Headlamps

Beginner's Guide to Backpacking

Headlamps
Our experience illustrates the first law of nighttime disaster control: no headlamp is reliable unless you check the batteries – and the spares – in advance. Electronics stores usually sell inexpensive battery testers that work with all sizes of batteries. I bought mine (belatedly) at Radio Shack. Battery testers can only tell you if the battery is good or not; they can't tell you how much life is left, since some batteries, like nicads, put out nearly their full voltage until exhausted. Alkalines lose power in a more linear fashion, so a battery tester can give you some idea of an alkaline's remaining life, but it's still an educated guess, at best. When in doubt, pack two sets of spares. Spare bulbs are equally important.

If we hadn't been able to borrow a headlamp from Lisa and Cindy, Jenny and I would have been in much worse trouble. The odds would have been good that some valuable piece of equipment would have blown away in the dark as we struggled to pack all our gear. It just goes to show that when darkness reigns, a headlamp is de-light.

If you're a typical summer backpacker, you'll never need to worry about your tent exploding around your ears, but you're quite likely to need a reliable headlamp or flashlight, if only to investigate those mysterious midnight gnawing sounds that prove to be a porcupine chewing into your pack.

A headlamp is just a bulb and a reflector mounted on an elastic headband. With some models, the battery case is also attached to the headband; with others, it rides in a pocket, where the battery stays warmer and therefore lasts longer. The disadvantage of that system, of course, is that you then have a wire running from a pocket to your head, which not only makes you look like an android, but also gives malicious branches the perfect handle to rip your headlamp from your head. Headlamps let you use both hands to pitch your tent, cook, or pack, which is why Cora and I prefer them over flashlights. For trail walking, however, you'll often find that carrying the headlamp in your hands makes it easier to pick out obstacles in the trail. The reason? Moving the light away from your eyes gives better definition to the scene by casting longer and more pronounced shadows.

When traveling solo, I carry a full-size Petzl headlamp, plus a four-ounce Mini-Maglite headlamp (so I can change batteries and bulbs in the main headlamp in the dark), plus spare batteries and a spare bulb for the miniature headlamp. I do a lot of nighttime hiking on my way to sunrise photo ops, so I put a halogen bulb and a hefty 4.5 volt battery into the Petzl. The combination will throw a usable beam of light for 100 yards – great for off-trail bushwhacking in the dark.

The best batteries for the environment and for your pocketbook over the long run are rechargeable nicads. They cost more initially, and you have to buy a battery charger as well, but they have a useful life of 500 to 1000 charges, which makes them far more economical over time. One disadvantage is that nicads hold less energy than comparable alkaline batteries. A second disadvantage is that even fully charged, never-used nicads will gradually go dead over a period of two or three months and have to be recharged. Throwaway alkaline batteries are convenient because of their long shelf life, but they contain nasty acids and heavy metals that pollute groundwater if these toxins seep out through the bottom of a landfill. In cold weather, nicads have the advantage over alkalines because their power output doesn't drop off as fast as alkalines' power does. The best batteries for really severe cold, however, are the non-rechargeable lithiums. Nothing else will power a headlamp reliably at temperatures below zero.

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