Merrell Men’s Moab Ventilator is one of the top selling hiking shoes on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk. The manufacturer claims that the Moab Ventilator shoes provide full bumper protection around the heel of the foot and the toes area.

The Moab Ventilator shoes are water resistant while at the same time they allow moisture to escape so that the feet stay dry. These shoes are designed with special odour prevention material and the sole of these shoes are made of Vibram rubber for added durability and excellent grip.

Reviewers of Amazon commented that the Merrell Men’s Moab Ventilator shoe provides excellent sole support, even for flat footed people. One particular user wrote that he has Tarsal Tunnel Syndrome and these shoes helped him in reducing the pain. This person also wrote that the shoes perform great in uneven terrain.

One reviewer stated that he loves the shoes as they are exceptionally comfortable. As a matter of fact, the man stated that he uses one pair to go out in town and another pair for hiking and working out.

According to another man, these were the first Merell shoes he bought and he said that if he knew how good these shoes were beforehand, he would have bought them much earlier. The guy wrote that he uses the shoes in sun, rain, mud, sleet and snow and his feet remain warm at all times.

Another Amazon customer wrote that the Moab Ventilator shoes have excellent ventilation and are great for use in hot and tropical countries. This user also wrote that the shoes provide great protection against the rain.

A female customer said that her husband loves these shoes and he prefers them to other brand name shoes that he has owned in the past. Another user stated that  these Merrell shoes last about 5 years and in view of this he will not buy any other shoes except Merrell’s. One user wrote that these shoes last twice as long as any other shoe.

A user said that he wears the shoes at work while standing up for 8 to 12 hours per day and he finds the shoes to be very comfortable and hard wearing. Another Amazon customer wrote that the Moab Ventilator shoes are so comfortable that you won’t know that you have them on.

A man wrote that there is no need to break the shoes in while another one wrote that the Moab Ventilator provides more padding than shoes of competitor firms. One customer stated that once you wear these shoes you will be converted to Merrells while a man even wrote that the shoes are out of this world. A few reviewers even wrote that the Moab Ventilator shoes are the most comfortable ones they have ever worn.

However, no shoes are perfect and this also holds for the Merrell Men’s Moab Ventilator shoes. One Moab Ventilator owner wrote that while the shoes are great for dry and flat land, they are not that great on uneven and wet terrain since they lack traction.

Some customers commented that the shoes run a bit smaller in size. While a couple of users said that they run a half size large, a few others said that the shoes run a full size large.

However one user wrote that a size and a half greater size would be required while two users even said that they had to buy two sizes larger than the size they normally wear. Some reviewers stated that while on the outside the shoes may look large, the extra padding in the shoes makes them smaller that the advertised size.

For more information, please visit Merrell Men’s Moab Ventilator pages on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.

Whenever I am travelling, my smartphone is given a lot of work to do. My current smartphone is a Sony Xperia Z and before buying the Xperia Z I have owned an HTC Touch Pro. However I only occasionally use the phone for making and receiving phone calls and messages while on my journeys. Instead my phone is made to serve its function as a GPS receiver. The thing is that I am one who likes to discover new places and without some sort of GPS receiver I would get lost in no time.

The GPS software I am currently using is Sygic GPS Navigation while on my HTC Touch Pro I used to find my way around with an iGO Amigo. In the not so distant past I have also used my iPad as a navigation device. The navigation software I am running on my tablet is NAVIGON. While Sygic, iGO and NAVIIGON are not the cheapest navigation software around they are without a doubt three of the best GPS applications available on the market.

Given the importance of a GPS receiver for my travels, I have been thinking about buying a dedicated GPS unit for some time and having my smartphone as a backup GPS. Having said this, I never came about to buying a dedicated handheld GPS unit and there are several reasons for this.

First of all is the fact that lower entry GPS units, like the Garmin eTrek 10, provide very limited functionality. The eTrek 10 in particular does not even allow one to download maps onto the unit. While it is possible to download waypoints on the device, I cannot see how useful would that be in finding my way around a city.

Another reason is that while high end portable GPS receivers, like the Garmin Montana 650t, provide a significant range of features, such devices are perhaps too expensive for the average man in the street. As a matter of fact, the Garmin Montana 650t costs $545 in the US and GBP 437 in the UK at the time of writing.

Apart from the price, one can also find a significant number of negative user reviews for the Montana 650t and other high end GPS units on the Amazon marketplace. Some users reported that the software on the 650t is rather “primitive”. Others reported that the battery lifetime is rather poor even though, according to Garmin, it should serve for 16 hours when fully charged. Other users wrote that Garmin’s support is not very helpful and if a faulty unit is returned to the manufacturer, Garmin will only replace it with a refurbished one.

Instead of buying a dedicated handheld GPS unit I prefer to keep using my Sony Xperia Z as a GPS receiver. Using a smartphone instead of a dedicated GPS unit has several advantages.

First of all is the fact that using a smartphone allows one to select from a variety of GPS applications which are usually available for trial download. Thus one is able to test a series of navigation applications before deciding which application to purchase. In the case of a handheld GPS unit one is stuck with the software provided by the manufacturer of the unit without the possibility of testing the unit before paying for it.

Secondly is the fact that when compared to the software that is installed on most handheld GPS units, most smartphone GPS applications are continuously being updated. The developers of smartphone navigation software know that they have to keep the software updated in order to compete with the many other navigation applications available on the market. On the other hand a manufacturer like Garmin knows that given that there aren’t many handheld GPS units available on the market, it will still keep selling such units even if the software is not updated in a couple of years.

While I am using a Sony Xperia Z, which I bought for € 650 some 18 months ago, any cheap Android or Windows smartphone can be used as a GPS receiver. Carrying two smartphones while travelling makes sense as in this way one would have a backup GPS unit in case one of them gets faulty, lost or stolen. While one is free not install a SIM card in the spare smartphone, having a second SIM card would be useful if wants to have a backup phone as well.

Given that a GPS receiver consumes a lot of battery power, having a backup smartphone is also useful should one of the smartphone batteries get drained. This way one does not need to go around carrying a portable battery charger in case the smartphone’s battery gets drained. Apart from being useful as a GPS receiver, a second smartphone might just as well serve as an MP3 player without the fear of draining the battery of the primary smartphone flat.

On the negative side is the fact that the GPS receiver on smartphones is usually not very powerful. This might not be an issue in the open air but in cities and in areas with dense vegetation the smartphone may take a few minutes to find the correct position. For this reason I always carry my Qstarz BT-Q818XT Bluetooth GPs receiver with me, but more about this will be covered in a future article.

In the past when people spoke about “identity theft”, they usually meant impersonating or pretending to be another person in physical life. Nowadays the term “identity theft” is also commonly used to refer to cases when credit card details are stolen. The same term is also used to refer to cases when one steals identity card details, passport details or be it any other membership card details for personal gain.

Information in RFID Credit Cards and Passports Can be stolen by an RFID Reader

Many people are unaware that the information stored on RFID credit cards and biometric passports can be stolen from a distance, without actually having to get hold of a person’s credit card or passport. RFID cards and passports contain an RFID microchip or RFID tag that emits the information stored in the card in the form of radio transmission. The thing is that this radio transmission can be read from a distance of up to 10 feet (3 metres away) by means of an RFID reader.

Most RFID readers are relatively small and cheap and some smartphones also include one in the form of an NFC chip. As a matter of fact, some identity thefts are simply carried out by means of a smartphone and a free app.

RFID enabled credit cards include but are not limited to Visa PayWave, MasterCard PayPass, American Express ExpressPay and Discover Zip. On the other hand, all biometric passports have an RFID tag. All passports that are now issued in the US, UK, Canada, Australia and most other countries are biometric passports.

Some Apparent Experts are Not Well Informed

According to some supposedly experts, it is not possible to retrieve data from a biometric passport when the passport is closed. However other experts suggest that this is not really the case. According to the article “UK Biometric Passports not Secure”, a security expert managed to obtain data from a biometric passport that was closed and sealed in an envelope.

While some believe that having ID card or passport details stolen is not such a big issue, the same cannot be said in the case of the theft of credit card details. The information stored in credit cards is encrypted in order to make it safe, however those that steal information from RFID enabled cards usually know what to do in order to decode this information. Credit card details theft is usually a bigger issue if one is travelling as the victim may end up not being able to pay any restaurant or hotel bills.

When asked to clarify on this issue, spokespersons from credit card companies stated that although they appreciate the possibility of having one’s RFID credit card details stolen, they do not believe that there is any real cause of concern for their clients. For more information please refer to the article “Digital pickpockets using smartphones to steal credit cards”. However I have little or no faith in what such spokespersons say, especially if they have little or no security background.

Avoiding Identity Theft

So what can one do in order to avoid having his or her credit card details stolen? The most obvious thing is to avoid using RFID enabled credit cards altogether, especially if one is travelling. In fact most of today’s credit cards are of the type “chip and pin”; which requires the user to insert the credit card in a card reader and then input a unique pin number. While the information on a chip and pin card can still be stolen, one actually needs to get hold of the card and insert it in a special reader in order to read the information inside the card.

Checking the bank statements on a regular basis can also help in identifying strange transactions, which might be a result of the theft of credit card details. While this is not a way of preventing identity theft, the sooner a case of identity theft is identified the better. Another way of protecting RFID cards is to use a special type of envelope, but more about this will be covered in another article.

Before buying any kind of tent, one should have a clear idea of what he or she really requires. For this reason the following questions have to be asked:

1. How many people will be accommodated in the tent?
2. How many days will the camping last?
3. Will the people to be accommodated in the tent have a backpack with them? How large will the backpacks be?
4. Will we be travelling by public transport to the camping site or will we travel by car?

Having a clear answer to each of the above question would ensure that one buys the correctly sized tent. Many people only buy tents according to the number of persons to be accommodated inside the tent. What these people forget to consider is that a large backpack takes as much space as a child. Added to this is the fact that if one intends to get some items out the backpack, then more space would be required in the tent. These items might be a jacket, toiletries and torch in case one needs to go to the toilet during the night or the clothes for the following morning.

Is a Single Person Tent Large Enough?

I too was going to make the big mistake of buying a single person tent for my trip to a music festival in June 2014. I ended up buying a Karrimor Elite Ridge 2 person tent from Sports Direct and I have to say that buying a 2 person tent was a very wise decision. The Elite Ridge Tent was just the right size for me and my luggage even considering the fact that I am of very small build. A man of huge built will still fit in together with his backpack but he might find a 3 person tent to be more suitable.

Does the Tent have a Porch?

Apart from the luggage size, the type of tent must also be taken into consideration. Due to the way they are constructed, some types of tents include a porch or storage area. While this feature is available in some tunnel tents, most other tent types do not possess such a feature. As a matter of fact semi-geodesic, geodesic, dome and pop-up tents do usually have a storage area.

As a matter of fact, two friends of mine have shared a two person tent between them without any issues at the same music festival I have been to. The tent in question was a Karrimor Discovery 2 Tent. This tunnel tent includes a fairly large porch at one end and sleeping quarters at the other end and thus it is perfectly suitable for any two adults with backpacks and/or luggage.

Being sold at £49.99, €59.99 or $79.98 at the time of writing, the Discovery 2 tent is also £40, €48 or $64 cheaper that the Elite Ridge 2 tent. The reason why I chose the latter is simple – the Ridge 2 tent is more robust than the Discovery 2 tent due to its semi-geodesic shape and aluminum poles. While the Discovery 2 is perfectly suitable as a festival tent, I preferred not to buy any tents with fiberglass poles.

Will the Backpacks be kept in the Car?

While a larger tent might be required is one is travelling by bus or train, the situation is different is one is travelling with his or her own vehicle. If the vehicle is parked near the camping site then any luggage or backpacks might simply be kept in the vehicle, thus saving space in the tent.

To conclude, this is a summary of the most important points to remember:

1. When looking for a tent, one should consider the fact that luggage and large backpacks can take the space of one person.
2. Some types of tents include a porch or storage area, making such tents perfectly suitable for those with luggage and/or backpacks.
3. If one is travelling by car then a larger sized tent might not be necessary.
4. If in doubt always go for a larger sized tent.