When I bought my GoLite Shangrila, I asked the guys at Backpackinglight.co.uk whether it could be pitched with trekking poles.
Bob mailed me back and said that it couldn’t, although ‘he was working on something’.
I then bumped into a chap in the Lakes who had taken a hacksaw to an old lower walking pole section and was using it to marry two Black Diamond FlickLock poles together to create one long support pole.
His solution was to remove the lower sections of the Black Diamonds and use the sawn pole section as a spigot.
‘Neat,’ I thought, ‘I’ll follow suit’.
However, just as I was about to order my new Black Diamonds, Bob’s ‘something’ became available.
The principle is the same as the sawn-off pole, but Bob’s solution is more elegant in that it uses an expander at either end and hence can be used with a range of twist lock poles with a 14mm diameter lower section.
It works really well with my old, battered Leki Makalus, and a list of compatible poles is available on BackpackingLight.co.uk
The section does come with a health warning, though. A leaflet supplied with the pole urges caution when sliding the expanders into pole sections and care is needed.
I think it’s going to be the just the ticket, though, and at £12.99, a bargain (and for all those pole posers out there, a carbon version is available, too, for another fiver).
I’m hoping to take my new shelter ‘rig’ for a test drive this weekend and will report back.
The weather looks like it’s going to be awful…
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