Video: An Intro To Trekking Poles!

Trekking poles are a great addition to your outdoor equipment. Not only do they help with balance and stability, but they can enable you to hike faster and more safely. CHECK OUT OUR TREKKING POLES! Hint - the video is way cooler than the boring ol' transcript and features awesome people, some of whom may or may not be recreating scenes from The Karate Kid while demonstrating their prowess with trekking poles. Transcript: Hey guys, my name is Halle. I'm here at the Sandy location of Next Adventure and we're here to talk about trekking poles. Over the past few years, trekking poles have gained a lot of popularity. In the hiking world, they're useful in a lot of ways, obviously for stability as well as maybe take some weight off your back and if any problems ever arise you could always use them for some first aid. Whatever you might need for trekking poles, there's a whole bunch of brands and types of trekking poles. Today we're just going to talk about a couple of the basics to help you pick out a trekking pole. One of the common types of trekking poles is a twist lock. So, basically you twist, and it locks into place there. These have been really popular for a long time. It's kind of the standard. They could either have one locking mechanism or maybe two. They are tried-and-true, everyone loved them. Flip locks have become a lot more popular over the years. These guys are really nice for micro-adjustments, when you are maybe taking some steeper inclines or starting to walk downhill you can adjust them really quickly. Typically, you would like the pole to be at about your elbow to be out like a 90-degree angle to start. So, for me that's a little high, we could address it real quick here. Drop it down a hair. Now we're ready to go. Maybe for walking uphill, you could choke up a little bit and be ready to start walking uphill. Make sure to be aware that right here it says stop, that means do not go any farther past this point. The nice part about it though is they do come completely undone if you ever need to repair or for traveling purposes. There's also lots of different types of grips. A lot of them can provide different types of uses. The most common are going to be the standard grip here. A lot of brands also have corked handles. Those are helpful if you got sweaty hands or you just like to feel cork a little bit better. The other cool thing to note about these guys is they always come with a couple different options for tips. This tip here does best in snowy conditions or loose conditions. There are always options for other types of tips that will help you out in many different terrains. Trekking poles are great for, you know, if you're on the trail, maybe in some snow, or even in the streets of Portland. If you have any questions you can give us a call. Check us out online at nextadventure.net or you can just come on in and say Hi!