Welcome to episode 12 of the first 40 miles.

If you're new to backpacking or if you're hopelessly in love with someone who wants you to

love backpacking, then this podcast is for you. We'll talk about the essentials,

how to lighten your load, and how to make the most of your time on the trail.

I'm your host Heather Legler. And I Josh Legler and this is the first 40 miles.

Today on the first 40 miles we'll talk about the top five pack messes and how to avoid them. On the Summit Gear Review,

we'll review some ultra light sock liners made by actual worms.

On the backpack hack of the week, we'll show you a multi-use item for your mess kit,

and we'll wrap up the show with a little trail wisdom from a famous English poet of the romantic era. All this and that's

about it. Today on the first 40 miles. A few episodes ago we talked about fun and interesting places to find backpacking gear and supplies for your backpacking trip.

Well one of the websites that I recently discovered is called Kickstarter.

Yeah, Kickstarter is a place where you can come up with an idea for a product that you want to make

and you can get it crowd-funded. So, you know

instead of going to the bank for a loan or something like that put it up on

Kickstarter and then a bunch of people can visit the website they can check

out these product proposals and they can pledge a certain amount

of money to the development of that product.

Usually there's different levels of pledges and based on the amount that you pledge,

you're promised something in return for that pledge, which may or may not be the final product when it's produced.

Yeah, it could be a bumper sticker or signing up for their email list.

And then if they meet their funding goal, then the project is considered funded and the people behind it go make their product and get it launched.

Yeah, it's pretty exciting. It's a fun way to do things.

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