First we look at my sleep and shelter system
Weighing in at 3.6 lb, it includes (clockwise from the top)
- Enlightened Equipment Revelation quilt (30 deg, long/wide, 750 fill)
- Klymit Kush pillow and sit pad
- Borah Gear square 9x9 ft silnylon tarp with custom guyouts
- Thermarest Neoair Xlite (regular size)
- Polycro ground sheet (from Ace Hardware)
- 6 Orange Tough Titanium Stakes (6.5 in) from zpacks
- 9 Carbon Fiber tent stakes (6 in) from Ruta Locura
- Cuben stake sack (zpacks)
These items weigh in at 3.9 lb and consist of
- Bearikade Weekender bear canister (rented from Wild Ideas - they offer a great discount for JMT and other thru-hikers)
- Mountain Laurel Designs Exodus pack (with SPOT GPS Messenger attached to one shoulder strap)
- Lite Trail NyloBarrier Pack liner (lighter than trash compactor bags but still plenty durable)
- Hyalite torso pad - used as a pad / support for backpack
That last item is a relatively late addition. Although it weighs considerably more than the cut-down CCF pad I've been using, it provides a measure of structural rigidity that CCF pad doesn't. And for part of the trail, I expect my pack weight will be up above 25 lb. With only the CCF pad, the pack is uncomfortable above ~22-23 lb. Use of the partially inflated Hyalite pad extend that range to ~27 lb. I'd probably do better with an airbeam kit from MLD, but time and money both militated against that choice.
Next are my trail clothes or other items worn:
This category is actually the heaviest, weighing about 4.4 lb. I includes (clockwise from left)
- Leki trekking poles (so old they have wooden handles - try finding those at REI)
- Bicycle gloves (blister protection for my palms, and sun protection for the backs of my hands - essential due to my vitiligo)
- Cotton handkerchief
- Oiled cotton hat and sunglasses (the hat and trekking poles were both with me when I reached the summit of Longs Peak 12 year ago)
- Underwear and polyester basketball shorts
- Merino wool t-shirt (Icebreakers)
- REI gaiters, with stirrup laces replaced by hook-and-loop sewn on the back (and corresponding pieces glued to the backs of my trail shoes)
- REI merino low-cut hiking socks
- REI sock liners
- Trail running shoes (Salomon XT Wings 3).
- Notebook and mini pencil (Rite in the Rain waterproof paper)
- Timex
- Maps in a ziploc (Tom Harrison Maps, supplemented in a few key places with USGS 1:24,000 scale quadrangles downloaded and customized) This is only the first 6 days worth - the rest are contained in resupply caches.
These weigh in at 2.8 lb. They include (Clockwise from left)
- Warm jacket (Western Mountaineering Flash Hoody, 3+ oz of 850 down fill)
- Rain Jacket and pants (DriDucks Frogg Toggs)
- Fleece gloves (Columbia)
- Rain overgloves (Outdoor Research Versaliner shell, Pertex quantum fabric)
- Merino wool 1/4 zip base layer (Icebreakers)
- Wind Shirt (Mountain Hardwear Ghost Whisperer, packed up in its internal pocket. The tiny piece of fabric does an amazing job of deflecting the wind and weigh only 2.2 oz!)
- Fleece cap (zpacks)
- Sleeping socks (REI low-cut, different color so I don't mix them up). Sleeping sock get hiked in the next day, while the other socks are drying out from being washed the night before.
- Microfleece base layer bottoms (REI)
My Cooking kit is shown below:
This kits weighs only about 8 oz. Clockwise from top left:
- MYOG (Make Your Own Gear) windscreen from aluminum flashing
- Can pot with flat bottom (from zelph's Stoveworks)
- MYOG caddy for cook kit from a Ziploc container
- Long-handled Ti spoon (Sea to Summit) to make it easy to get into the corners of those freezer bags
- Lighter and matches
- Fuel measuring cup (repurposed cough syrup measure)
- 1 oz and 4 oz fuel bottles with denatured alcohol (bottles from US Plastics)
- Lid for can pot
- Starlyte stove with built-in pot stand (zelph's Stoveworks)
- Cup / measure / caddy top
This gear also comes in at about 8 oz.
- Smart water bottle (0.5 liter because it fits neatly in one of my shoulder strap pockets)
- Two 1-liter platypus soft bottles
- A 2-liter Sawyer Squeeze water bag
- The Sawyer mini filter
- Tube for attaching the filter outlet side to one of the platypus bottles (this just makes the filtering process that much easier)
- A cut-down water bottle used as a scoop to fill the dirty water container if water is shallow or slow-flowing
- Cuben fiber bag for the filter and scoop (and some other accessory items shown below)
The final category is accessory items:
For the JMT I'm carrying more than usual, primarily due to duration between resupply opportunities and desire to have a cell phone / backup map and GPS unit. This gear totals 1.6 lb
- Two ziploc bags - one for first aid type items, the other for convenience or other items
- Thermometer (Acurite) - I carry this to be sure I can measure the comfort limits of my sleeping system
- Comb - a necessity since dreadlocks are simply not an option
- Two extra guylines for my tarp
- Charger and cable for iPhone
- iPhone with several books and complete set of maps for the JMT area pre-loaded (using the free Gaia GPS app)
- Patch kit for sleep pad and pillow
- Earplugs
- Primary and backup light (Princeton Tec Pulsar, and a pinch light I got for free)
- Extra camera battery
- Toothbrush and floss
- Penny for opening bear canister (the handle end of my spoon also works)
- Extra hair elastics
- Toothpaste (blue), Dr Bronner's soap, and Sunscreen
- Swiss Army Classic
- Small container of zinc ointment
- Small container of ibuprofen
- Tincture of benzoin (bottle of dark liquid) for blister treatment
- Two tubes of Bonnie's Balms lip treatment / climber's salve (primarily for my feet)
- Small roll of leukotape
- Roll of cotton gauze
- Small ziploc with waterproof matches, triple antibiotic ointment, several Blist-o-Ban bandages, several large bandaids, and several steri-strips
- And course, my camera:
This gear weighs in at 13 lb for my base weight. Given an expected maximum load of food plus fuel coming out of Muir Trail Ranch of nearly 10 lb., I can still keep my total pack weight right around 25-26 lb at most (13 lb base wt + 10 lb food and fuel + 2-3 lb of water carried).
Gear is all in ready to be be packed up tomorrow morning. Checklist is done:
Time to hit the trail!
Awesome!! Enjoy! ;)
ReplyDeleteGood luck and stay dry.
ReplyDeleteTHANK YOU thank you THANK YOU for posting your gear list and pics! I'm a total newbie. Just joined this fb page to get enlightened. Plan on doing the JMT in two years! Good luck!
ReplyDeleteThanks. Glad you found it useful. There is a lot of good info to be found on the backpackinglight.com site. Also Mike Clelland's book "Ultralight Backpackin' Tip" is a great intro.
DeleteCan you please provide your detailed list (shown as an image of an Excel page) in Excel format too? Thanks in advance. Also, this is such a nice writeup, it would be great if you had a link to this page in the JohnMuirTrail Yahoo Group Links folder dealing with equipment/gear lists. We have 4000 members who'd appreciate it. https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/johnmuirtrail/links/all/Equipment_001262976041
ReplyDelete