Hot Water Bottle

[zig-zag man]

Does anybody actually carry and use one of these?

[Sarcasm the elf]

In the winter I use my hard plastic nalgne as a hot water bottle at night. It's fairly common practice here in New England.

[DownEaster]

I think it's worth the weight penalty to add one Nalgene bottle to your collection of used SmartWater and Gatorade bottles. The wide mouth is also useful if you're mixing things in your water, like Nido Fortificada: easy to add the powder, and easy to clean the bottle afterward. And you can brew up some piping hot tea before bedtime in the Nalgene bottle, tuck it in your sleeping bag, and have some warm tea to sip in the night if you get thirsty.

[colorado_rob]

I use my Gatorade bottle all the time in very cold weather as a hot water bottle. No need for a heavier Nalgene, G-ade bottles work just fine. (I haven't tried other drink bottles though...). The trick is to put a couple ounces of cold water in the bottom first before pour the hot water in. If you don't do this and just pour boiling water in, the bottom will distort. Though this really doesn't seem to hurt anything, it makes me nervous...

I guess the "nervous" thing is why folks carry a Nalgene for their NW bottles, as pointed out already. But I've used simple G-ade bottles on many multi-week, unsupported frigid high-mountain expeditions and never had a single problem.

One little trick is to slip a sock over the hot water bottle, it then releases the heat slower during the night vs. releasing it much more quickly early in the night. Not as war to start out this way, but it lasts much longer. My wife actually uses two; one without the sock for a quick heat-up, the other with a sock to last.