Today on THE ROCK FIGHT it's time for the pairings that matter most... GEAR & BEER!
We wrap up our four weeks of 10 Barrel beers by pairing their 9.6 ABV monster IPA, Juicy Drama, with Justin & Colin's favorite piece of camping gear.
For Justin that's the REI Half Dome 2 tent and NEMO's Stargaze Reclining Camp Chair while Colin talks about his Mountainsmith Celestial 2 tent (aka the Morrison).
Because that's what you get here on Gear & Beer... the pairings that matter most!
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Episode Transcript
Colin (00:08):
Welcome to the Rock Fight where we speak out truth, slay sacred cows and sometimes agree to disagree. This is an outdoor podcast that aims for the head, and today we are back with another piece of gear and another beer that's right at your weekly dose of gear and beer. I'm Colin. True. I spent over 20 years working for brands and makers in the outdoor industry
Justin (00:28):
And I am still Justin Housman, a journalist, professional gear reviewer, senior editor at Adventure Journal and believe it or not, certified beer expert.
Colin (00:38):
You want to put old ex porn star on the list too? Keep a
Justin (00:41):
Going people. I think they know. I don't want to use my porn name so they'll know the voice. I'm sure is enough.
Colin (00:49):
Sidebar, what would be your porn name be?
Justin (00:53):
I mean probably something about House. House. Man, it has to be, I mean house man, I don't know. They're usually not based on your actual name, right? I
Colin (01:02):
Know, but it works out in
Justin (01:02):
This case. It works out pretty well. Yeah. The house call, I don't know.
Colin (01:06):
Today we will first be reviewing a piece of gear the way you would expect gear to be reviewed on the rock fight. We don't talk about stack height, geometry or with underfoot. We talk about the experience, our likes and our dislikes, and then we'll take that piece of gear in today's case, multiple pieces of gear and pair it with the perfect post gears, plural with the perfect post activity beverage because Justin is a beer expert, a cone is what they call him, which is a certified beer expert. You can look it up. It's a real thing. The bottom line here is you'll get the pairings that matter most. Gear and beer. And Justin, what gear and what beer are we reviewing today? Well,
Justin (01:46):
Our gears, I'm going to start using that as plural. I don't love the English language sometimes. I mean, I realize gears is plural for more than one gear, but as a category it's just gear. You know what I mean? Right. You
Colin (02:01):
Wouldn't,
Justin (02:02):
Right. How many gear are on your bike? No, how many gears are on your bike anyway? Right,
Colin (02:07):
But we have three items we're talking about, so go for it.
Justin (02:10):
Only three. I thought you were doing two.
Colin (02:12):
I got one.
Justin (02:13):
Alright then. Well anyway, we're talking about our three favorite camping items. We just went camping together and we got all inspired to talk about the stuff that we love camp wise and otherwise
Colin (02:21):
I guess I kind of have a half a one. I want to reference another thing, but you can't get it anymore, so I'm not going to spend that much time. That's
Justin (02:25):
All right. That's all right. It's not about getting stuff, it's about talking about how cool stuff is, remember. That's true.
Colin (02:30):
Yeah,
Justin (02:30):
That is true. And then we're beer wise, we're going with the 10 Barrel, the Juicy Drama IPA, which is very aptly named. We'll talk about that in a minute.
Colin (02:39):
It's the best name of the
Justin (02:40):
Four. It's a good name. It's a great name. It's a good name. Cloudy mentality is pretty good, but Juicy Drama is even better. This is the last, the fourth and final week of 10 barrel beers, at least for this installment. Who knows what's coming down the road from this beautiful partnership? We did the cloud mentality first. We did the apocalypse last week. We did Always Down. And this week, as we said, it's juicy drama time. So yeah, I chose to pair the final Boss, the 9.6% A VV basically liquor Juicy Drama was something we could just riff on. Just camping Gear general. If you're drinking juicy drama, you're probably mostly just going to be rambling to your friend's. Incoherently around the campfire anyway, so we'll try to keep it coherent. But yeah, it's a big old beer and you're going to be, you drink a whole one of these and yes, ready to sit back and just tell everybody everything you've ever thought of ever how this,
Colin (03:28):
I suggested we bring this beer with us camping and then considering how the last night I was so tired, I was basically in a coma. We were hanging out eight
Justin (03:35):
30. If we
Colin (03:37):
Had had a juicy drama, it would've been over. It would just knockout time.
Justin (03:41):
Yeah, you'd have been joined the raccoons digging through our garbage.
Colin (03:45):
Oh yeah, we got hit
Justin (03:46):
Hard. Well, it was okay, not so bad.
Colin (03:48):
Before we talk about our favorite camping items, a couple of housekeeping items. First, we want you to sign up for Rock Fights Newsletter. You know why? Because you'll like it. It's a good newsletter. You should check it out. It's the kind of email you want to receive and you won't want to immediately unsubscribe from. Second to all of our new listeners, welcome to the Rock Fight and to Gear and Beer, please click that follow button on Apple Podcast or Spotify, just whatever app you're listening to, it's on. Please click follow. That's how you subscribe. It's how we show up on charts. It's how all of these things happen is you guys clicking follow. So please do that.
Justin (04:19):
Please, please tell us about your favorite gear and beer. Will you? We want to hear from you. Send your suggestions and feedback to Rock fight@gmail.com and we really do want to hear from you. If you're thinking right now, like, oh, they're not going to take the time to read. Yes, we are. We're going to read it. We're going to read it to each other. We're going to talk about it. We're going to share some laughs, and then we're going to talk about whatever you suggest that we talk about. So send us some suggestions. Okay. I
Colin (04:42):
Try to respond to every email we get to least say, Hey, thanks for listening. So yeah, you
Justin (04:45):
That so slow. It's hard for if you're not getting responses because Colin uses both index fingers to type.
Colin (04:53):
I'm still working on the emails we got in June of last year.
Justin (04:56):
Yeah, he has a typewriter plugged into a computer somehow. I don't really know how it works. Hey, a question. I have a question. I've never thought about it until I'm seeing it right here was written down slay Sacred Cows. That's mean. Is that mean?
Colin (05:11):
Well, it's just metaphorically, I suppose it is.
Justin (05:15):
I'm not criticizing you or anything like that. I just never really thought about that. The origin of that saying before. I mean, it's like obviously cows are sacred to certain religions and the idea is that we're not going to respect how we're going to kill it. It's just such a gnarly way to say that. There's got to be a less violent way to say tackling things that other people are unwilling to tackle
Colin (05:38):
That thing that's really important to you, super
Justin (05:40):
Important to you that
Colin (05:41):
Yeah,
Justin (05:41):
Fuck that, fuck that we know better. We're going to kill. It's just such a gnarly phrase.
Colin (05:47):
That's amazing.
Justin (05:49):
That's a good phrase. Have you ever thought about it before? I hadn't.
Colin (05:51):
Not like that. I mean, I think it's an interesting descriptor. It's
Justin (05:56):
It band. It's also a band name slay sacred cows.
Colin (05:59):
Alright man, well let's get into the gear. What are we talking about today?
Justin (06:04):
You want me to start?
Colin (06:05):
Yeah,
Justin (06:05):
You go first. Alright, so I didn't actually have either of these things while we were camping. That's not really the point, but we decided that we, I feel misled. Well, I mean, not this particular time, but Oh, you know what? Yes I did. Nobody else saw I had these, both of these things. Nobody else was there. They were so cool far as we had 'em. No, we wanted to take the time to kind of talk about some of our favorite camp pieces and after Colin went to bed at four 30 in the afternoon with the five hours of daylight we had after that was sitting around kind of thinking about it and thinking about the hundreds of camp experiences I have, and it's weird how the two things I picked, one of them is kind of unique. The other one is the most run of the mill thing of all time, but you know how it is.
(06:50):
Some things just mean more to you. Some things you get bummed about if you don't have it anymore or you'll turn around an hour into your drive to go get it kind of a thing because almost like a blankie or whatever, you have to have it while camp. So the two things I picked are, I think the two things that when I think back to my camp experiences over the last decade are the things that I have kind of cherished the most. And I'm going to go in the order of the one that, well, I guess they're both still available. So one of them is my favorite camp chair of all time, which is the Nemo stargaze, and this thing is pretty unique. One, it folds up into a tiny little bag. Nemo is Nemo and CED Summit clearly have the two. I bet their engineers, or at least some of the product engineers are big time rivals because both NEMO and CED Summit are experts at making things fit into the tiniest fucking bags on earth.
(07:43):
Where as you're trying to break something down and fold it down to put it back in its bag, you're thinking there's no way in hell this is going to fit. But they do. And so anyway, the NEMO star gaze is like a swinging chair. It's almost like a little hammock chair with a collapsible pole. It fits into a nice little bag. I mean it's a rocking chair per se, but really the way that it works is you put up these two kind of stands and then you clip two sides of the chair into it and it just swings freely between both of the stands. That's so sad. And if you kind of need a footrest or some sort of natural ottoman, if you will, to really make it work the most comfortably, but you really can just kind lean back and look at the stars and just kind of gently rock and it's incredible. I only get to use it if I'm solo camping because the second I set it up, my two little girls are all over it. It's like their favorite thing on earth because it swings. But I love mine so much. That
Colin (08:35):
Was my first question is, is it the star gaze so you can actually lean back and look up and comfortably
Justin (08:39):
Do so? Yeah, and it's amazing. I mean, you just lean back, put your hands over your chest and just kind of gently swings two cup holders is awesome. I mean the only, I guess downside if you will, is I'm probably on the upper end of the size that you can kind of be to sit in it comfortably at like six one and a half and awkwardly shaped as you saw, Colin,
Colin (09:02):
I thought you were quite handsome.
Justin (09:03):
Well, that's true, but just kind of oddly shaped. So if you're bigger
Colin (09:07):
And graceful,
Justin (09:07):
If you're bigger than me, thank you. If you're bigger than me, it might be a bit of an issue, but that thing is just so epic. Go get one. You can get 'em like, what'd you say it was? How much does it cost? $5,000. Oh,
Colin (09:19):
Two 50 bucks
Justin (09:19):
It's worth. Wow. So you're getting a real bargain at two 50 because I would easily pay $5,000 for this.
Colin (09:26):
Is it light enough? Could you take it backpacking?
Justin (09:28):
Hell no. I mean, oh, it's heavy. Well, it's not that it's heavy. I mean, even though yeah, it gets into a small bag, but Well,
Colin (09:34):
I was curious. I just looked at the picture of it real quick before we hit record and I was like, oh, that could be small enough that you could maybe stow it inside of
Justin (09:41):
Your backpack. It's you, but you wouldn't want to do that. I mean, I don't know. Amazing chair. It goes on all of my trips except for this last one, and I bust when we do fires in the backyard. This is the chair I use if I'm going to sit outside at home. This is the chair I use. It's just awesome. It's my favorite. Nemo also makes my favorite giant family tent, but this is my favorite thing from nemo. It's badass. But yeah, you can get 'em Nemo, you can get 'em. REI. You can get 'em probably back country. I dunno. Pretty much any third party retailer, get'em from Nemo if you're going to buy one. So what's
Colin (10:09):
The next thing you got?
Justin (10:10):
So the next thing I got, I mean tents are, it's a tent. Tents are, so can we just talk about cool tents are for a second, Colin?
Colin (10:17):
Totally. That's my choice is a tent. I
Justin (10:19):
Don't think they get enough respect or enough talk in the outdoor space how amazing tents are. I mean it's just like it's a little home. It's just a little home, tiny little home that you get to make. I don't think there's a cozier experience on earth than getting into it like a well set up tent, right? Yeah. I
Colin (10:35):
Mean not to spoiling it on my thing, but I famously am not the biggest fan of camping and I still, you hate camping
Justin (10:43):
Actually, you said that multiple times.
Colin (10:45):
I never said hate, but the setting up this tent, which I've only probably ever spent nights with kids in and just being able to kind of get inside and rediscover that just joy being in a tent by myself. It's an awesome experience. And you're right. When you're a kid, is there a better piece of hell
Justin (11:02):
Gear
Colin (11:03):
Than a tent? One of the, because it's your own little house.
Justin (11:05):
One of the first memories I have or earliest memories of just general life is getting into my GI Joe tent that I slept into my house. Yeah, so plasticy just getting high off the fumes, that terrible cheap plastic that it was, but man, that was great. You
Colin (11:21):
Could hallucinate about being the greatest American hero,
Justin (11:25):
Halluc
Colin (11:26):
GI Joe Hall. Great
Justin (11:28):
Real American hero. That's it.
Colin (11:29):
Real American hero. I was confusing
Justin (11:31):
Tv. What the great TV show's. Greatest American Hero. Yeah, sorry about that. But yeah, I mean I know everybody loves tense. I just think we tend to, I don't know. I don't think we tend to appreciate them for how amazing they are of a thing. Tents are so good now I'll get to that in a second with this one, but for the most part, unless you're getting some extremely bargained basement tent brand, it's going to work. It's going to be sufficiently staked to the ground. It's going to keep you dry. If you put the fly up properly, they're so much easier to set up than they were 20 years ago. Every 10, unless you get a really weirdly complicated one, they're all super intuitive. Anybody can set 'em up. We've come a long way and they're all so much lighter in something they used to be.
(12:12):
So the one that I kind of, my favorite all time tent is just because of its sheer utility and price point is the REI half Dome two. I don't have one anymore. It was kind of the first tent that my wife and I got together probably in 2010 and I'd had tents before that, but this was, it's the kind of thing where I didn't know really where they came from. Maybe I bought one from a friend or whatever. They were just kind of around, but this one we got as a birthday present or something like that. So we went to Christmas presents, we went to REI, typical REI experience. The sales guy came over and showed us the one that he thought we should get with our money and set it up for us and let us both get in it to make, because we're big to see that we'd fit and we did, and that was our tent for years probably.
(12:57):
I think I sold it four years ago. So we used that tent everywhere. We went from that tent car camping to using it backpacking to getting to the point where I would carry the poles and she would carry the fabric. We learned everything about camping and backpacking in that tent and I think it costs what, 2 50, 3 50 I be, it costs about the same. I think it's three 50. Three 50. I bet it cost about, I bet it was two 50 when we got it. And it looks exactly like the current version. Color's a little bit different, but it's just a very simple basic two poles, four points on the ground, a really easy fly to set up. You can set the fly up by itself. I'm pretty sure with this one, I could be wrong about that, but I think you can weighs four and a half pounds.
(13:43):
It's not small, but you could have that thing forever. I sold it to somebody who was going backpacking for the first time and I guarantee they're still using it and having a blast. We lent it out to folks all the time and everybody loved it. It's nostalgic for me, it was just kind of the first 10 I really fell in love with. But it was also, you'd go backpacking and you'd go on a day hike and then you'd start walking back to camp and I'd see that little yellow fly from a long ways away and I'd be so proud of it. It's like, look at that little tent. It just was awesome. It's your home. Yeah, I had millions of tents since then. My garage is filled with tents and I kind of love them all and there it wouldn't be the tent I would use if I was going backpacking now, but I'll always have a soft spot in my heart for a tent like that. I mean it's just the entry level, badass bulletproof tent is a wonderful, wonderful thing. And Aria, I nailed it with that one.
Colin (14:33):
There's some, we talked about it I think when we talked about maybe it was the es, the Hoku maps, but footwear is special. It becomes the crown jeweled store and everything. It's not the most expensive thing, but when you talk about what shoes that goes in your feet, the connectivity of the ground, but then also just the cool of what shoes you're wearing. I think tent in the gear world more so than even packs or sleeping bags. There's just something about a tent and popping it up. Maybe he said it is a kind of call back to your childhood, whatever it is. I remember the first tent I got with my wife was an EMS Pompeo. I was working there and we thought it was so cool it had the zip on vestibule so you could like, oh, you get in, you could leave your stuff protected in front of your, oh, a little mud room for your 10.
(15:17):
It was the coolest thing ever. And even though I'm not the biggest camping fan in the world, it's still like that's why I'm going to talk about a tent in a second because it's just like, I don't know, there's just something about setting that up and getting in and getting your sleeping kit put in there and then when you go to bed like, oh, I'm going to hang my headlamp at the top to kind of create a little dome lamp at the top. I'll put my glasses up there too. Whatever. There's a thing about being in a tent that's is special.
Justin (15:40):
Yeah, it really is. And I enjoy setting them up. I enjoy kind of envisioning how I'm going to have it set up on the inside. I mean, I'm a big cot. I always use a cot when I sleep now I always use a three person tent even if I'm by myself so I can accommodate my cot. But every time you get it all set up, you kind step back. You always look at it, okay, look at it. Yeah, totally. Always. It's like cleaning out. It's like washing your bike or your car. You step back and admire it and I dunno, I guess this is a human need for shelter obviously. I mean it's not like we're probably not a brilliant realization or anything like that, but more than anything else that's like that, I mean what's interesting is it's not even the most important. Theoretically your sleeping bag is probably more important. I mean unless it's raining in terms of keeping you comfortable. But nothing quite sparks joy to me, like a cool little tent. And so that's my pick.
Colin (16:31):
Those are good picks. Good picks, man. Thanks. Good picks. Thanks. Well, my number one favorite item, like I said, it's like I'm squeezing it in here because I want to talk about, I have this go late sleeping bag that I got when I was working at Go Light. I had it on our trip this weekend. It's amazing how based on every camping trip I've had since 2007 or oh eight, something like that, and it's center zip. So good
Justin (16:54):
Backpackers do that more often. Center zip is so easily the best, easily the best.
Colin (16:58):
I don't, yeah, that was 2007, 2008 timeframe. And I know I'm wrong. I'm sure there have been other bags, but the next one I recall coming out that had got any notoriety was the Patagonia one that came out a few years
Justin (17:10):
Ago. Yeah, I'm sure there are. I feel like I've had other CERs zip tents or I mean sleeping bags.
Colin (17:16):
You would think, okay, everybody who makes sleeping bags, they have oh, the double wide bag or there's a bunch of different, or a mummy or a rectangular one. Why don't you all just have a center zip? I don't get it. It is objectively better than a side zip bag. I
Justin (17:30):
Agree. I don't understand it either. I
Colin (17:31):
Don't recall, I don't understand. But anyway, that's still my favorite piece of gear. I love that thing. Still going strong years later. But the one I really want to talk about is the, it's called the Mountain Smith Celestial two today it was called the Morrison when I got it. Then the Morrison is still part of the Mountain Smith line, a little bit of a modification. They've done some things differently than the tent tie that I have. This is that kind of rare occasion where I had just zero expectations for something and now I'm still using this tent like 12 years later was my buddy Jay was the president of Mountain Smith at the time. I wanted to get a tent that was sort of versatile. It could take car camping, but if I wanted to do a one or two night backpacking trip wasn't weight prohibitive kind of thing.
(18:12):
And he sent me this tent and since then that's been the go-to for our family. We have a couple of other tents that we use if we need more space, but it is a two plus, so you could easily get three people in there. So especially when you have kids like a parent and a couple of kids fit in very comfortably, it is a easy two pole dome style setup, easy peasy to set up. And the thing, I've taken it on the river trips, I've taken it car camping, I've taken it all sorts of different places. It looks brand new. I know it was really looking at it on our trip and I'm like, kind of thing looks good and I got it 12 years ago. I'm not out there for 30 nights of summer consecutively beating it and it hasn't really gone through a lot of tough weather, but you'd think there shows there's not a mark on it. So it's a really well constructed piece of
Justin (19:00):
Gear. And Mountain Smith is, I mean, I dunno if I would say a budget brand, but they're known for being affordable. So it's not like you paid a thousand dollars for it either, which is cool.
Colin (19:11):
Well luckily I got hooked up with that one. But yeah, the current model on their website is going for 110 bucks.
Justin (19:16):
Come on. See what I mean? Yeah, I love Mountain Smith stuff. Everything I've had from them has been really good and it's unique, even if it's just the pattern on the materials, it's always a little bit unique and it always works great and really inexpensive so that's awesome.
Colin (19:32):
I had a conversation earlier today with someone in the industry and we're talking about the big brands, the stuff problem that we have in the industry that we talk a lot about on this show both gear and beer and the regular rock fight show is some of these people just need to stay in their lane a little bit. Akai recently said they're going to release pickleball shoes. It's like, why? Just make freaking dope flip flops, man. Just do what you do. And Mountain Smith is the kind of brand that you can feel really good supporting. They've been around for 45 years and I don't think the team is much bigger than when my friend worked there. There's like six people working there, just like you said, making really solid products. They have a parent company, I think it's the same parent company that owns Hydro Flask. They're just kind of chugging along, making really good solid products at a very reasonable price. I think it was originally about a $200 tent and now they're on sale at
Justin (20:24):
Even
Colin (20:25):
Still,
Justin (20:25):
That's an insane price
Colin (20:27):
And look how good it is and yeah, it's like same as year. It's like four and a half pounds. If you want to go backpacking with it, you can and it just performs and it's not, you can feel good about spending your money with a brand like this.
Justin (20:39):
Yeah, totally. Plus I have that dope logo of an anvil.
Colin (20:43):
They're really well made. They're reputable. They're not trying to be anything more than they are I, which is a lot of outdoor brands can say that they, they get lured in by the big bucks like, oh we'll expand, we'll do more things. And it's like, nah, mountain Smith just makes really good packs and tents and sleeping bags. Actually they have sleeping bags anymore.
Justin (21:01):
Dunno. But if you don't know the Mountain Smith lumbar pack, you got to check 'em out. They make by far the best lumbar packs in the biz.
Colin (21:07):
They do not make sleeping bags. My bad. So you can get the EVO on RE i.com. I mean, well not the Evo, the Morrison Evo, the updated version on re i.com or mountaintop.com. I don't know if the celestial will come back into inventory if they're going to continue to make it. Maybe it's done but it's on their website and sold out. So I would assume that it is. And I guess the only other thing really about on the gear side today when we talk about the stuff TER and the category, I'll let you talk about the chairs. I think on the 10th side though, it's kind of like the wetsuit where we talked about last week with Faroh. If you buy, whether it was a feral wetsuit or another brand, most people are probably going to have that wetsuit forever. I mean, I'm talking about a tent that I've owned for 12 years. The only reason probably you replaced even your REI, maybe it got a little longer in the tooth, but it's because of the nature of your job more than anything. Yeah,
Justin (21:58):
I I'd still have it if I didn't get a tents all the time for sure I'd still have it.
Colin (22:03):
This is one of those things where I think in terms of making stuff, it's probably fine, right? Every big brand's going to have their line of tents. You have a bunch of different choices. I'm sure some stuff gets made specifically to sell at Sierra trading posts or just Sierra. Sorry, I know that stuff happens, but for the most part, most people listening to this are going to get a tent. You'll probably have it for most of your life if you want to.
Justin (22:28):
That's also, it's just so fricking cool. I mean new gear obviously since you get a little dopamine release or whatever when you get one. But man, there really is nothing cooler than when you go camping and someone busts out a 30-year-old tent that is so much cooler, especially if it's been repaired. I mean think about it. Every tent you've ever had has the little tent pole repair tube and have you ever used one of those? Probably not.
Colin (22:59):
This is another reason what made me think of it when I was breaking down my tent on Tuesday before I left and the polls look like they did when I took them out 12 years ago and they're still no issues stretching them. I was kind of like waiting, when's that day going to come when I go to break 'em down and it finally snaps. It doesn't feel like it's going to be soon.
Justin (23:16):
I have had to use one of those once, but it's rare. There's just something, I would like to have a tent where I've had to patch a hole. Yeah, that'd be kind of cool. And then it's like my boot thing when you're, I'm 70 years old and I'm going camping down the street and I'm like, yeah, I everywhere using this tent in Big Sur and way back in 2023. It was so awesome. Is that
Colin (23:42):
Why you set your tent up next to the fire? You wanted to see if little camera might hit it. I was just
Justin (23:45):
Blowing smoke out. Yeah, that's exactly why. What about
Colin (23:49):
The chair? What do you think of the chair category? Is it kind of overburdened? Is
Justin (23:53):
It overloaded? Yeah, of course it is. I mean everybody makes a fricking camping chair. Lord knows we have plenty of them, but this one's unique enough to where I don't think that it's, it's going to be, I mean the camp chair is a category. You got to have one. They're important, but we have too many of them, so that's a tough one to rate. But as individually, I'd probably give the chair, honestly, I want to give it an eight. It's like I can't think of another chair quite like this. There might be other ones it, I've never had one quite like this that's this well thought out and really serves its purpose really well, I'd be bummed if they stopped making it and mine broke, I'd be really bummed. I dunno how I'd replace it. Well,
Colin (24:38):
And Nemo is one of the few brands who are using that talking about circularity. They just released their pack line that has recyclable contents, which I'm sure you have to jump through a lot of hoops in order to get them recyclable. But they're trying. Yeah, they're trying. Yeah. They're overtly trying to make a difference that way. So you can feel good about supporting them as a brand.
Justin (24:56):
Yeah, yeah. And you should, they're very cool. It's very cool brand. But yeah.
Colin (25:01):
What do you rate in the half Toum?
Justin (25:03):
Same deal. Honestly, the thing about REI that I really do is that they don't make, as far as I'm concerned, they don't make shitty product. So even if it's it's reliable, really inexpensive and not that flashy, it's going to work. That's such an important thing in the outdoor space. I'd rather have a tent like that than some finicky seal nylon $800 thing that if you breathe on it wrong, it's going to shred. Yeah, totally. Yeah. Maybe only weighs what a Kleenex does, but frankly that doesn't matter to me that much. It would, I guess if I was running the entire PCT in sandals, but guess what? I'm not. So I want something that's bulletproof that doesn't cost that much.
(25:48):
You could outfit yourself with a tent, a backpack, a sleeping bag and sleeping pad all made by REI for probably less than 800 bucks if you were just starting out from scratch. And that's great. I mean a lot, some of the other tens I have cost $800 by themselves and you don't get a better night's sleep just so anyway. I think as far as the budget, Bulletproof never have to worry about it. Tent goes, it deserves a high ranking on this, but just because I don't think there's a ton out there that can rival it. So I'd also put an eight I think on the tent.
Colin (26:20):
Yeah, I was going to give the Mountain Smith tent, which was the Morrison. Now the Celestial, I gave it a 7.6. I think that's just for the longevity. It's something special about it in terms of what it can do. It's very solid. But all things you say apply I think. But that's just kind what it felt like. It makes a lot of sense and the land intense. Totally. I think your point about REI makes a lot. It's a good point and that kind of goes back to it made me think about my point about stay in your lane. I feel like REI is a good candidate for that. It used to be like it was a good value, really good stuff. You didn't have to buy the big name brand stuff and you get an equal quality and now they're kind of out over their skis to use a term that makes sense in the outdoor space. Just trying to do a little too much. Kind of get back to where you were REI, people liked REI or they still do like REI. I'm not saying they don't, but it's like you're having a lot of issues it sounds like both on the staffing level and then on even your earnings last year weren't so great. So I think what Justin described is what people think of when they think of REI about what makes REI great.
Justin (27:22):
I mean I bet that the earnings they did have are probably based entirely on things like the half do 10, just that foundational, inexpensive, relatively speaking. Of course, the foundational inexpensive product that first timers and people on a budget can even if you can't for 30 years, you need a new tent, but you don't want to spend a bunch of money. It's like that's probably most of their sales, I would think.
Colin (27:47):
Well, they had $300 million loss last year, so there wasn't really any earnings. Well,
Justin (27:50):
Yeah, I know, but I mean it wasn't a half dome's fault was what I'm trying to say. Yeah, come
Colin (27:55):
On. Not blaming the half tome.
Justin (27:56):
Yeah, also that's a cool name. It doesn't look anything like half Dome, but
Colin (28:01):
Okay, let's now turn our attention to after the activity at the break, the put in the trailhead, we're going to crack open the cooler and IBI a beverage so we can celebrate our wins and losses in the back country. Let's have a beer. So all right, we've just rolled in the camp. We have the Mountain Smith Morrison and the REI half to set up. You are relaxing in your star gaze camp chair. You're checking out the stars. You're just looking up. You're so comfortable right now.
Justin (28:26):
I'm awake.
Colin (28:27):
You're
Justin (28:28):
Awake. I'm awake.
Colin (28:29):
I'm asleep in the dirt next to the table because I just couldn't make it to my tent. We have the fire going. We open up the cooler and pull out a 10 barrel juicy drama. Justin, why is this the pairing that matters most at the campsite?
Justin (28:42):
Well, it's a bang for your buck, that's for sure. I mean, you only need one for the whole trip. If you could seal this beer, you could have this beer for four days and just have a little sip each day and you'd be good. It's not that strong, but it feels like it.
Colin (28:56):
Well, it's 9.6, right?
Justin (28:57):
I like that. In the notes it says, let's have a beer like all caps and that's what they should be called, just beer like that beer shouting at you.
Colin (29:08):
You know those greeting cards? You open it, it plays a song. You crack this thing open and he yells at you.
Justin (29:14):
So let's talk about the as we like to do, let's talk about the art on the can. Got some eagles getting some salmon out of this river. No apocalyptic anything other than that looks like a beautiful day. I mean, it's a beautiful day unless you're this fish.
Colin (29:31):
You know what is prominently featured though?
Justin (29:33):
Hops?
Colin (29:34):
Yeah. Yeah. You can't miss 'em.
Justin (29:38):
So this is an imperial IPA. Now imperial usually just means if I may use some of the Northern California lingo, hella strong. I mean that's basically all imperial means. There's not like a specific A BV that needs to have to achieve that, but this is a 9.6% A BV beer, my friends.
Colin (29:58):
Is there a point where a double IP leaps to imperial or are they basically the
Justin (30:03):
Same? This is pretty close to it. If I see imperial on a sign or on a, I'm going to assume around 10%. So this guess is getting there. Okay,
Colin (30:12):
So if you're under that, then you could say double.
Justin (30:15):
Yeah, I mean you could call it whatever you want. It's not like champagne, not like there's some sort of rule about what it is, but yeah, and so you don't see a ton of, you'd be more likely to see a triple IPAI think, than a imperial IPA Imperial is for whatever reason, often reserved for stouts. You see a lot of imperial stouts,
Colin (30:35):
So there are triple IPAs. That's a thing. Yeah,
Justin (30:38):
Finding the younger is considered a triple IPA, but for example, the younger, not the elder, the one that's really hard to find. So yeah, but again, those things are essentially, it's not that they're meaningless, there's no rigorous standard that they're held to. But anyway, that's what this was going, that it says it has a natural flavors, which is making me think it has. It doesn't say what though. So I would guess based on the color of the can orangey, maybe pineapple juice or something in it. I don't know. It's going to have some sort of tropical flavor. I mean, so juicy, juicy drama is a play probably on the fact that it has some juice in it, but also really danky, gnarly hops are usually called juicy anyway, so that's kind a little double untold kind of situation here.
Colin (31:25):
All right, man. Should we crack open the final 10 barrel of 10 a
Justin (31:27):
Month? I'm afraid to.
Colin (31:29):
Should I yell beer when I crack this up? Beer.
Justin (31:33):
Okay, let's do it.
Colin (31:34):
3, 2, 1.
Justin (31:38):
I'm drunk. I'm already drunk. Okay. It
Colin (31:43):
Smells juicy.
Justin (31:45):
It smells like pineapple juice.
Colin (31:46):
Exactly like pineapple juice smell. Oh, that's not good, man. This is going to be drinkable, like the cloud mentality.
Justin (31:52):
It would be a problem. All right.
Colin (31:54):
It looks like pineapple
Justin (31:56):
Juice. Is this pineapple juice?
Colin (31:59):
This is pineapple juice with vodka.
Justin (32:02):
It's a greyhound with pineapple juice. Yeah, it actually does kind of look like sparkling pineapple juice. It's pretty yellow. It's like light yellow with a little gold. Smells like pineapple juice. All right, here we go.
Colin (32:12):
Ready? Here we go. Cheers. Cheers. That's fucking dangerous.
Justin (32:21):
So that tastes, see this tastes less strong to me than the last one.
Colin (32:25):
Don't. Way less strong. Yeah. Well, I'm getting the warmth now. The warmth is kind of hitting my chest a little bit,
Justin (32:31):
But if you just handed me this and I took a couple sips, I wasn't paying attention. I might not realize it was an imperial.
Colin (32:37):
When you listen to last week's episode, we say we're not going to finish this. We comment, we're kind of commenting on it the same way we're commenting on this one. That was a 9%. I had no problem not finishing that beer that day, even though I really liked it. We ranked it highly. I was like,
Justin (32:51):
Okay, this is a good beer. This is a good beer.
Colin (32:53):
This is more drinkable than the apocalypse. This is almost as drinkable as the cloud mentality, I feel
Justin (33:01):
Like. So here's the thing. That's nice thing about this, and God, I wish this was possible, but it'll never happen. I would love to see this sold in a six ounce can or even a four ounce can.
Colin (33:09):
Thank you.
Justin (33:10):
Because bring
Colin (33:11):
Back the pony bottles,
Justin (33:12):
Honestly. Or if you go beer tasting and you get those little cute little three ounce pores of everything, you want this at a beer tasting. So I used to run a beer bar and I would do this where there'd be not like a dessert beer, but kind of like a digestif beer. We didn't have an alcohol license, but we had a lot of really strong beers, and so I would do these, these cute little tulip glasses that were pretty small. It'd be like four ounces and it would be like, you could have that after your meal because that's what you want with this. You want about four ounces of this? I mean, this would actually make a really good digest, Steve.
Colin (33:47):
Yeah, because and a 12 ounce is evil.
Justin (33:51):
That's a lot of this beer. I mean, even if it wasn't that strong.
Colin (33:54):
No. I also feel I could put down this can really quickly just drink it. You could just like, oh, I'll just keep drinking it and be like, oh, it's really good.
Justin (34:00):
It does taste like pineapple juice. It really does. You could probably chug this can before you realize that was a huge mistake.
Colin (34:06):
That's what I saying when we talk about the Y, those imperial stouts or the barrel age stuff, you start drinking. You're like, oh, I got to take a break. Right? It's like this is,
Justin (34:17):
My children would drink this
Colin (34:19):
And they'd be halfway, wait, wait, this juice tastes funny. Daddy. They'd be a third of the way through it before they even said that.
Justin (34:25):
Jesus Christ. That's so dangerous. I'm going to
Colin (34:27):
Have some more though.
Justin (34:28):
It's good. I could already feel it. The two sips I had, I can already feel it. You know what though? That really is, that's like a, I've had a meal. I'm going to sit down. I'm going to have a little night cap.
Colin (34:42):
Yeah, yeah, right. Usually you would be like, oh, some brown water, right, A little liquor, something like that. This case, a little four ounce pour of the juicy drama kind of gets the job done.
Justin (34:52):
Super cold would be really, really good in Hawaii or something like a nice tropical destination. Have this ice cold almost frozen. Be good.
Colin (35:01):
What would you eat with something like this? Is this truly, this is only after you've eaten kind of thing.
Justin (35:05):
You could. I think you could. I think this would actually pair really well with food because it's a really big, it's not that big. It's weird. It drinks so smooth, but it's a pretty big beer. This would be really good with fried food. I mean all beer is, but this would be really good with fried food. This would be really good with fish that has some kind of citrusy element to it. This would be super good with Thai food. I think
Colin (35:28):
If you think about if we had gone, I think actually this worked out really well with the pairing we're doing on the gear front, because if we had gone and done two bike rides on Monday, we did one. Right? If we were pretty whooped, we didn't really, and maybe you were as tired as me and neither one of us really felt like staying up to kind of crush one of these and then just go to bed.
Justin (35:47):
Yeah. I thought you were say just go and you're having your cozy crush one of these and then just go run down to the beach and just freak out. Yeah. Remember those days you are like, I'm going to have three beers and I going to be energetic afterward and we're going to just run down the street. Now it's like I have three beers and I can barely watch a baseball game.
Colin (36:03):
I do think I'm feeling it in my head right now.
Justin (36:05):
Oh, totally. Yeah, yeah. No question about it.
Colin (36:09):
Before we rate it, I will say 10. Thank
Justin (36:11):
You. Took a shirt off. Turns his hat backward 30 seconds ago. He's buying stuff. He's drunk buying.
Colin (36:20):
He just left the podcast. He just ran out of here.
Justin (36:22):
He's like, I got to go. I'm impersonating Colin. I'm doing both sides of the mic. That'd
Colin (36:26):
Be amazing. He's a ventriloquist too. No, we'll say, Hey, before we raid 10 Barrel, you guys kind of crushed it with all four. All four beers were spectacular.
Justin (36:34):
Really good beers. I mean, Tam Barrel, I'm sure that not everything you make is this great, but
Colin (36:39):
Hopefully you duped
Justin (36:40):
Us. Yeah, everything has been really good. I mean, I've been really impressed. I knew I liked 10 Barrel, but yeah, all four of these have been really good.
Colin (36:45):
Yeah, the cloud mentality, definitely the winner of the four. If I had to pick one for sure.
Justin (36:50):
So
Colin (36:52):
Let's rate this guy. What are you thinking?
Justin (36:54):
A number just popped into my head and it's 8.3. 8.3.
Colin (36:58):
Yep. You did last week. The always down, you gave an eight.
Justin (37:02):
Yeah, this is better.
Colin (37:03):
The apocalypse, you did 8.7 and the cloud mentality. You did a nine.
Justin (37:07):
Yeah,
Colin (37:08):
Beer. I'm just going to go right with you and say, well, sorry, hold on. I'm going to go 8.6.
Justin (37:14):
The thing is, this one is, it's a bit smoother. They've masked the alcohol a little bit better than in the previous one. It is funny because for the Hot Burst series it, it's pretty, there's not a lot of hops to this.
Colin (37:30):
No. It's probably the least hop of the, for
Justin (37:32):
This beer tastes like a Belgian beer. This beer has that kind of, A lot of Belgian beers have a banana sort of tropically thing. That's the yeast. I wouldn't be surprised if they used a Belgian yeast with this one, to be honest with you. What's the
Colin (37:44):
IBUI
Justin (37:45):
Guess? I dunno if you can mix yeast though. I'm thinking about it. It might not say, should we
Colin (37:49):
Look it up?
Justin (37:51):
Yeah.
Colin (37:52):
I'm giving this an 8.6 because I like it more than the apocalypse, and I gave that one an 8.4, so I did 8.6 for this. I did 7.2 for the always down, which I mean I liked, but I guess I never really felt like I would probably drink it again. This I would drink, I will drink.
Justin (38:05):
Untapped is a gnarly, those people are mean on untapped rating. Yeah, nothing gets a good rating. What
Colin (38:12):
Do they rate the, what's the average rating of the juicy drama on Untapped?
Justin (38:16):
Like three stars out of four, five. Oh,
Colin (38:21):
Fuck off. Are you serious? Come on.
Justin (38:24):
These are definitely hard to rate though, because it's like you either like these or you don't,
Colin (38:30):
But I mean this is not, it's a four out five at least,
Justin (38:33):
Right? I would think so. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not seeing IBUs. I'm very curious though. I guess I could just look up IBUs 30. You know what? Oh, it's low. I was going to say something in the thirties, but I didn't want to be like wildly. It's really low awesomely the picture of the, if you go to the website, the homepage for juicy drama, so a woman fly fishing, which is badass.
Colin (38:57):
Alright, well to summarize this episode of Gear in Beer, in our gear category, we have the REI half Dome two, which Justin rated an eight, and the Nemo Star Gaze camp chair, which Justin also rated an eight. We also have the old school Mountain Morrison, which today is called The Celestial, which I rated a 7.6 and when you're looking to end your day at your campsite, really end it, have a beer and go straight to sleep. The official cerone of the rock fight suggests that you enjoy yourself a frosty cold, 10 barrel juicy drama, which Justin rated an 8.3 and I rated an 8.6 on the gear and beer beer scale. Another one in the books. Look at Us Go.
Justin (39:38):
Kind of sad to say goodbye to 10 Barrel.
Colin (39:41):
I'm as well. It was really nice to have that decision made for us for four weeks, obviously that Yeah,
Justin (39:46):
I guess, and it paid
Colin (39:47):
Off because they were all good.
Justin (39:48):
We could do is we could just plan out the episodes.
Colin (39:51):
Oh my God, you're smart. You're really smart. Yeah. Alright, well that is the show for today. What did you think of this edition of Gear and Beer and do you have a suggestion for a future edition of Gear and Beer? Do you simply dislike gear and beer and want to tell us about it? Send an email to My rock fight@gmail.com and let us know what you think. The rock fight is a production of rock Fight LLC for Justin Hausman. I'm Colin True. Thanks for listening and here to take us out. It's Krista Makes with the Rock Fight Fight song. We'll see you next time. Rock fighters. Rock fight,
Chris DeMakes (40:23):
Rock fight, rock fight, rock, bike into the bike where we speak our truth, say sacred cows and sometimes agree to disagree. We talk about human power, outdoor activities and big bikes are about topics that we find interesting. Black culture, music, the latest movie reviews, ideas in for the head. This is where we speak truth. This is where we speak our truth. Rock.