2023 Holiday Gift Guide: Gifts for the Great Outdoors

Bushcrafters do it snail-style with the TENTSFORMER. No, not slow. Nope, not slimy either. With this combination poncho and tent from OneTigris, bushcrafters - and plain ol' backpackers too - can carry their house on their backs.

OneTigris calls the TENTSFORMER "the ultimate survival raincoat," because in addition to covering you and all your belongings with a 1500mm waterproof sheath while on the go in a downpour, the poncho can also serve as a tarp-like shelter to keep you dry when it's time to stop. Just add an alpenstock to turn the wearable into a half-teepee hideaway.

Where there's smoke, there's fire, and where there's backpacking trips, power outages, and survival situations, there's VIRE. The VIREstove is a portable, foldable wood burning rocket stove made for building fast and easy fires anywhere your outdoor adventures, or misadventures, might take you.

The namesake VIREstove V-shaped design creates a 45-degree angle to the ground at your wood's point of entry. Combined with a separated channel for air passage in the same angled shaft, its makers say the VIREstove enjoys smoother air intake, and a longer burn time per wood load. A pair of fold-out legs team up with the point of the "V" to keep the stove stable after setup.

Hands-free? That all you got, newfangled tech? Well, Wayband sees your hands-free gadgets, and raises you one that's eyes-free and ears-free too. The Wayband Haptic Navigation App & Wristband is a personal navigator that relies on gentle vibrations to guide you where you're going - no looking or listening required.

No hands, either, just to cover that base too.

Whether you're on a run or a ride, or walking around a new city, or driving somewhere you've never been before, the Wayband App and its accompanying wristband can bzzz you there without making you to take your eyes of the road, or making you look like a tourist who doesn't know WTF they're doing. Even if it's true.

The Gogglesoc slips over your ski or snowboard goggles to protect their lenses from nicks, scratches, smudges, and snow streaks when you're not wearing them. You can also use the microfiber material of the Gogglesoc to clean the lenses before and after use. Gogglesocs have an oversized label that allows you to slip them on and off easily, even with gloves on, and even when your goggles are still attached to your helmet.

Lady Gaga said it best: Let's have some fun, these bunks are rad / I wanna take a ride on your Disc-O-Bed. ... Though maybe I don't, because even though Disc-O-Bed convertible bunkable cots are kinda cool, in none of their versatile configurations do they seem to lend themselves well to riding anything. Even with a 500-pound weight tolerance apiece. Perhaps leave the playing of Love Games to the true beds and benches out there, and let the Disc-O-Bed just help elevate your experience sleeping and relaxing outdoors.

Disc-O-Beds pack down into a pair of handled carry bags (about 30 pounds apiece) for easy transport to campsites, tailgates, or anywhere you want to bunk with your buddy Cornelius, sleep side-by-side with your wife, She-Ra: Princess of Power, or lean back in a bench seat with your mama to talk about all the weeding she's gonna need you to do when you get home from this camping trip.

The only thing scarier than mountaineering is mountaineering in the pitch dark, but I still support ownership of Black Diamond's Distance 1500 Headlamp, because those 1500 long-range lumens could also benefit non-adventurers during power outages, nighttime searches for runaway pets, and extreme shadow puppet shows for the kids.

Though Black Diamond does note they made the Distance 1500 Headlamp for "fast-paced, overnight endurance pushes and moving through technical terrain at night," so it still probably works best as gear for those annoying gung-ho outdoorsmen, or a gift for an extreme athlete.

In the past, I've spoken of Nocs' monocular telescope, the Zoom Tube, with much admiration. And I still think it's a nifty little lightweight tool for viewing from afar. But if you happen to have two eyes...or just happen to prefer looking at magnified scenes through both of them...then you might prefer the Nocs Standard Issue Waterproof Binoculars.

Nocs makes their Standard Issue Waterproof Binoculars in 8x25 and 10x25 power ratings and, true to company style, a bevy of super-saturated matte colors. Beyond their looks, the Nocs 'nocs use Bak4 prisms and multi-coated lenses to provide a bright and wide field of view, and magnification properties equivalent to a 400mm lens. In addition to live spying, er, I mean, sighting, the Standard Issues are designed to link up with your smartphone and its camera rig to shoot zoomed-in photos and videos too.

Jedis, Siths, droids, and whatever the H-E-Double-Lightsabers Yodas and Grogus are can all grab some burgers and dogs, take a seat on one of these Star Wars-themed picnic / camping tables, and battle it out with their rumbling bellies. Available in Death Star, R2-D2, and Baby Yoda themes, the folding tables pack into a 33.75" x 15.75" x 4" hard plastic carrier, making them easy to take with you to any galaxy far, far away.

The mountains of Telluride. The beaches of Key West. The farm of your redneck uncle in O'Fallon, Illinois.

And here I thought Sasquatch's only talents were leaving footprints and hiding from mankind. But apparently he can also open bottles, cut cords, measure increments of 1", and screw things in and out. Which is a lot more than I can say for grizzly bears, who usually just screw things over.

The Sasquatch Tool A Long Multi-Tool comes with an attached carabiner so you can clip 'Squatch to your pack or pants, and keep his 3.6" x 2.5" talents at the ready (or at the Yeti, if you prefer) at all times.

The Adventure Board claims to have "endless uses," and it's not messing around in saying so. You can use this all-terrain, all-season utility board as everything from a floating dock and paddle raft, to a waterslide, bridge, snow sled, and gymnastics tumbling mat. And those are just its basic applications. If you've got some ideas for a DIY adventure that could use a variably inflatable plank to enhance the outcome, methinks the Adventure Board will not disappoint.

Available in 10', 16', and 23' sizes, the Adventure Board is able to play so many roles thanks to a design that combines river SUP levels of durability with the bounce and rebound of a gymnastics air track. You'll also tailor the board to your intended use - on grass, water, snow, or the rocky surface under your truck wheels - by adjusting its inflation level from 1 to 20 PSI.

The Extremus SwitchBak Tie-Down Bungee System is ideal for activities such as extremus sports. Extremus adventures. Extremus recreation. Extremus home and garage organization!

Extremus says their 6", 8", and 10" length sets of bungee cords have "infinite uses to organize your gear." You can use each SwitchBak individually, or attach any number of them to create the exact length you need.

Most people will use the Uno Casa Double Pie Iron to make sandwiches, skillet breakfasts, and grilled sausages and kababs over the open flames of a campfire. But what I would really like someone (ahem, Mama) to do is stay true to its name, and use the Double Pie Iron to make me some pies. It doesn't even have to be over a fire pit - this little cast iron cooker can do its job over all types of cooktops, and in the oven. Uno Casa even includes a pair of handles that are 2 different lengths, 13.8" and 21.6", and the option not to use either of them, further increasing the Double Pie Iron's versatility, and further decreasing the number of excuses not to make me some Double Pie Iron Peach Pies and Blackberry Cobblers.

The Barebones Edison Mini Lantern predates their latest darling, the Edison Light Stick, by a couple years, but I'd say it's still a darling in its own right. Classic, compact, lightweight, and designed for use indoors or out, the Edison Mini Lantern is a portable piece of ambience you can take with you anywhere you want to light up in style.

Need MOwok in your life? Check out this collapsible propane cooking grill / griddle from RMP. The powder-coated steel base - with bitchin' flame cutouts - supports an 18" steel disc with stainless steel handles RMP designed after farmers who would reuse their old plow discs for cooking surfaces. Waste not, want not, right, dudes? The disc's wide, flat surface lends itself well to cooking entire meals, including eggs, pancakes, hash browns, and other foods that wouldn't fare as great with grill grates.

Hit the slopes, without ruining them, with mountainFLOW biodegradable ski and snowboard wax. Deemed safe "for both the user and the environment," mountainFLOW is a plant-based wax that contains no petroleum, the active ingredient in conventional ski and board waxes.

As skis and snowboards glide along coveted powder and bruising packed snow, small bits of the wax used to decrease friction and avoid buildup fall off along the way. Petroleum-based waxes shed their petroleum, along with fluorocarbon particles, which eventually make their way into the watershed. By using only plant ingredients in their wax, mountainFLOW avoids leaving behind deposits of artificial and toxic particles.

Puffy coats and mummy bags, they're not just for...individual drink cans and bottles anymore. The Monti Puffy Cooler is like a Puffin Koozie, but for your entire case or 12-pack of beer. The chill sacks are ultra-portable - they weigh just 11 ounces, and pack away into an integrated stuff sack - and easy to sling over your back, hang from a hook or branch, or tether to your boat or SUP. Their lack of structure also allows them to mold to the shape of the size and number of beer cans / wine bottles inside.

And their design, according to Monti, will keep those cans and bottles cold for up to 30 hours.