In the old days, people often wore a sort of belt/girdle around the waist/hips from which leggings or other items of clothing or weapons and pouches might be suspended. For men such girdles were often used with improved mobility in mind, for hand to hand combat. Anyhow, when chosing hiking clothing it is sometimes difficult to get various clothing layers and backpack hip belts to all work together. It is further complicated, I think, when sporting a beer belly, even a modest one.

Here are some common issues I have encountered:
1. Base layer and fleece layer bottoms often don't go up high enough.
2. Base layer bottoms often has a cheap elastic which eventually fails.
3. Hiking shorts and hiking pants often have a light belt, which is neccessary and handy, but which is also somewhat redundant with the hip/waist belt of backpacks.
4. Rain and wind pants usually have a decent wide but light elastic waist and usually go up high enough also, but are somewhat redundant with hiking shorts and backpack hip/waist belts and it can get rather encumbering and excessive in the seat and waist area when it is cold enough to wear all your layers at once.
5. Top base layer and mid layers and shell layers and wind layers often have some overlap, which is useful, but they all seem to end up about halfway down the butt, and I'm not sure they should all end in the same place.
6. For bushwacking, especially through tall grass with some thorns or raspberry canes, it is often neccessary to have some extra protection, like that of brushed nylon hiking pants, but they are otherwise excessive. Convertible shorts/pants are a good solution but the velcro seam is a bit excessive.

What is the best system for avoiding excessive weight and encumbrance and redundancy in the seat/hip/waist area. I'm not really suggesting girdles are the answer, but I'm wondering if some customized clothing/gear solutions might be in order here. What about button-on legs rather than velcro for convertible shorts/pants. Also, is it really neccessary to have a belt for you shorts in addition to a belt for your pack? How high should bottoms go and how low should tops go?

This is what got me thinking about girdles...
http://museum.gov.ns.ca/arch/infos/mikmaq1.htm

From what I understand the Mikmaq men often went shirtless in summer, but would often wear leggings before adding top layers, which is sort of the opposite of what I do as I usually wear sweater and shorts and only add bottom layers next. This doesn't work so well when bushwacking. Perhaps the Mikmaq had to deal with more bush. They were mostly on the coast in summer, as am I, but I presume they would also have used more or less the same trails as I do. They had different materials of course, but they started using wool as early as the 1500s after contact with the French and others. There main use of packs would most likely have been when they broke up into smaller family units and went inland in the Fall, by canoe, but also on foot. I am not sure how their packs integrated with their girdles/belts and other clothing systems. Also I am not sure how they combined portaging their canoes with carrying their packs, whether they always took two trips or if they could sometimes do it in one trip. Also not sure what suspension system they used for portaging their canoes. Their rough sea canoes I would imagine they left on the coast or on the shore of the big rivers, but I understand they used smaller solo canoes for hunting/fishing on smaller lakes and streams.

Anyhow, I like to wear boxers also, and I have alot of redundancy in the seat region when it is cold enough that I am wearing all my layers at once. Leggings might make sense for base layers and fleece layers and hiking pants, rather than all layers having a seat. Also, it might make sense to use the same removeable belt for my pack as for my hiking shorts somehow.

i find any sort of belt annoying b/c it sits right underneath my hipbelt. i can appreciate your dilemna jak. a wool serapi may be something you'd benefit from

Thanks Wags. What is a wool serapi? All I could find was Persian rugs.

I'm thinking I would like to try making a simple primitive frame pack some time like this...
http://www.whiteblaze.net/forum/showthread.php?t=49177

But instead of more wood across the bottom maybe some sort of leather or woven belt.

Also, for a waist/hip belt I'm thinking of one wide strap in back, but which switches into two in front, one high one low, so you can get a better fit. Also two small buckles might be lighter and less slippy than one big one.

For my hiking shorts I don't know. I need something to hold them up when I take my pack off especially when I have stuff in my pockets or the shorts themselves are helping to hold up other layers. I really like my new hiking shorts (Columbia Titanium) because the breath better than my old pair. The belt is fairly thin and light and soft nylon webbing but could be wider maybe. The loops are wide enough that they could be wider. I might try plain nylon cloth rather than webbing, and maybe the two buckle idea also.
I'll have to check again and see where my pack belt is in relation to my shorts belt. I think ideally the shorts belt would be up above and out of the way, and could be loosened some with the pack is on. I suppose I could extend the waist band up if needed. I might also add button holes to button on some leggings for bushwacking or wind/rain.

Now that I am losing weight I am not exactly sure where things are going to end up.

Anyone else used to read Conan the Barbarian comics?

I just got to thinking that maybe if done right the hiking shorts belt might not be so redundant if it also serves as extra padding for the pack belt if its in the right place and is the right fit and width. The other layers I almost always hike with is a sweater which I sometime tuck into shorts sometimes out, but which does help with padding and keeping things up. Also usually boxers, but sometimes fleece pants or skin layer pants, and those sometimes can be a pain in the ass if the don't stay up high enough. The worst thing is skin layer bottom with the elastic gone so they hang down held up only by the crotch of my shorts. Next worst think is fleece pants with a tight waist string in the wrong place instead of something wider and higher, but that's more a winter problem and I've fixed that. For summer I have one comfy pair of boxers with a nice high wide waist band but when they are damp or drying or if its cold and I am wearing my long skin layer bottoms I think I've got to give them a wider higher waist band somehow. Next sewing project in the field maybe. Its good to do stuff in the field because you can think and trial and error as you go, plus of course you're out in the field. Maybe button holes and leggings added to the boxers is the ticket, if the boxers would stay dry. Maybe upgrade to those wool icebreaker boxers but dang they are pricey. Also not sure if I like the name icebreaker for boxer shorts. Too many bad memories from winter jogs gone ugly.

It's spelled "Serape", a Mexican poncho/raincape/sleeping blanket.

thanks hoz. i had no idea how to spell it :D it's kinda like the thing clint eastwood wore in the good, the bad, the ugly.

what about board shorts to replace your hiking shorts? drawstrings aren't nearly as bunchy as a belt and will hold up your pants better than elastic

Man why have modern people become so fat, soft, and complicated? The answer like most things in life that truly matter....KEEP IT SIMPLE STUPID! You DO NOT need all that heavy gear on the trail! Hell didnt Grandma Gatewood prove that!? Carry a lite load...you DO NOT even need a damn hip belt! Loose the weight or beer belly! Get out of the damn REI mentality!

Serape eh. I like it. I might try something like that this summer and leave the sleeping bag at home. I carry wool blankets on dayhikes now with kids instead of blue foam pads because they can be used for more and the kids like to sit on them and use them as robes and they don't blow around like blue foam pads. Easier to pack up also.

Heh. Along the lines of your Micmac analogy, I've "backpacked" with a breechclout, mocs, leggings and long shirt in the summer, using a tumpline and blanket roll. I put a belt on top of the shirt to tuck my axe and knife in. FSO not counting a gun and bag (when doing a trek using them) can be <20# without food, but I don't carry a lot of things other people would think was mandatory.

To actually answer your question -- wear your warm stuff on your trunk - shirt/insulation/jacket - rather than on your legs. While you're walking, your legs are going to stay warm because of the exertion.

(caveat - I hike in the south; heavy or prolonged exposure to snow may change this attitude)

I never really understood the whole tumpline thing.
I like the idea of those types of packs, just not the tumpline.

I have canoed the Missinaibi and the Bloodvein rivers in Canada. The packs on long distance canoe trips often get heavy, 50 lbs or more. We use tumps on our packs portaging and they are a great help in distributing the load.

it's kinda like the thing clint eastwood wore in the good, the bad, the ugly.

Yeah, and you knew the ****e was gonna hit the fan when he threw it back over his shoulder...

I have canoed the Missinaibi and the Bloodvein rivers in Canada. The packs on long distance canoe trips often get heavy, 50 lbs or more. We use tumps on our packs portaging and they are a great help in distributing the load.So does your neck get sore or what?

Not really, You get used to it.

My longest portage so far was Hells Gate on the Missinaibi, about 2400 meters. I carried 80 lbs across that one using shoulder straps and the tumpline, then went back for my canoe. I even added a tumpline to the carrying thwart of my canoe.

The line goes over the top of your head BTW, not the forehead, so the weight is transferred down through the spine.

Got it. I'll have to mess around with that sometime.


From Barney Miller...

Dietrich: Begging; the world's oldest profession.
Wojo: I thought that was prostitution?
Dietrich: Someone had to ask for it.