I don't know about you but I like looking at new gear. I don't care what it is if it looks

like it's going to make my trip a little easier. I'm looking at it and evaluating.

I'd like to welcome back a friend of the podcast Alicia McGarice.

Alicia is going to talk about a piece of gear in this segment that she likes and recently

did a review on her YouTube channel.

Alicia McDaris, the Tara Drift YouTube channel, welcome back.

Hi, thanks.

Happy to be back always

always a pleasure chatting.

I'd want to say, Alicia, I've been enjoying your

YouTube's. They're always very entertaining and

educating. They're educational. They're great. Well, thank you. We do try.

Yeah, you're doing a great job by me. But what we're going to talk about today is a piece of gear you recently reviewed that seems to be catching on in the hiking and backpacking community and that is the grail titanium ultra-press? What can you tell us about that? Well, you know, it's a really kind of cool piece of gear. I have just right off the bat, I have mixed feelings about it for backpacking. But from the very first time that I tested a

grail filter, I was really intrigued because you know like most of the water filters out there are you have to squeeze them or they involve some sort of bag, you know, like or a water bottle you have to attach to a filter. You know, the Sawyer squeeze being a a big one those sorts of things which are very useful and

helpful and easy and lightweight generally but they do just filter water and in my as a journalist I've written about water filtration and

purification in the backcountry and learned too many facts about what can happen if you don't filter and purify your water.

Usually it's fine, usually it's fine, but if you're the kind of person who like worries about bacteria and cysts and viruses and things and all of the things that can be in water in the wilderness, you know, filtering and purifying is a really good bet.

And the grail does both of those things, which is really cool, and it does it in a way that's very different from any other water filter or purifier I've ever seen and that's like you pressed it instead of squeezing it or something you just fill up this outer reservoir, right?

And then put the sort of inner cup that has this big honky filter on it and you press it down

which sort of, you know, forces the water through this filter and purifier and then you have a

bottle full of purified filter drinkable water that you can then just chug or you can you know pour into your pot to cook with or

Rehydrate your meals or whatever which is really nice because a lot of other bottles that filter and purify you can only drink through a straw which I personally hate so that's that's always a no go for me and also you can't use those for cooking. So that's kind of that's kind of a

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