Hi everybody,
I will travel to New Zealand in a few weeks for a long solo hike. I usually use a home-made alcohol stove to cook my dinner. Is it easy to find alcohol/methylated spirit like Trangia fuel or similar in New Zealand? I would like a mixture with at least 90% ethanol.
Can I easily find this in outdoor shops or gasoline stations?
Thanks!
Willem
Yes it is very widely available.
Look for a purple liquid in clear 1 litre bottles called methylated spirits (or in kiwi slang "meths"). Every supermarket and 4-square store, The Warehouse, petrol/service station, hardware and outdoors store stock it. It's usually found in the cleaning/hardware/paint sections. About $8/litre.
NZ meths is usually 95% ethanol, 5% methanol, plus colour, odurant and bitter flavour.
You will also occasionally see purpose made denatured alcohol but only in the larger outdoor stores.
It also tastes really really bad, and is hard to wash off, so be careful not spill any in your cookset.
A packet of raro improves the taste no end.
Yeah yeah ;)
I had owned and used one of those white trangia cookers for year, and soon learned to never ever trust the rubber o-ring to contain the fuel, always burning off the fuel after each use. The cooker fits exactly inside the billy, right. Then one day something happened and i forgot and it leaked. I washed the billy with cold water, then cooked a pasta meal with the lad. It was so bad we couldnt eat it.
Thanks guys! I will try not to drink it ;-)
Bit of river sand works really well to get it out, the scouring action of the sand acts like a steelo pad.
