Lowe Alpine AirZone Pro 35:45 Rucksack Test & Review Wild Camp (Plus the Rab Geon Pull-on)

hi folks robin here i’m just waiting on kevin for a wild camp and it’s an absolutely gorgeous night i just hope he hurries up because the daylight is limited in this episode i’ve also got a rucksack and a fleece to show you that cotswold outdoors kindly sent me in return for a honest review this this fleece here it is the rab geon pull-on fleece and the rucksack is a low alpine airzone pro 35 45 and i’ll explain later why it’s got two numbers in it. right folks this is the low alpine air zone pro 35 45 and this is the second week i’ve used it in a row so it’s probably more of an initial review because i’ve not had a chance to test it properly but i’ve got a good idea over the last two trips what to expect from this but anyway what i’ll do is i’ll give you a quick run through we’ll start from the top and work our way down on the pack so at the top of the pack we have a floating lid this zips open obviously and you’ve got plenty of space in here for bits and bobs and last night i put my food in there underneath the lid you’ve got another pocket here and you can see there i’ve got my car keys clipped in and there’s room for a wallet perhaps an old bits and bobs it’s got a little emergency protocol just in case um and that’s pretty much the lid the lid does adjust here there are straps so if the packs are full you can obviously increase that to fit over the rucksack but so i mentioned yesterday this is a 35 45 and the reason for that is i’ll show you i’ve got set 35 at the moment but if you need more space this opens out and it gives you an extra 10 liters which i used last night to carry the drone and an insulated layer and that just brought me that bit extra space and then there’s our second toggle here so there’s two toggles that’s for the 35 that one’s for the 45 and then this just folds over clips in and then you put your lead across and obviously it’s just a little bit tighter now that they obviously adjust and you can see there i can loosen or tighten the lid so i’ll just loosen that off a little bit okay so at the front you can see this it’s a sort of spider configuration they call it and you can put a lot of things in here this plastic bag here would hold in a helmet you can put in waterproofs i managed to carry some water in it last week and this week i just popped in my setmap just like that it’s actually handy for bits and bobs and i think if you had wet waterproofs and then the sun came out you could leave them on there as you walk to the side of the pack each side has a wand pocket this is good for carrying water as you can see here i’ve got two bottles in there and they’re quite they’re quite deep as well and they’ve got a strap here just to tighten across there that is obviously echoed on the other side as well you can see here i’ve got my tent poles in there with another bottle of water so they those one pockets are decent when i first got this pack the first thing i noticed was like well where can i put my ice axe and where can i put my trekking poles and this is really clever there’s two little loops here you just pull out and your your spikier trekking pole goes in there and what you’ve got here is another loop which if you un do this you put the trekking pole in there and the point in there and then you just clip that in and that would keep them in place so i’m here you see what about the ice ax well this is really clever as well hidden away is this little toggle and that goes through one of the holes on the head of your ice axe that i thought was really clever and again the top of the sacks would be up here so yeah that’s really clever i like that to the rear of the pack you have got the air zone system and this is obviously to keep your back a bit more ventilated and it does work to a degree and you can see here it’s got this what they call the four stitch and it’s really tough and durable it’s also got this sort of contoured bit for the small of your back that took me a little bit to get used to that actually but it is comfortable and the one thing i did notice about this rucksack is it really manages the weight really well i’ve got about 10 to 11 kilograms including water and food and it just kept it all nice together whereas my osprey levy 45 everything just bounces a little bit but this just kept it all nice and tight you can also see here it’s got a sternum strap with a belt and whistle and you’ve got your hip belt with adequate padding there as well and you’ve got two hip pockets which is quite useful i can fit my mobile phone in that or you can put snacks compass whatever you fancy now the one downside to this rucksack is it weighs 1.56 kilograms so for the gram counters this just might be a little bit on the heavy side but i can live with that because it’s comfortable and it carries the weight really well so that’s the main thing for me for long distance backpacking i would want something lighter but for one or two nights away this is ideal because you’ve got the 35 or the 45 but because it’s so heavy it’s also very durable it’s got 200 denier rip stop nylon and for that this is a good winter pack it’s just so durable so first thing i noticed was the durability of it and i think this will last the test of time inside the rucksack you have a storage system for your hydration bladder i don’t particularly use them so i always have bottles at the side here you can also adjust the um the back of the rucksack as well just to suit your height and to do that there is i’m just into this adjust the pack to suit your size inside here you rip that open there’s some velcro and you just move your hand and you can just feel that move up and down and that should adjust to suit your back there’s plenty of space in here particularly when you open up to the 45 as well is there anything else i’ve missed oh yeah to the side here there’s a pocket to get into the rucksack so that’s handy for things at the bottom you can see i’ve got my tent there i’ve got my sleeping stuff below again it’s sharp can something’s beat but tricky particularly you’ve got it full to the gunner like me there you go you don’t want to catch the tent on the other side of the pack there is an identical pocket but instead of getting gentle rucksack this is just storage and i can get my hand right down behind the bottles there so that’s quite deep i don’t know what you could put in here a set mat mapping compass some food whatever you like but yeah there you go that is the low alpine air zone pro 35 45 if you’ve got any questions do ask in the comment section below uh i will put a link to this in the description as well if you want to have a look at this all right kev how’s it going all right so cotswold outdoors also kindly sent me this rab geon pull-on fleece and it is made of their thermic stretch material i have to say it’s nice and fitted for me albeit i do find the rab sleeves to be just a little bit tad long on me obviously you’ve got slightly longer arms maybe better but i’ve always noticed that the rab stuff’s just a bit too long for me but it’s not a show stopper i’ve been wearing this fleece constantly for the last couple of weeks and i find it a really nice mid layer i run quite hot so i can walk with just a base layer and this one especially when i’m heading up hill if you’re a bit of a cold potato you can use this fleece as part of your wearing system so you’d have obviously your base layer use this fleece as your mid layer and you’d either have a hard shell or another mid layer on top of the fleece as well it depends on your own personal setup how hot cold that you run but this would certainly make a good um mid layer for your winter setup i think it’d be too warm for summer but yeah so i’ll put a link to the rucksack and the fleece down below if you want to check these out so the aim of the game is to camp just somewhere up here you ever get that feeling you’ve picked the wrong hill this one here is basking in the last of the sun yeah we’re in the shade well then the breaks well we’ve just literally just missed the sunset by minutes this is the top i think we’ve settled on somewhere summit cairns just behind us identify this and this gives us the view which is really nice the tent up going for the helm compact one again she’s looking good solid we think that kev what we’ve got today i have the lanchan 1.5 well it’s pretty much the 3F UL pyramid but it’s lovely and spacious inside all right it’s time to get some hot water on the go and get some dinner i am starving it’s going to be a noisy world camp tonight the geese down there are loud as in i don’t know if you can hear them there’s hundreds of them hunners cant he beat the candle light for this time of year it’s just nice to have that natural glow instead of harsh led when i say hash led i mean like this here’s the button boom but it’s a bit too dark to see that we shall see in the morning i suppose boat head i’ve turned off the head touches because somebody’s coming up and i don’t know why that’s a walker coming up i can see in the line so you should be able to see it now like what’s this boy wanting do you know morse code kevin let’s see if he comes over oh oh [ __ ] is heading right towards us oh i’ve given a location away i don’t know why me and kevin were pure panic in there but they’ve turned around there must be one of those like an outdoor cat or something because we can see the tail lights just disappearing away now but uh i don’t know maybe they thought we were illegal stalking or something like that but uh they’re away now i’m not going to sleep tonight all right folks it’s just gone 10 o’clock rock and roll in our beds bring us back in the morning cheers good night night cave night john boy good morning campers it’s looking to be a rather nice morning versions and since and sun rises in another 40 minutes let’s shape it up to the east of us office there is the sun beginning to rise just beyond kev’s tent my ass was just packing up kev’s dropped his tent i’m about to do mine and we’re gonna head down to the reservoir down there right that’s us ready to roll rock and roll what’s the key message kev leave it’s actually a lot later than it was so we’re just heading down to the east end of the reservoir we’re gonna have a little look around there and we’ll bring you back then do kevin has a parted company with me he’s going to head up a hill called spartan just behind where we’re parked so he’s a way to do that just now if you’re wondering and depending on the time i might put it on back at the car hi folks kev here at the top of sparlington hill i left robin at the reservoir to play with his toy a little drone just took a wee walk up here he’s done this whole before eh so good visibility there can see the five lomans over the arthur c and then the paintless and there’s where we were camped last night up there right that’s me on the road always walk in opposite direction of the traffic when you get to a bend like this it’s actually safer to then cross the road there’s good example mr razdaman alright folks i’ve probably got about enough plumber back to the car so i’m going to leave you with some other videos here that you might like to watch if you haven’t already please subscribe and i’ll catch you next one cheers .