The bi-annual Outdoor Retailer show wrapped last month, where a veritable avalanche of outdoor/adventure products were unveiled ahead of their fall 2015 release. And while we all love to drool over the latest/greatest in high-end, high-cost tech jackets, the recent trend to make outdoor products more affordable and more enjoyable is just as welcome. Even better? A lot of adventure-centric companies want to make drinking in the outdoors easier than ever. Here are a few highlights to keep an eye on in the coming months.
Stanley Growler
$50
Yes, we’ve already seen a small army of outdoor-friendly growlers that keep your beer cold for hours. But Stanley’s new model offers something slightly different: one of the most user-friendly handles on the market, making it easy to deftly pour the perfect pint. It’ll also keep your suds cool for 16 hours, and comes in the company’s iconic green.
Hydroflask Pint Glass
$22
And when you’re ready to upgrade from the red Solo cup, reach for the new Hydro Flask insulated pint glasses. Modeled after a German design, which perfectly captures the poured beer and delivers the beer’s aroma, the vacuum-insulated cup will keep your beverage cold, while the upper rim mirrors the sensation of drinking from glass.
Snow Peak Silicone Glasses
Starting at $25
But then not every beverage needs some sort of uber-insulated vessel; after all, you’ll probably sip faster than it’ll keep your beverage cold. For more hard liquor-inspired libations, Snow Peak’s new silicone glasses are perfect. They’ll come in three sizes—wine, rocks, and pint—and look like glass. Yet they’re flexible, light, and ridiculously durable.
Snow Peak Titanium Sake Carafe
$180
Or you could embrace your love of the more refined things in life by dropping some coin on Snow Peak’s titanium sake carafe. Designed to cool your sake by submerging it in a cool river or heat the liquid by putting it in pot of boiling water, and weighing only 4.8 ounces, it’s light enough to carry anywhere, and cultured enough to impress any backcountry skeptic.
Brunton Lightwave Amp Lantern
$219
Now that you’ve got your drink vessels sorted, we turn to creating a party atmosphere. Sure, camping is typically about zoning out to the silence, but Brunton turns that expectation on its head with their Lightwave Amp, a lantern that is oh, so much more than a lantern. Yes, you get a max illumination of 400 lumens, but it can also charge your smart devices via three USB ports. And it connects to your smart device via Bluetooth. This latter feature has some functional uses (no more stumbling out of your tent into the inky black night when nature calls), but it also encourages the more…hedonistic part of camping, because the lantern also has speakers and the ability to create your own full-on light show. Just download the B-SYNC app and you can play from your own music library and control the entire spectrum of LED colors via the “color mixer” interface or let the color spectrum auto-sync to the music to create a truly robust backcountry party vibe.