I posted a photo on Instagram earlier of some salt, pepper and spices I'm taking with me on a walk soon. Rather than go the route of tiny plastic bags where the granules get caught in the ziplocks, I wanted to take something slightly more robust (longer lasting for future hikes = hopefully more environmentally friendly) but still small. Breaking Bad and chemistry lesson inspiration (thanks Mrs. Ferdinand) came to me and a search on eBay for "5ml plastic tube" with shipping to Norway came up with this:
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| Lipgloss for the trail??? |
But happily, further down were these:
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3GBP for 50 x 5ml test spice tubes |
It's a bit cheaper, and lighter, than the
MSR equivalent at 6.2g empty:
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| What exactly are Alpine Spices? |
Ordered May 27th and delivered yesterday, June 8th, the delivery time wasn't bad at all.
These were 5g each when full:
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| Ground black pepper; salt; kanel (Cinnamon - writing the Norwegian is shorter than in English :D) and chilli powder |
If I used Thomas' coffee weighing scale I imagine these would even be a tad lighter, but he's thoughtlessly taken the thing to work... Lucky colleagues!
I've found lots of small items like this on eBay, that with a bit of creative thinking can be applied to good use. Be aware that they may not be BPA free etc, but for the short amount of time I'll be using them I am happy with any risk. But I don't accept any responsibility for others' :) God tur!
You might also want to check aliexpress. Most of the stuff is from China and is laughably cheap and usually has free shipping!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.aliexpress.com/af/containers.html?ltype=wholesale&exception=&maxPrice=&isFreeShip=y&SearchText=containers&shipFromCountry=&isUnitPrice=&isFavorite=n&isAffiliate=y&needQuery=y&shipCompanies=&isOnlyAffiliate=y&isrefine=y&d=y&origin=n&shipCountry=no&isAtmOnline=n&maxQuantity=&isBigSale=n&CatId=230603&initiative_id=SB_20150615081012&isViewCP=y&isOnSale=n&isRtl=n&pvId=&minQuantity=&minPrice=
Thanks for the tip Tor Magnus – I came across the site a while ago but came to the conclusion that many of the sellers there sell the same stuff on eBay. I've been looking to replace some 5ml dropper bottles and many of the prices and the photos are the same :). There may be other stuff I've yet to discover though!
ReplyDeleteI have to admit I'm not too fond of ebay, but I wasn't aware that people had started turning up with free shipping there. Quite often I've found ebay to be overpriced both on the wares and the shipping. I just find ebay so hard to sort in a meaningful manner.
ReplyDeleteeBay actually has a checkbox you can select for free shipping - so it's not that vendors have turned up offering that as such. And as I said, the prices and photos are the same, so overpricing isn't an issue. But if you like aliexpress then use that; the point of the post was to illustrate how we can use alternative items in backpacking applications :)
ReplyDelete