[pct-l] Sawyer Squeeze

[Justin West]

 I hiked the PCT over the past two years using an older model sawyer inline
filter.  this worked great.  I would recommend just buying the sawyer
inline filter and forget their bag system.  Get a platypus 2L bag, put the
sawyer low on the hose (far from the bag to create as much head as
possible).  these bags are easy to fill even in low flow situations.  Carry
a lightweight water bottle like a gatorade bottle.  tie a bit of cord to
the handle of the platypus bag.  when you need to fill up; fill the bag,
hang it from a branch, or perch it on a rock, and let gravity filter your
water into your gatorade bottle while you eat something and stare off into
the stream.  I don't like trying to suck water through a filter while I am
breathing heavy and moving along.  I prefer to be able to gulp from a
bottle.  I mostly hiked with just the one quart bottle of water and an
empty platypus bag, but in the event I needed to carry more water I had
capacity for two more quarts in the bag.
if you have a bounce box, put the backwash attachment in it and USE IT in
towns.  find a tap and run  a few gallons of water back through it
regularly.  this little filter has probably done about 800-1000 quarts and
shows no signs of slowing up using this method

only downside I found was that sometimes if the filter ran all the way
empty (I stared off into the stream too long) and sucked up air, it would
not run well, in which case just unscrewing the two halves of the filter
housing (not sure if the new ones allow you to do this) would prime it fine
again.

justin
www.storythewalk.wordpress.com