[pct-l] Gear/Weight/Risk

[Diane Soini of Santa Barbara Hikes]

You said you have a 20lb base weight and don't know if you can go  
lighter. Here's my advice, take out all your change of clothing, if  
you have any, then hit the trail with what you have.

You do not need a change of clothing. Just one complete outfit: Your  
hiking clothes plus any insulation layers and rain gear and one or  
two extra pairs of socks.

Now you are ready to go. As you haul your load around, ask yourself  
if you really used all the pots and pans you brought, or if a stove  
that can melt snow is really a necessity. If you didn't need all the  
pots and pans, cups and bowls, mail home everything you don't need.  
If the stove that melts snow isn't needed, ask another hiker to show  
you how to make a stove out of a pepsi can. There's a couple pounds  
saved right there.

Continue up the trail. If those blisters are really killing you, and  
those goretex boots are making your feet really sweaty, ask the other  
hikers how they like their trail running shoes. Perhaps you'll talk  
to someone who has feet similar to yours and you can consider  
ordering a pair of shoes from Zappos along the trail.

With your new shoes, keep on trucking up the trail. Do you really  
need a double-wall tent with a rain fly? People around you are  
managing even on rainy desert days with just a tarp. Maybe, at least  
through the desert section where mosquitoes are nearly non-existent,  
you can save a few pounds by mailing your tent ahead to Kennedy  
Meadows and carrying only your rain fly. Or maybe you'd like to place  
an order over the Internet for one of those really nice light single- 
wall tents everybody has.

As you keep on hiking, you'll start to realize the PCT isn't a "man  
alone in the wilderness" situation. Maybe you don't need so much  
survival gear. Maybe you can let the post office carry more of your  
stuff for you. Maybe you can resupply more often so you can carry  
less food. More weight saved.

As you go along, dropping more and more gear that maybe isn't so  
necessary for a tour-de-small-town-American-West that the PCT is,  
perhaps you'll start to wonder somewhere around Agua Dulce if your  
heavy old backpack is really necessary anymore. After all, it's not  
even full anymore. Everybody else is going to REI in Agua Dulce, so  
hop in and we'll take you down and maybe you can get a smaller pack.  
Or maybe once again, it's time for another trip to the Internet to  
purchase one of those spiffy UL packs everybody else seems to love.

So now you're all ultralight, lean and mean, loving every minute of  
it, worried about the snow in the High Sierra. Well, you own a heavy- 
duty backpack, a double-wall tent, a stove that can melt snow and  
probably an ice axe and crampons. They're probably waiting for you to  
pick up in Kennedy Meadows. Now you can handle the snow for a few  
weeks. But you're not stuck with it for the duration and can send it  
home when you are clear of the snow.


Enjoy your hike. The PCT is not like other trails. It doesn't have to  
be hiked like other trails. But you won't know that until you do it.

Diane


On Feb 21, 2011, at 10:00 AM, pct-l-request at backcountry.net wrote:

> Gear/Weight/Risk