Kitty Dennis: Overpacker to ride for longer
Co-founder of the Steezy Collective, we’re not sure when she’s ever indoors.
What’s the chief thing you look for when choosing kit?
Whether it’ll keep me out longer, both in terms of times of the year and length of the trip. This is great, it’s so broad spectrum that it means I can always justify a new purchase! To me this means one key thing – does it make the trip more comfortable? If it’s lighter, it’ll be less taxing to pedal with. If it’s warmer, I’ll be able to stay out longer into the winter. If it’s rugged, I won’t be stuck without a paddle (or more likely a stove!). This means I tend to look for lightweight, durable kit that keeps me warm and dry while not weighing down the bike too much. This is always hard to find, so if I find something that fits these criteria I jump on it. However, lightweight sometimes comes with a compromise so I like to make sure that all the features I need are there, if not, it’s probably a bit too lightweight for me.
What’s your favourite piece of camping kit?
I’m sure it’s a common answer, but my tent. I’ve got a Big Agnes Fly Creek HV UL2 Bikepack and it is fantastic. Definitely an investment, but it’s lightweight, warm and doesn’t pack in condensation. My old tent used to turn into a sauna and I’d wake up with a soaking wet sleeping bag having had a miserable night’s sleep. This one comes with 30cm poles to make sure it can fit in between your bars and has plenty of bike-oriented features. I’ve used it in a gale in October, freezing temperatures in December and the peak of summer – it’s never let me down.
Advice for a good night’s sleep?
I learnt early on that you can find the lightest sleeping kit out there, but if you have a rubbish night’s sleep you’ll be worse off in the morning than if you’d carried a little more. I always pack sleep kit to be more than comfortable at the forecast temperature so that if it dips, I still have a great night’s sleep. The mat is often overlooked, but after I came across a winter sleeping mat I don’t think I could do without it now! Realising that when you compress your insulation by lying on it, you completely rely on the mat makes it seem more enticing to spend a little more.
Any unexpected luxury items?
There are so many things I could say, I love a lot of bits of kit that make my camping more fun or more comfortable, but the one thing I recently got that makes all the difference is a pair of ultra-packable booties. I know this isn’t for the light and fast crew, but after a long day of riding with soaking wet feet and clip-clop cleats there’s no better feeling than being able to dry off your shoes and still mill about the camp in the evening.
Favourite camp breakfast?
I apologise already, but I don’t like porridge while camping which is going to make this answer seem even weirder. I like Ready Brek with some fruit and maybe a bit of peanut butter and honey. I think after a long day on the bike I wake up a little discombobulated and the easy-to-eat shredded porridge just seems like the most appetising thing possible.
Any tales of bad camping kit choices
Many, many, many. I think the worst would probably be trying to go too ultralight on an ultra-distance race. I got so cold one night because I had a summer sleeping bag and an uberlite mat, that I woke up and had to sleep on the bathroom floor at the campsite. I spent the whole night in a semi-sleep worrying someone would come in or that the shower would leak onto me. It isn’t something I’m looking to repeat. I reckon if I’d just used a warmer mat at the very least it wouldn’t have gone so badly. It didn’t help that the baffles in my mat had started to come apart! I think this is when I realised that being able to have a cosy night’s sleep is more important than having the lightest bike in the group.
