MaxP’d to the Max - Falcon II Review

In the past, I’ve been a bit unkind to Maxpedition. To be fair, there have produced some good utility items like the roll up pouches (roly-poly pouches), roll up back packs (reviewed here) and other small, utility pouches. But I’ve never been too keen on the Gear-Slinger bags with one strap or side-carry type bags. They might be a good idea in theory but in practice, they just didn’t work too well for me. I do know other people who swear by them though.

I was, however, impressed with the build quality and the style of the bag. So, as always in pursuit of the perfect day bag, I approached Lakelandbushcraft to seek advise. The advise came back in the form of a similar style bag to the Sitka, but a larger capacity and, fundamentally, traditional shoulder straps instead of a single shoulder strap.

The bag in question is called the Falcon II and here are the specs (from Maxpedition site):

• Main Compartment: 18"(H) x 9.5"(W) x 4.75"(D)
• Secondary Compartment: 16"(H) x 8"(W) x 3"(D)
• Upper Front Pouch: 4"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Lower Front Pouch: 10"(H) x 7"(W) x 2.5"(D)
• Capacity: 1520 cu. in. / 25 liters
• Hydration: Up to 100oz (3 liter) Bladder
• Support: 1" Sternum Strap, 1.5" Waist Belt (min 9" strap alone / max 42" strap alone; min 19" loop / max 52" loop)

The first thing that impressed me is the internal capacity. I have packed a whole overnight kit inside this bag.  That means food, water, cooker, billy, tarp and hammock and poncho . There are two main zipped, front loading compartments which are expandable and hold quite a bit of gear. The Thermarest and sleeping bag don’t fit in the bag (and only the smallest sleeping bag would) but they can both be strapped to the outside by the many external straps and fixings.

Internally, there a few handy meshed pockets and on this occasion, I’ve loaded these with essentials like fire lighting kit, hygiene gel, cordage and a spork. I’ll be keeping them there instead of using up space with my usual drop-bag.

The front loading system allows you to pack everything exactly where you want it and you can compress the bag by the ideally placed compression straps so that the 2 zipped compartments and outer pouches squeeze together very nicely. This keeps all the kit in the same position as when you packed them.

The water bladder pocket  has a gusset on the inside so it can accommodate a 3 litre camelbak quite comfortably.

You still have to be a little careful how you pack the sack. In fact, my 14 cm billy was causing a few problems with it’s awkward shape when everything else was loaded in. I also missed the lack of side pockets. So after a bit of thunking, I decided to Max-out the MaxP Falcon!

Firstly, I decided to use two Roly poly pouches that I had previously bought and fixed them to each side of the Falcon. I used one of their Silkclips and a Tac-Tie to do this.

 

Instantly, I had two high capacity side pouches to put in awkward and odd shaped items like the billy and stove or my other favourite day sack item, a flask of coffee. The pouches can be rolled up when not in use.

As you can see from the picture above, I didn’t stop there. The next addition was a little pouch that I attached the front of the Falcon’s smallest front pouch.

This is called a Volta case and is intended to house a plastic holder full of spare batteries. I bought it for my phone but find it’s more suited to my GPS .

Attached to the top of the case is a Janus extension pouch. This little pouch is an excellent alternative to a leather possibles pouch. It has a main compartment, two smaller internal side compartments and some internal elastic straps to hold small items like a fire-steel. The outside of the pouch has some handy elastic cordage as well.

I actually took this pouch to Namibia with me and had it attached to my belt at all times containing essential survival items. Here I’ve attached it to the bag to save it hanging off my trouser belt.

You can see that I can still get to the Falcon’s top pouch where I keep some tracking kit.

At the front of the bag on one of the straps, I’ve attached a Cocoon pouch. This pouch is ideal for stashing small items to save you keep taking off the bag.

The Falcon II is very comfortable to wear, even when fully loaded. It’s narrow enough to keep close to the spine and the bag compresses enough not to become too saggy with kit at the bottom of the bag or at the sides that you get with traditional top loading bags.

Everything is designed to be in the right place for a day trip or overnighter where quick walking  from one place to another (like when tracking) is essential.

Even without the added accessories, this is superb bag.  Obviously it’s a modern, tactical-type carrying system, and doesn’t pretend to be anything else. If you’re a traditionalist, don’t even bother to look at this. If you want a good, strong day bag for a tactical purpose, this is the bag to look at. Don’t look too closely if you haven’t a lot of money to spare, but Lakelandbushcraft will always give you a good price on any MaxP kit.

Maxpedition – Perhaps not Hardly Useful Kit after all.

A Link With The Past

Last Sunday, I took a break from the woods and went fossil hunting. The area I went to was Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex, which is about an hour away from where I live.

I’ve never been fossil hunting, but a friend who I went with has been a couple of times, so told me what to look for and roughly where to look.

At the top of the Naze, I was taken aback by the erosion of the cliff tops. Apparently, this is happening at a rate of 2 meters per year.

The Hanoverian Tower - or Naze Tower, was built as a sea mark in 1720 and was the forerunner to the popular lighthouses of a later era. This tower will follow the world war two pill boxes and fall onto the beach in 50 years time if the area isn’t protected soon.

The cliffs are made up of a complex mixture of different geologies. If you want more info go here for a detailed explanation, but briefly there are three layers: The top layer is sand and gravel from the Pleistocene epoch, a Red Crag formation from the Pliocene and the bottom layer, which is a strange black sticky clay called London Clay from the Eocene period.

We were looking for bivalve valves and gastropods in the Red crag and anything from Shark’s teeth to wood fossils at the foot of the cliffs in amongst the London clay and on the partly shingle beach front.

It wasn’t that far removed from tracking as I ended up on the damp shingle, on my hands and knees searching for micro signs and getting “tracked out” as I searched for unseen clues.

And this was the haul:

Firstly, 4 Shark teeth identified by the highly knowledgeable Nazeman himself, Mike Todd, who runs a small store as part of an education project. These teeth are from Striatolamia macrota (7 gilled sand-shark) from the Eocene period - 53.7 million years old. I know this exact detail because these were found on Mike’s table at the top of the Naze! In other words, I got them from him because I failed to find any myself!!

Next up is some fossilised twig preserved as iron pyrite. I found this myself!

 

The piece de resistance for me was finding this piece of flint. I found it right up against foot of the cliff, in a puddle of water running off the London clay. Even though I didn’t get a chance to show it to Mike, I’m more than 90% sure that this has been knapped. I went on Mike’s website and confirmed that Neolithic knapped flint has been found in the area in the form of hand-axes and blades.

Another pointer is the brown/bronze colour of the flint. I’ve knapped this sort of flint before with the legendary John Lord. It almost certainly comes from Grimes Graves Neolithic flint mine in Thetford, Norfolk, which isn’t a million miles away from where I found this.

The final confirmation will be to send a picture to Mike and see what he makes of it.

I have little doubt that I am the first human to touch this tool since the last user, possibly between 7,000 and 11,000 years ago. That fact makes this an incredibly special find for me, possibly more so than finding a much older shark’s tooth (if I had found one that is). It provides me with a strangely personal, physical link with the prehistoric past and it’s no wonder people get heavily involved in fossil hunting.

The full haul is shown in this picture with a one pound coin (2cms –0.8in dia) for scale. On the left is (I think) Coprolite (fossilised scat) and the item with a hole may well be a part of a fossilised sea-sponge. The rest are fossilised twigs. I think the white shells are quite modern and should really be discarded.

I thoroughly enjoyed the day and I will most certainly be going back in the near future to have another fossil hunt.

Thanks for the visit.

A Link With The Past

Last Sunday, I took a break from the woods and went fossil hunting. The area I went to was Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex, which is about an hour away from where I live.

I’ve never been fossil hunting, but a friend who I went with has been a couple of times, so told me what to look for and roughly where to look.

At the top of the Naze, I was taken aback by the erosion of the cliff tops. Apparently, this is happening at a rate of 2 meters per year.

The Hanoverian Tower - or Naze Tower, was built as a sea mark in 1720 and was the forerunner to the popular lighthouses of a later era. This tower will follow the world war two pill boxes and fall onto the beach in 50 years time if the area isn’t protected soon.

The cliffs are made up of a complex mixture of different geologies. If you want more info go here for a detailed explanation, but briefly there are three layers: The top layer is sand and gravel from the Pleistocene epoch, a Red Crag formation from the Pliocene and the bottom layer, which is a strange black sticky clay called London Clay from the Eocene period.

We were looking for bivalve valves and gastropods in the Red crag and anything from Shark’s teeth to wood fossils at the foot of the cliffs in amongst the London clay and on the partly shingle beach front.

It wasn’t that far removed from tracking as I ended up on the damp shingle, on my hands and knees searching for micro signs and getting “tracked out” as I searched for unseen clues.

And this was the haul:

Firstly, 4 Shark teeth identified by the highly knowledgeable Nazeman himself, Mike Todd, who runs a small store as part of an education project. These teeth are from Striatolamia macrota (7 gilled sand-shark) from the Eocene period - 53.7 million years old. I know this exact detail because these were found on Mike’s table at the top of the Naze! In other words, I got them from him because I failed to find any myself!!

Next up is some fossilised twig preserved as iron pyrite. I found this myself!

 

The piece de resistance for me was finding this piece of flint. I found it right up against foot of the cliff, in a puddle of water running off the London clay. Even though I didn’t get a chance to show it to Mike, I’m more than 90% sure that this has been knapped. I went on Mike’s website and confirmed that Neolithic knapped flint has been found in the area in the form of hand-axes and blades.

Another pointer is the brown/bronze colour of the flint. I’ve knapped this sort of flint before with the legendary John Lord. It almost certainly comes from Grimes Graves Neolithic flint mine in Thetford, Norfolk, which isn’t a million miles away from where I found this.

The final confirmation will be to send a picture to Mike and see what he makes of it.

I have little doubt that I am the first human to touch this tool since the last user, possibly between 7,000 and 11,000 years ago. That fact makes this an incredibly special find for me, possibly more so than finding a much older shark’s tooth (if I had found one that is). It provides me with a strangely personal, physical link with the prehistoric past and it’s no wonder people get heavily involved in fossil hunting.

The full haul is shown in this picture with a one pound coin (2cms –0.8in dia) for scale. On the left is (I think) Coprolite (fossilised scat) and the item with a hole may well be a part of a fossilised sea-sponge. The rest are fossilised twigs. I think the white shells are quite modern and should really be discarded.

I thoroughly enjoyed the day and I will most certainly be going back in the near future to have another fossil hunt.

Thanks for the visit.

Signs Of Life

On Saturday I went into Poor Park woods. I was specifically looking for early signs of spring (ever hopeful.)

I’ve seen snowdrops on the roadside verges but very little else. There’s no birch trees in these woods so I couldn’t test for rising sap. In fact, all in all, I was a little disappointed.

I did notice some Dog’s mercury coming through the woods floor…

 

… and some early growth on this as yet unidentified vine-type plant.

Looking back at this time last year, there was certainly a lot more going on. It’s not really surprising as only a couple of weeks ago we had a load of snow. Nevertheless, the last few days have been beautiful and sunny, but still with cold nights of –2C and lower.

 

There was a lot of sign of mammal activity, particularly badger, who seemed to congregate in this one spot. I couldn't figure out why apart from possibly a territorial scent area that I couldn't detect.

 

As last week, I settled down to some scrambled egg for lunch. Even I can do this pretty well. If you crack a few eggs into a Pour and Store bag, add some thinly sliced ham, cheese and onions, take along your favourite frying pan and stove and you’ll have a nice light lunch in no time.

By mid afternoon I’d drawn a blank in finding signs of life in these woods. Despite the bright and sunny day, there was quite a strong, cold, easterly wind.

I sat down to finish off the last of the coffee and noticed a red shape trotting along the main track. He was inquisitive enough to observe me at a distance, and I managed to squeak him in a little closer but he didn’t fall for it entirely and eventually he decided to cut and run.

Mid-week I’ll talk about a great day on the coast today looking for fossils.

Signs Of Life

On Saturday I went into Poor Park woods. I was specifically looking for early signs of spring (ever hopeful.)

I’ve seen snowdrops on the roadside verges but very little else. There’s no birch trees in these woods so I couldn’t test for rising sap. In fact, all in all, I was a little disappointed.

I did notice some Dog’s mercury coming through the woods floor…

 

… and some early growth on this as yet unidentified vine-type plant.

Looking back at this time last year, there was certainly a lot more going on. It’s not really surprising as only a couple of weeks ago we had a load of snow. Nevertheless, the last few days have been beautiful and sunny, but still with cold nights of –2C and lower.

 

There was a lot of sign of mammal activity, particularly badger, who seemed to congregate in this one spot. I couldn't figure out why apart from possibly a territorial scent area that I couldn't detect.

 

As last week, I settled down to some scrambled egg for lunch. Even I can do this pretty well. If you crack a few eggs into a Pour and Store bag, add some thinly sliced ham, cheese and onions, take along your favourite frying pan and stove and you’ll have a nice light lunch in no time.

By mid afternoon I’d drawn a blank in finding signs of life in these woods. Despite the bright and sunny day, there was quite a strong, cold, easterly wind.

I sat down to finish off the last of the coffee and noticed a red shape trotting along the main track. He was inquisitive enough to observe me at a distance, and I managed to squeak him in a little closer but he didn’t fall for it entirely and eventually he decided to cut and run.

Mid-week I’ll talk about a great day on the coast today looking for fossils.

What’s In A Name

Poor Park and Park Wood are the names of my two local woods. No-one seem to know why the former is called “poor” park, although it might well have derived from someone’s name. Although the local village is more than likely named by the Vikings, the French may have given names to many other local features.

Like it or not, there are many French connections in the countryside and most stem from the Norman invasion. Locally we have a nearby Norman castle owned by Aubrey de Vere who was one of William the Conqueror's most favoured knights. Therefore we would expect to have a substantial amount of land connected with it to be linked with the Normans. Local rumour has it that a later Normal landowner was so short of money that he was called Simon ‘the Poor’ but I’m not too sure of that one.

The word ‘park’ also has connections with the Normans, for it was they who set up deer parks for local hunting purposes.  Thus you should expect any woods with the name ‘park’ in it to have some ancient connection with deer. There were 36 deer parks named in the Domesday book and these escalated to hundreds and hundreds in England before the English civil war decimated them.

Apparently it is still possible to recognise a medieval deer park even today by the egg-shape of the land and the earthworks used as the park boundaries.

Not only were parks developed by the Normans but so were forests. These were lands legally set aside for the hunting nobility. Forest Law inflicted severe punishments for anyone found interfering with the deer in the Forest. If you were caught ‘red-handed’ i.e. blood on your hands, you could expect only one form of punishment.

The oldest map of the two woods I can get on-line (visit www.visionofbritain.org.uk) is from 1856. I was hoping that it would show the two woods joined as one as they are not too far apart, but it doesn't quite do that. Instead there’s another wood to the south east of Park Wood called  Hook Wood. No trace of Hook Wood exists now. Poor Park are the woods to the south. There is no mention of the name Poor Park on this map.

The next map is from 1925 and reveals that Hook Wood has disappeared. It does show the medieval Hawke’s Hall which has also now disappeared. I live just to the north of the now named Poor Park at Scot’s End, although there is now no such place as Scot’s End now.

Park Wood has been significantly reduced in size and it is rarely named on maps. Interestingly, Poor Park (see the Sat Map at the top of the page) has not even changed its shape for over 150 years and is now one of the bigger woods in the area.

The council describes the woods as:

…[a] large ancient wood, originally comprising Pedunculate Oak (Quercus robur), Ash (Fraxinus excelsior), Hazel (Corylus avellana) and Field Maple (Acer campestre), has now been widely replanted with Poplars (Populus sp.) and Scots Pine (Pinus sylvestris). Despite storm damage and forestry activity, a typical woodland ground flora still survives.

I’m going to have to delve a little deeper and go back even further into the history of these woods.

Thanks for the visit.