HikeArizona.COM

I have gone to the archives to view suggestions on boots, gear, etc, but I would like to post it here to get more recent opinions and suggestions. Anyone wanting to share their knowledge, I'm grateful!

First off I'm new to hiking, I've only done one hike, Waterfall Trail, but I plan to get into this and want to make good choices rather than too much trail and error. That's where you all come in

What brand names do you recommend? What one's to steer clear of? Where do you shop? Reasonable? Sales? I've been told about the REI stores, so I plan to go there to take a look around. (Phoenix area)

What I feel I need first off is boots, hydration pack, hat, cool (well cool to look good too, but meant not warm lol) clothing, back pack, etc. What else? I don't plan to go camping, so plan to use these for day hiking only.

Thanks in advance !

Happy Memorial Weekend!

Sherileeaz

JamesLyding wrote:Yet another thread coming back from the grave.
Hat: I have a supposedly-nice hat from REI, but it sucks. I'm a sweathog, and every wide-brimmed hat I've tried has collected sweat until it rolled down my face. I would love a recommendation for a good hat!

Not so much the hat, but the sweatband. I swear by the Halo sweatbands. The baffle technology diverts the sweat off to the side and keeps it from rolling down into your eyes. On adjustable size hats, you just make them a little bigger to accomodate the sweatband. On fixed sized hats, you need to buy them a size bigger. At REI in the bike department. When they do get soaked in sweat, just squeeze them out over your head. As Cody Lundin emphasizes in 98.6° - The Art of Keeping your pumpkin Alive "A drop of sweat lost, is a drop of sweat wasted."

I have a breathable Tilley but only because I want to see if they really stand by their lifetime warranty.

JamesLyding wrote:Hat: I have a supposedly-nice hat from REI, but it sucks. I'm a sweathog, and every wide-brimmed hat I've tried has collected sweat until it rolled down my face. I would love a recommendation for a good hat!

Yeah I'm in the same boat. When I hiked with Fritz about eight years ago he kept telling me I needed to get a wide brimmed hat asap! Being more of a baseball cap guy it really hasn't changed. I bought one of the outrageously expensive OR hats last year. Wore it once and sweat like a friggen pig in a sauna. So I dropped another chunk of change on a straw Stetson hat. Well, it's better but it ain't no comfy baseball cap. Not to mention I feel about as proud wearing it as a pumpkin tutu

The poly dri weave shirts are a blessing!

hippiepunkpirate wrote:as I always wear cotton, and sometimes it punishes me.

I know cotton is much more practical in AZ than most other places, but it gets downright abrasive when wet.

Yeah in addition to hypothermia it's a nipple eraser

big_load wrote: I know cotton is much more practical in AZ than most other places, but it gets downright abrasive when wet.

I prefer to wear a heavy cotton "boonie hat" style on my noggin when I need sun protection and cooling. Dunk that puppy in a pond, stream or douse it with your water bottle and it'll keep my head cool for hours (or minutes if it's over 110 - but then i just shouldn't be outside). There seem to be 2 consistent problems with this, however:
1. Most places only carry the non-cotton, quick wicking, quick drying lightweight type hats these days. Ol' fashioned canvas just ain't cool no mo' I wish they'd figure out is actually IS really COOL!
2. My noggin is roughly the size of a smallish planet. Good for thinkin and winning head-butting competitions. Not so good for finding good looking, relatively inexpensive hats. A man's size large is usually about right in the heat on the trail - though some have shrunk in the wash to be too small. I mean, come on folks - just because I'm a girl, doesn't mean I have a tiny head! (wait...wrong thread...)

One big switch I've made recently is to special hiking underwear. I hope that you all don't scream TMI and run away - because we're all grown ups , and i think we can talk underthings here. Particularly for girls on multi-day hikes, having the right undies can be the difference between a miserable week when you get home, and feeling like a new woman each day. I have finally decided that the fancy ones sold by exofficio and patagonia are actually worth the extra $$. Just easier to deal with and more suited to heavy duty activity than the ol' cotton standbys.

on and on and on...

joe bartels wrote:I feel proud wearing a pumpkin tutu

Good for thinkin and winning head-butting competitions.

Another sweaty guy here... I have a halo that I wore biking, that got replaced with a gutr.. because the new helmet made the halo uncomfortable.. the thing did rock and I'll probably go back to it eventually. That being said, hiking I typically wear an underarmour running hat. That's been the most effective and comfortable solution I've found so far.. simple hat wise at least.

although I'm tempted to get a halo hat...

joe bartels wrote:I bought one of the outrageously expensive OR hats last year...

I've had various hats over the years. The Tilley hat I recently got was pricey but worth it. Best fitting and with double draw strings so it can hold on to the back of your head, which keeps it from blowing off forward.

Better than bakin your noggin.

I'm on my second Tilley. I never hit the trail without it.

I got my Tilley a size too big so I can fit the Halo sweatband under it. And I got the Tilley that's ventilated around the top. I'm trying to beat it up so that I can collect on the lifetime warranty.

Tilley is evidently very proud of their hats. $70 for a hat! It had better be good because I'll probably get one before summer hits.

Maybe we should have TWO threads for this topic. Separate but equal. One for the people who sweat a lot and like to tell us all about it, and the other one for the rest of us dry types. ;)

I've always heard ..."men sweat, women glisten"... That's about as far as I'm prepared to go, however, else I become the subject of conversation in the Gender Issues thread.

Well, I have heard that too, only the version I heard goes: Horses sweat, gentlemen perspire, but ladies are dewy!

Yeah - well I sweat. 100deg hiking up hill with my pack on, yup - you bet there's considerable sweat involved. Heck, hiking down hill in the deep snow with only my 10lb dog on my back I managed to get more than misty. Of course, I'm a generational Arizonan. It may be genetic at this point - evolution in progress!

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writelots wrote:hiking down hill in the deep snow with only my 10lb dog on my back

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Good thing you don't have a Labrador or a Great Dane!! (Mine wouldn't go out in snow, they've definitely been domesticated...)