problems when not taking enough gear
39 comments
Madpom:
12-13 kg for a 10 day trip would be possible without going too extreme.
4.5 kg of gear all up, 8 kg of food and fuel for 10 days
Depends on a sub 1kg pack, 750g or so sleeping bag, waffle closed cell foam sleeping mat at about 250g, light bivy bag plus fly weighing total of 400g or less, total clothes between 1.5 and 2 kg.
Depends on going light on food and fuel - carry say 1 small gas canister and do a high proportion of cooking on fires. Dropping food weight depends on pushing fat content up. Last 10 day trip I did with kids I took 2 x 750 mm bottles of olive oil, a lug went in everything, on a solo 10 day trip I might take a 750 mm bottle of olive oil.
Could go lighter by a couple of kilos - homemade pack sub 500g, clothes closer to 1500g rather than 2000g if summer /staying in valleys, drop food to 700g per day.
Could go heavier - more fuel, 200g ice axe and trail or real crampons if going alpine. Heavier sleeping mattress...
Ok. So we're close on food and fuel. I could go lighter there by taking stuff that doesn't need simmering ... but prefer the real food and the extra 2xgas. 500g extra.
Pack is 3kg.but ... wouldn't trust anything lighter for scrub bashing or carrying traps when working so without a 2nd pack ... extra 2kg
Winter sleeping bag 700g. Could buy a summer one .... 300ma extra.
SW ssb Radio. Luxury item. 450g
Should buy a smaller billy ... but the modern ones all burn everything you try to simmer. 100g saving there
But that's it for 'free' weight savings achievable with expense but little risk. . 3.5kg. Down to 16.5kg total. Beyond that it's all at the expense of safety.
Down instead of fleece for warmth could save about 500g. But useless if wet.
One change of clothes instead of 2 (currently 1 hill change olus hut change) could save another 800g. But once wet & cold to core would have to stop & camp rather than change & move on to safety.
Kagool nstead of coat ... maybe 800g more but lose the ability to be on tops in storms.
Bivvy bag or tarp instead of tent. 700g saving. But again ... ability to sit out a storm in exposed spot
Which gets me to 13kg. In your ballpark. But at what cost?
those lighter weights are for people who are purely walking and not bushbashing.
I run the Osprey Exos 46 (900 gms), which has emerged unscathed from some pretty brutal sub-alpine scrub misadventures
Ditto, my identical pack is in pretty good nick and the GoLite did plenty of bush bashing too with just one mysterious cut at the base. I had to stitch up a couple of attachments with dental floss, that's all.
@bohwaz - "Carrying a heavy pack for a weekend is not a big problem, but for dozens of days on end, it's not the same thing, and you tend to pick your gear with more thinking before going :)"
I slightly understand the sentiment but almost couldn't disagree more. As @madpom has displayed above, a LOT of thought goes in to packing for non-thru hikes also.
I believe it has more to do with thru-hikers more likely to take some safety shortcuts. Heralded on from beliefs that they are on a main trail so there will be others around and it's not so remote. Also the age of the internet creates different cultures where people post their completion times and the fastest ones are what everyone wants to achieve and so decisions are made to accommodate shorted expectations and peoples time availability (i.e. budget constrains and people having to be back working etc after a certain length of time).
the thing is too, in america, most people are doing the long trails south to north, and to do them in one season puts tight time demands on doing it. on the pacific crest trail, theres a lot of snow in the middle sections and its softened up in spring summer. so they usually have to wait it out to time their start to coincide with most of the snow having gone.... but then you have to get to the canadian border before deep autumn snow storms hit leaving several feet of soft powder....
and the trails are good, mainly clear of mud and tree roots and reasonably smooth, and the weather generally more stable. it can be normal to put in up to 40 and 50k's day after day unless its harder terrain... most of the pacific crest trail is usually very dry, little problems drying out clothes fast if they do get wet... so they often dont bother with spare warm clothes.
on the appalachian trail the close the final mountain when the snow and bad weather come and it often then remains closed the rest of the year... so if you're hell bent on completing the trail in a season , you'll be wanting to go light so you can go faster...
so they've perfected their lightweight system in overseas conditions and travel around the world convinced they can apply it on just about any other long distance trail...
i'm watching a blog at the moment, a lady just did the cascade saddle AND the rees saddle to shelter rock hut in 9 hours,,, its a 1400m steep climb up the cascade saddle.... today she did the entire routeburn and the mckellar saddle into the caples valley.... wouldnt surprise me if she did key summit and possibly conical hill for good measure.
@Wayne Have you a link for that blog? I met a woman at Rangipo Hut recently who had a trip planned that sounds much like that one. She sure seemed like a racer too.
shes doing the TA, only doing the odd side trip. didnt do any side trips in the north island
Perhaps we should branch this into a 'Lightweight Tramping - What does/doesn't work in NZ conditions' or similar thread. Obviously some of the North American experience is not relevant to NZ conditions, but there are also people successfully going pretty light in NZ conditions / NZ style of trips, be good to share that experience / info.
One that springs to mind is some Nelson people who did West Arm Manapouri to Milford Track west of Lake Te Anau, went pretty light (shoes, silinylon fly, lightweight homemade packs) and made a fast time through there. Maybe someone can point to the blog again.
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Forum | Gear talk |
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Started by | waynowski |
On | 17 February 2017 |
Replies | 38 |
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