really earn their name. Typically a little more than a centimeter in length, one of these tiny amphibians carries enough poison to kill enough poison to kill over a dozen adult humans. What’s worse, there’s no bite required delivery. The poison is secreted through their skin, so all it takes is one deadly touch. Though they’re pretty versatile in coloration, Poison Dart Frogs are almost always brightly colored with neon-looking blues, yellows, and reds. They’re also native to South America, so there’s no need to threat unless you’ll be venturing abroad.

Feral Hogs

Native to the Midwest and Southern portions of the United States, feral hogs have become a real problem in several areas. Often exceeding 200 pounds, they look like hairier, less pink versions of the domesticated pig. And when threatened or guarding baby hogs, they have a reputation for turning aggressive. Additionally, they’re known carriers of nasty diseases such as brucellosis and trichinosis. Several states in which feral hogs live have instituted a “shoot-on-sight” policy in response to their widespread population growth.

The Portugese Man O’ War

Beach-goers typically keep a watchful eye out for fins in the water, which is good. But what they often fail to see are floating jellyfish – mostly because they look like a milk jug or other piece of debris. The Portugese Man O’ War is found in waters worldwide, but is especially common in the Gulf of Mexico. Shaped much like a transparent liver, its spindly tentacles extend down into the water, sometimes brushing unsuspecting swimmers. Tentacle stings from this species are extremely painful, and can cause vital organ interruptions or even death in those sensitive to its venom.

The Yellow Jacket

Like the jellyfish above, people generally know to keep their distance from bees and wasps. But while most species have large, noticeable nests, this species’ homes lie hidden underground. Their nests can hold adult populations of several thousand. And if you step on or near one of them, the whole colony will likely come after you. To make matters worse, they can sting more than once, are notoriously aggressive, and will pursue a moving target. They’re found all over the United States, particularly in the South. So if you’re camping in Dixie, be sure to watch where you walk.

The Whitetail Deer

The whitetail deer, one of the most popularly hunted animals in the U.S., is often seen as a victim rather than an antagonist (thanks, “Bambi”). But not only are they often dangerous to motorists, they can also turn aggressive during the rut. In fact, several deer attacks involving hunters, hikers, and campers occur every year – sometimes proving fatal. So the next time you stumble on a buck in the Fall, it’s probably a better idea to turn around than bust out the camera and see how close you can get.

Public vs. Private

If you’re an outdoor lover who prefers the feeling of “roughing it” when camping, the public is almost always the way to go. Though some pre-cleaned public campgrounds are available, the majority of National Parks in the United States allow camping on all grounds except for specified “no camping zones”. The advantages of public campgrounds are that they’re usually low cost, averaging about $20 per night, and provide you the opportunity to really isolate yourself from other campers — so it’s truly just your party and the Great Outdoors. On the other hand, there are zero facilities in non-designated public campgrounds. This means you’ll have to bring your own water, toiletries, and live without the convenience of a bathroom for the extent of your camping trip.

Private campgrounds, meanwhile, maintain many of the amenities you’ll find at home in the outdoors. Ones funded by large corporations, for example, provide just about everything you could want – including electricity. They often have recreational areas for activities like golf, swimming, and tennis, and generally range between $30 to $60 per night in price. If your camping party isn’t exactly made up of outdoor enthusiasts, then private campgrounds are often a good place to get their feet wet in the outdoors, so to speak.

Features to Look For

Most camping parties prefer to find a sort of middle ground when looking for a good campground. They would prefer to have a genuine outdoor experience (i.e., no electricity or other “luxurious” amenities), but don’t want to be alone in the woods. For these folks, middle range public and private campgrounds usually suit them well.

For both types, you can expect fees of about $20 dollars per night for a campground that includes features like restrooms, basic running water, picnic tables, and old-fashioned charcoal grills. In addition, these campgrounds are often conveniently located near outdoor points of interest like hiking trails and fishing access.

No matter what type of campground you’re looking for, odds are there is one to suit your needs well nearby. As a general rule, don’t be hesitant to contact local parks services and/or private campground providers to inquire about their campsites, amenities, and rates. The more planning and research you do, the more satisfied you’ll be with the campground you find.

Lake Okeechobee, Florida

If there’s one word that describes Lake Okeechobee, it’s big. Also known as the Big O by local residents, Lake Okeechobee is over 730 square miles in surface area. Its claim to fame in fishing is the Largemouth Bass, which congregate in the lake’s numerous patches of hydrilla. Record breaking largemouth are often pulled in here, and the favorable weather makes it a pleasure to fish at any time of the year.

Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri

“The Lake”, as it’s known to Missourians, is a world class fishing lake for multiple species. A man made reservoir created from the damming of the Osage River, the Lake of the Ozarks’ real draw for freshwater fishermen is its monster catfish. The deep water area near the dam at the head of the lake is known for holding downright huge Blue Catfish. Local legends about divers seeing catfish “as big as Volkswagens” abound.

Lake Vermillion, Minnesota

Like most Northern lakes, Lake Vermillion has its fair share of pike and walleye. Its unique quality, though, is the propensity of muskie in its waters. Known by fishermen as the “fish of 10,000 casts”, muskie fishing is what many consider the ultimate freshwater challenge. And there’s no better place to try your hand at it than in these chilly Minnesota waters.

Grenada Lake, Mississippi

This Southern lake was constructed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers by damming up the Yalobusha River. Though it was designed as a flood control water, it has proven itself to be one of the best crappie fishing lakes in the country. It has 48 miles of monster crappie-holding shoreline. These crappie aren’t “palm sized” big – they’re commonly Largemouth Bass big, often weighing in at 2-3 pounds.

Crater Lake, Oregon

Among fishing lakes in North America, Crater Lake is a true oddity. It was formed by rainwater in the caldera (crater) of a massive volcano. Its surface area is over 30 miles, and since there are no inlets or rivers flowing into it, it has some of the clearest water in the world. In fact, anglers can see down an astounding 80 to 115 feet on average. The lake holds Sockeye Salmon and Rainbow Trout among other species, so fly fishing and sight fishing are popular recreational styles there.

With all the great fishing lakes in the U.S. to check out, there’s little time to waste. No matter what your favorite species or fishing style is, odds are there is a spectacular lake that fits you perfectly within a day or two’s drive of you.

Binocular Basics

On the packaging of any set of binoculars, there is one piece of information more prominent than anything else. It’s a set of two numbers with an “x” between them (8×32, for example). The first stands for the magnification level of the lenses. So, for instance, if you’re looking at a pair of binoculars with 10 as the first number, you know that their magnification is 10x larger than the normal eye. The second number is an indicator of the objective lenses’ (the lenses on the front of the binoculars) diameter.

As a general rule, the size of the first number relative to the second number correlates directly to how clear and crisp the image will be. As the relative size of the first number gets lower in comparison to the second number, the image quality increases. It’s a result of the fact that bigger objective lenses let more light in, making details of the image much easier for the eyes to pick up on.

Choosing the Proper Optics

There are two separate categories that your binocular use can fall into. The first is bird watching and hunting. These activities generally require higher quality binoculars. Recommendations from the Audobon Birding Society call for binoculars that have a magnification of around 6 to 8 times for optimal bird viewing. Any higher, and you will likely have trouble locating animals in the scope, as you’ll lose points of reference when putting the binoculars up to your eyes. The same should be taken into account for hunting – where getting an animal in your binoculars’ viewing range quickly is paramount.

If you’re getting binoculars for recreational purposes, on the other hand, the main specification to look for is sturdiness. Before buying a pair, get a feel for the binoculars you’re thinking about choosing. Dealers of higher end optics, as a rule, almost always let you test their products before making an investment in one.

With a decent pair of binoculars, you can do anything from improve your general outdoor skills to develop an addictive new hobby. Plus, if the kids get restless on one of your excursions, they provide great entertainment. So the next time you head out, be sure to make room in your pack for some outdoor optics.

Finding a Body of Water With Carp

Since their introduction in the States, carp have thrived in many bodies of water. Today, the Common Carp can be found in almost every major lake and river in the lower 48. Realize, however, that smaller lakes and ponds that have been deliberately stocked aren’t very likely to hold them. Your best bet in finding a good carp lake near you is to do some research. Check out fishing reports from nearby major bodies of water, and talk to local fishermen to see if they’ve run across any. Since they probably don’t go after carp, they’ll likely point you exactly to where they are.

Carp Fishing Methods

The easiest way to catch the Common Carp is with a good old fashioned rod and reel. This species is no runt – many grow up to 40 pounds and over – so you’re going to want heavy tackle. Poles and reels designed for catfish typically work the best. Most carp fishermen slip a heavy weight down the line about 2 to 3 feet from the hook, cast, and let their bait simply suspend until a carp picks it up. When you set the hook on your first carp, dig in and prepare for a real battle.

Alternately, there is a much more extreme way to harvest carp. It’s called bow fishing, and it’s growing in popularity in the Midwest, where jumping Silver Carp have inundated the Illinois River. They’re stimulated by the sound of a running motor, so bow fishermen simply jet up and down the water, waiting to shoot at a jumping carp with a specialized arrow that has a reeling apparatus. It’s important to not that proper bow training and licensure is necessary to practice bow fishing.

Making Your Own Bait

One of the greatest things about carp fishing is its economy. Expert carp fishermen make huge bulk batches of homemade bait; each has their own secret carp catching recipe. The most popular ingredients are canned corn, corn meal, flour, and cereal. Generally, some combination of these ingredients is mixed together with water into a solid dough, and formed around the hook much like catfish bait.

With the equipment on hand, a place in mind and the bait made up, you’re ready to start carp fishing. You might get some strange looks on the water at first when fishing for carp, but they will turn into admiring gazes when you land your first 40 pound plus lunker.

Stitches

If you’ve been severely cut in the outdoors, getting to an emergency room isn’t always the most practical option. In a bind, you can use dental floss and a sterile needle to close up the wound and stop the bleeding. It certainly won’t be pleasant without anesthetic, but the primitive combo gets the job done.

Thread

Along the same lines as the stitches, you can also use floss as thread for clothing repair. Whether it’s a popped off button or a torn sleeve, floss is a great substitute for thread when you’re in the outdoors. Granted, it probably won’t look exactly like a tailor did it. But clothes don’t make the man in the outdoors.

Slicer

If you’ve got strong hands, you can actually cut many meats and cheese with precision using dental floss. Simply wrap it around gloved hands, like you would when you’re flossing, and proceed to apply downward pressure on the item that needs to be sliced along with a back and forth movement.

Fishing line

If you end up near a body of water but forgot to pack a rod and reel, you can actually hand fish for most species using dental floss. As mentioned before, its wax covering makes it perfect for tying even the most complicated fishing knot. Just try not to do anything silly (shark fishing, perhaps) with it.

Rope

Obviously you won’t be able to climb a length of dental floss or anything, but in situations where objects need to be tied together (twigs in a shelter, for instance) floss serves as a fitting substitute for thin rope.

Dental floss, with its convenient and lightweight packaging, is a great stealth outdoor tool to bring along with you on your next trip into the wilderness. With all of it’s amazing uses, you might have to consciously remind yourself to save some for your teeth!

Canoeing Basics

The first step to canoeing is, obviously, to get the canoe in the water. In swift currents or rough waters, this is usually done best stern (back) first at a 90 degree angle to the current. As you push the canoe out, get to about shin-deep level in the water and hop in as carefully as possible. Know that it might take a little practice learning how to get in the canoe without tipping it.

Once you’ve gotten in the canoe, it’s time to position yourself for paddling. When there’s just one person in the apparatus, the best spot to sit is typically between the center and the stern. This will allow you to keep balance while simultaneously making it much easier to steer in the water. Now, imagine there’s a box about the width of your shoulders and an arm’s length in front of you. When not paddling, you want to stay within the bounds of the box to keep the canoe traveling straight.

Paddling

When paddling, remember to move that imaginary box in front of you to one side or the other. This makes you move your whole upper body and helps you avoid the overextension of your arms and shoulders. In addition to this principle, below are a few basic strokes that are useful to know.

First is the bow stroke. To perform it, grab the paddle towards its middle with the hand whose side you’re going to paddle on, and take hold of the top with your other hand. Don’t attempt to use the lower arm to pull the paddle through the water alone – that’s not very efficient and will tire you out quickly. Instead, push the top of the paddle with your top hand, using the lower hand as a sort of fulcrum for the lever-like paddle. For the bow stroke itself, dip the paddle in the water in front of you, and, using the aforementioned lever motion, push it forward so that the paddle’s blade makes a 180 degree arc in the water.

In rougher rivers or streams where taking the paddle out of the water isn’t recommended, the stroke to use is called a sculling draw. It is similar to the bow stroke, except you don’t lift the paddle toward the back end. Instead, turn the blade so that it glides through the water and make a figure eight motion to bring the stroke back to its front position.

When you’re moving at a decent clip and simply want to steer the canoe, the rudder stroke is perfect to employ. As you might suspect from the name, you simply dip the paddle in the water behind the canoe and turn it much like you would a rudder. Rotating the paddle to the left will cause you to go right, and vice versa.

Knowing basic canoeing technique is beneficial in anything from a float trip to a fishing excursion. The principles are relatively simple, and by using the above techniques, you can improve both stamina and directional control. The next time you go out, just be sure to pause and wait up for the struggling canoeists behind you!

Trick candles

Fun birthday gag? More like cheap wind-resistant matches. Trick candles, no matter how windy it is outside, will stay lit – allowing you liberal amounts of time to get your kindling started. This is decently useful, but the one distinct advantage sets them above the windproof match echelon is that they’re completely reusable. You can put a trick candle out with a pinch of water, and, once it’s dry, it will light right back up. The next time you go to the party store for a birthday card, be sure to pick up a package of these impressive fire starters.

Hot water in a pinch

When hot water is needed for any reason and you don’t have time to build a fire, try this simple trick when you first arrive at camp. Fill a few gallon sized Ziploc bags with water, lump them all in a black trash bag, and leave them to sit in the sun. If the weather’s warm, that water will be nice and hot in a matter of hours. Do note, however, that this technique is not especially effective during Winter.

The best kindling money can’t buy

The next time you do some laundry, don’t throw out that dryer lint. Your clothes are made mostly of cotton, and those loose fibers that get left behind are packed just loosely enough to catch easily and maintain a nice, steady blaze. If you save some of it and put it in a bag, you have free emergency kindling in just about any situation.

Never sleep in a puddle

If you’re an avid backpacker, this outdoor tip can really come in handy. Most sleeping bag cases aren’t waterproof, so if a sudden downpour occurs, you’re stuck with a damp sleeping bag at best, and a soaked one at worst. To prevent this from happening, put the sleeping bag in a trash bag, and then in the case. The waterproof plastic will stop the rain from getting to your bag, no matter how hard it’s coming down.

Carry some Crayola

Trail markers, as any avid outdoorsman knows, are an absolute necessity when hiking in unfamiliar territory. The problem with using tape, though, is that you have to go to the trouble of collecting it on the way back up the trail. The next time you go hiking, carry some brightly colored chalk to mark the trail. A rainstorm will wash it right off, so there’s no need to worry about cleaning up any messes.

Whether you’re an avid camper or just starting out, these creative tips can make your life in the outdoors a whole lot easier. They’re simple, cheap, and will hopefully prevent some of the nagging annoyances that life as a camper can sometimes bring.