If you have reflective gear markers on your clothing, tent or rucksack and have tried shining a torch on them at night, you’ll know how efficient they are. They are a great safety feature either to spot someone in the darkness or to find equipment. What’s also very noticeable is that you don’t need much reflective material to still be really visible.
Many manufacturers now add this as standard to some bits of equipment, but there are other places it may also be of benefit. Fortunately, it is very easy to buy self adhesive and high performance reflective material. This makes a perfect do it yourself option.
The places you can use reflective gear markers are pretty endless, but here are a few ideas. We add some to the top of trekking poles (see photo above). This is certainly useful if you are walking alone roads in the dark. We also often use our poles to mark snow shelter sites. This might be the shelter entrance or up slope of the shelter to prevent someone walking onto the shelter roof by accident. A strip of reflective tape on your pole might mean you can spot your shelter entrance more easily. It also makes your shelter more visible to others who may be out at night.
That’s just one example of uses for reflective gear markers though. What about adding a strip onto your snow shovel to help locate it in the same way when sheltering. Put some on your water bottle to help you find it in your tent at night find. Add some to your tent zipper pulls or to the back of your bike saddle for night time riding. The options are only really limited by your imagination.
You can find rolls of reflective tape easily online. We have found this 3M tape works extremely well. If you buy a decent quality version, it sticks really well and lasts indefinitely.
We hope you found this top tip useful. Please do also have a read of our releasable cable ties tip here.