Compact, but flimsy - Hydrapak Stash Water Bottle 750ml

I've gone on several hikes and camping trips with this bottle. It collapses down to the size of a standard cup coaster, which makes it extremely easy to transport. It is great when traveling through airports as you can squish it down before security and fill it up after. In this respect, the bottle really shines.

We were planning to visit the visitor center in Gettysburg when I noticed backpacks were not allowed. The entire scout troop had to ditch our backpacks even though we had a decent hike to the center. It was easy to put the bottle in my pocket for transport and take it out once inside.

There are a few downsides to this bottle. The biggest being drinking from it once the water is half way or lower. Because it lacks structure, the less water in it the more unstable it becomes. This means either a face full of water or having to tilt it in weird ways because the bottle is floppy. Not what you want to be concentrating on during a several mile hike.

It doesn't always collapse down as easily as I would like. There are times when the sides are stuck or it simply won't click into place. This usually requires a few additional minutes of fiddling to make it work. And no instructions were provided on how to collapse the bottle. I had to watch a youtube video of someone doing it in order to understand how it functioned.