Gear of the Week | Tealight

Tealights are small candles in aluminum containers that usually have a diameter of 39 mm and burn for 3 - 4 hours, as you can read in the surprisingly extensive Wikipedia article on this topic. Especially now in the fall, you can use the little lights to create a cozy atmosphere when baking cookies, or spill the wax and make a mess. Incidentally, the tealight wax liquefies so quickly because the aluminum containers have a very high thermal conductivity.

The romantic embellishment of the living situation with candles can also be used for unplanned bivouacs in snow caves. The tealight is ideal here due to its low weight. You can throw it in your backpack and then never think about it again until it's time to raise the mood and temperature in the snow hole.

Even when not burning, tea lights can be a lifesaver on a ski tour. If the snow is sticky, I smear them on the skins without hesitation instead of the skin wax intended for this purpose, the advantage of which has not yet become clear to me. Tea lights are relatively soft compared to other candles and are therefore easy to rub into the fur. Depending on the snow conditions, this can prevent (minor stud problems) or at least reduce (serious stud problems) studding.

You get a pleasant feeling of altruistic heroism when you can give fellow mountaineers half a tea light for their studded skins. That's why I sometimes take more than one tea light with me, especially on spring tours. Conveniently, for example, IKEA sells tea lights in a bag of 75 for €1.69. This will easily get you through one to around 75 winters, depending on whether or to what extent you also want to use the tea lights for cooking in the snow hole.