Over the last year a bunch of friends have asked us how we decide what to bring up and what to leave at home with such a small space to live in and store stuff in. I thought I would do a small series on outfitting the cabin and give it a category of it’s own. The first series is on lighting at the cabin.
- Small Flashlight :: While I personally perfer a Maglite, Mark has wrecked an awful lot of them over the years. Now he gets a $1 flashlight from Dollarama that has a waterproof shock casing and I keep the Maglite. We have two or three cheap flashlights up at the cabin and whoever is up there can grab one as they make their way to the washroom or just out for a walk. If they go missing, they go missing and we aren’t very far behind. We also have some LED flashlights that linger around. While they don’t have a focused lens like the MAG light, they do last forever and put out more than enough light for a small flashlight. Despite Mark’s uncanny ability to wreck my more expensive Maglite, he still has his original $1 Dollarama lights a full year later. They have not only stood up to his abuse but the abuse handed out by Oliver and quite a few of his friends. For something that I questioned their ability to survive the drive up to the lake, they have provided excellent value.
- Large Torch :: We do have a larger spotlight in the car and at the lake. I am not sure why but sooner or later a dog will take off, we will have to fight the Saskatchewan version of the Loch Ness Monster or we will need a more powerful light. (I may or may not have told Mark that his older brother “Dan” was eaten by the cousin of the Loch Ness Monster, “Lockie”, who lives in Saskatchewan a couple of years ago.
Dorcy LED Lantern :: Sooner or later you are going to be at the cabin and you will lose your power whether you are on the grid or off the grid. Sure it may be mother nature or Sask Power’s fault but it is going to be nice to light up your cabin for a couple of hours. We have two of them. One is a kind of torch/lantern hybrid that uses 4 D batteries that Mark uses for his tent while the other one is a simple LED lantern that used 4 AA batteries. Both cost under $10.
Coleman Lantern App for the iPhone and iPod Touch :: I downloaded this free app the other day just to use it to goof around with Mark. The other night at the cabin I decide to check my e-mail and grab my iPod Touch and head to the Kinney Memorial Lodge. As I am heading over there I realize it is totally dark. Being diabetic, I don’t have the best sense of feel in my feet and have lost a bit of balance. Walking in complete darkness over uneven terrain isn’t impossible but I wasn’t enjoying it. All of a sudden I remembered this app and fired it up. It lit up the road way enough to walk comfortably and even enough to notice the family or raccoons in the trees beside me. You may not ever need to use it but if you do, it is nice to have.
For our permanent light fixtures, we use five CFL bulbs over three rooms. Not only are they energy efficient, they give off some fairly unattractive light which means that we often choose not to use them. Because of the open design of the cabin, once Mark and Oliver head to bed for the night, we tend to reduce the lights as much as possible and often head outside to the gazebo or around our fire pit. Since our area of Arlington has no street lights (which is a good thing), the cabin has two mini night lights which are powered by LED bulbs. This keeps us from breaking our legs while walking around at night.
For reading on cloudy days, we have one touch lamp which provides enough light to do most everything in the cabin while not having to light it all up.
Outside in the gazebo we do have a string of low wattage ornamental lights in the gazebo but for lighting we generally choose to use candles. The cabin is also surrounded by 15 LED solar lights which not only look quite nice but are very environmentally friendly. With windows on three sides of the cabin, a lack of light is not a big issue for us. In fact that for most of the day the lights are not even a consideration.
The lighting at the cabin is in flux and will change a bit once we rewire some of the fixtures but the plan is to keep consumption as low as we can and rely as much as we can on candles and other low energy sources.
Let me know if you have any better suggestion in the comments below.
1 comments:
Because of our location off-the-grid in Coastal BC with little winter sunlight, we have propane lights as a backup. Our propane fuels our refrigerator and stove as well. The propane light has a yellow cast, but give the cabin a warm glow. The lights have mantles just like a Coleman lantern but are connected to our 40 lb. tank housed outdoors. For reading we use a few CFL bulbs or rechargeable reading lights. For fun, we have a string of solar power NOMA Christmas lights strung up indoors. They run off their own small solar panel and battery. They've been a lot of fun in the summer, but recharging them in the winter is a challenge. - Margy
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