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Kepley
03-21-2011, 16:37
How much would be too much food (in weight) for a mail drop?

GeneralLee10
03-21-2011, 16:41
That is totally up to you. How much do you want to carry after said mail drop is picked up? In my opinion there is no need for them on the AT. I did just for a new piece of gear from home or letters, or that plush TP that you can't get for free on the AT.

Kepley
03-21-2011, 16:49
So is 8 pounds too much for all my food for a week?

cold kettle
03-21-2011, 17:28
It really depends on how much you eat. Most of the folks I've seen get too much then stand outside the PO trying to give it away to others hikers who also just got too much. I'm starting out with one of those PO medium size "if it fits it ships" boxes for two hikers about every 3 weeks supplemented with town day pickups. But i am diabetic and need regular medication resupply and I'm trying to use up a bunch of food I accumulated doing section hikes.
If you have the time, eat trail food and monitor exactly what you eat for a week although your trail consumption may vary a little.

GeneralLee10
03-21-2011, 17:29
To be honest I can not answer that question, only your body can. Your food consumption will change over time on the trail, along with your taste. To start out you might only need 3-4 days of food which can come out to 6lbs +/- depending on what you carry food wise. That should get you to Neels Gap.

Hope that helps you some and did not confuse you any more than you might be.

Skidsteer
03-21-2011, 19:31
So is 8 pounds too much for all my food for a week?

No, not at all. Wouldn't be enough for me in fact.

10-K
03-21-2011, 19:55
So is 8 pounds too much for all my food for a week?

No, but you don't need to carry a week's worth of food either.

Papa D
03-21-2011, 20:03
You really never need to carry a weeks worth of food - divide it into 4-day segments if possible with an emergency meal (bag of dehydrated cheesy potatoes?) Are you mail dropping ALL of your food? I'd strongly recommend against that - shopping at towns and re-packaging into zip lock bags is so much more efficient than drops - I'd suggest just mail dropping "specialty stuff" that you might not be able to buy - along with non-food items - lighter sleeping bag, clean shirt, whatever.

Kepley
03-21-2011, 20:19
Thanks everyone. Its good to hear that 8 pounds is not enough, and too much. That means that I must be right where I need to be. My goal is to eat roughly 50% mail drop and 50% town bought food. A total of 14 mail drops to be exact, only one of them 2 miles off of the trail. I'm actually not as much of a newbie to trail cooking as I might come off to be, but thanks for your advice on helping me calculate the weight of the drop.

leaftye
03-21-2011, 20:32
It depends if you plan on buying any food in town. You should probably be getting somewhere around 1.25-2 pounds a day, less when you start the trail, and then more as you get your hunger.

For mailing, there's a new way to do things. Most people had been using flat rate priority mail boxes. Now there are regional type A & B boxes that are almost certainly cheaper to anywhere on the trail. The type B box is about the same size as a large flat rate priority mail box. When I checked the rates, it was cheaper as long as the weight for the furthest shipment was under 17 pounds, which is no problem. And the boxes are still completely free to order on the USPS website.

Blissful
03-22-2011, 12:31
It depends if you also plan to supplement with buying. Then it would be the correct weight.

Blissful
03-22-2011, 12:32
Thanks everyone. Its good to hear that 8 pounds is not enough, and too much. That means that I must be right where I need to be. My goal is to eat roughly 50% mail drop and 50% town bought food. A total of 14 mail drops to be exact, only one of them 2 miles off of the trail. I'm actually not as much of a newbie to trail cooking as I might come off to be, but thanks for your advice on helping me calculate the weight of the drop.

Well it would be good to have included some of this info in your first post. :cool: