paul standley
30-06-2011, 12:25 AM
So, you know how it goes, it seems everybody has a hammock except me so I wanted one...!
I'd never used a hammock (actually, I've never even seen one before in the flesh) and so I watched a few you tube vids and got the general idea... I thought...!
Bought 6 mtrs of rip-stop nylon x 1.3 mtrs wide for £5 from ebay and set about making a 'gathered end' hammock by doubling up the fabric length-ways to give me a hammock of 2.9 mtrs x 1.3 mtrs.
Got the wife to stitch in double hems each end and rigged up the ends with some polyprop cord and gathered it up and looped it.
I had two climbing carabiners and I rigged two tree-huggers using double knotted 550 para cord and it looked like a hammock to me so off I went on Sunday to the woods for two days and nights armed with my new budget hammock and my budget tarp.
Got it all set up easily enough and slid my self inflating mat between the two layers and popped my sleeping bag in it and left it at that until bed time. That's when the fun started because never having used a hammock before, I probably should have spent some time getting used to one first...!
First off, I realised that one end was much higher than the other and I kept slipping down so fixed that by lowering one end then got in again and then hey ho, I was now only 6" off the ground but that was a 'safe place' to be I thought for a first time so tried to settle down and then the mat kept sliding out from between the layers because I hadn't stitched the two layers together down the long sides and at one point it must have looked like the hammock had sprouted wings with the mat sticking out of both sides.
It was around 1.00 am when I finally wriggled myself to sleep and I was up 3 or 4 more times during the night to put the dam mat back in...!
Next morning, off I went to the local town to buy a needle and some thread and so spent the next two hours back on site under my tarp in the rain sewing down the two long sides by hand.
Re-jigged the tree huggers to get me back off the ground a bit more and was now already for night 2... or so I thought.
Monday night it was cold at around 9 degrees and windy and I only had a light summer sleeping bag so I spent the first hour after getting into it trying to balance my fleece over my legs for a bit more insulation.
Not withstanding all of the above, I actually think I got a half decent nights sleep on the 2nd night and am definitely impressed with the comfort of a hammock compared to ground dwelling in a tent as my back isn't what it used to be when I was younger.
My budget kit then for this latest caper consists of an £8 plastic tarp (3.2m x 2.8 m), £3 worth of para cord, £12 for two carabiners and £5 for the home made hammock.
Learned a few lessons the hard way but it was good fun and I'll definitely be doing some more hammocking this summer.
1864 1863 1862
Paul.
I'd never used a hammock (actually, I've never even seen one before in the flesh) and so I watched a few you tube vids and got the general idea... I thought...!
Bought 6 mtrs of rip-stop nylon x 1.3 mtrs wide for £5 from ebay and set about making a 'gathered end' hammock by doubling up the fabric length-ways to give me a hammock of 2.9 mtrs x 1.3 mtrs.
Got the wife to stitch in double hems each end and rigged up the ends with some polyprop cord and gathered it up and looped it.
I had two climbing carabiners and I rigged two tree-huggers using double knotted 550 para cord and it looked like a hammock to me so off I went on Sunday to the woods for two days and nights armed with my new budget hammock and my budget tarp.
Got it all set up easily enough and slid my self inflating mat between the two layers and popped my sleeping bag in it and left it at that until bed time. That's when the fun started because never having used a hammock before, I probably should have spent some time getting used to one first...!
First off, I realised that one end was much higher than the other and I kept slipping down so fixed that by lowering one end then got in again and then hey ho, I was now only 6" off the ground but that was a 'safe place' to be I thought for a first time so tried to settle down and then the mat kept sliding out from between the layers because I hadn't stitched the two layers together down the long sides and at one point it must have looked like the hammock had sprouted wings with the mat sticking out of both sides.
It was around 1.00 am when I finally wriggled myself to sleep and I was up 3 or 4 more times during the night to put the dam mat back in...!
Next morning, off I went to the local town to buy a needle and some thread and so spent the next two hours back on site under my tarp in the rain sewing down the two long sides by hand.
Re-jigged the tree huggers to get me back off the ground a bit more and was now already for night 2... or so I thought.
Monday night it was cold at around 9 degrees and windy and I only had a light summer sleeping bag so I spent the first hour after getting into it trying to balance my fleece over my legs for a bit more insulation.
Not withstanding all of the above, I actually think I got a half decent nights sleep on the 2nd night and am definitely impressed with the comfort of a hammock compared to ground dwelling in a tent as my back isn't what it used to be when I was younger.
My budget kit then for this latest caper consists of an £8 plastic tarp (3.2m x 2.8 m), £3 worth of para cord, £12 for two carabiners and £5 for the home made hammock.
Learned a few lessons the hard way but it was good fun and I'll definitely be doing some more hammocking this summer.
1864 1863 1862
Paul.