A Camera Built for Abuse

I've had bulky cameras that took beautiful pictures and tiny cameras that took crappy pictures; and I've learned that if the camera is so inconvenient to lug around that you don't bother bringing it, then you end up with no pictures. Finding the balance is tricky. On top of that, I usually punish the cameras with dirt, rocks, sand, ice, freezing temperatures, etc.

With that in mind, I think I've found the camera that I'll lug up Foraker; it is the terribly name Optio WG-1 by Pentax.

The optical zoom isn't the greatest (5x); nor is the price ($399). But from the looks of it, it won't be too traumatized by the expedition. It's water proof. And it has a built-in gps, which'll so great when when it comes to trying to figure out where exactly I was when I took that 300th picture of snow.

Pentax has this other new camera that has built-in HDR support, which would be really great ... but it looks really fragile. And I don't think it has a GPS either.