Schooley
09-05-2012, 23:23
What is your opinion of geargrams dot com? Do any of you use that, or do you use a spreadsheet such as google docs or no gear list at all?
jakedatc
09-05-2012, 23:28
What is your opinion of geargrams dot com? Do any of you use that, or do you use a spreadsheet such as google docs or no gear list at all?
Gear grams is pretty easy and you can make one master list and then do separate lists for different seasons or trips. drag and drop.
http://www.geargrams.com/list?id=9466
I prefer to use Google Docs. I can change things up and design it the way that I want it to be. I have never used any gear list dot com sites for mine...
Here is an example of one of mine:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Aqh886ycFM9kdHZrUEUyWVdlaGZ0TkRkWUxFWWdMV VE#gid=0
And the cool thing is, if you have a Google Doc account, you can easily copy my gear list and simply plug in your gear in it's place... pretty easy...
Zippy Morocco
09-05-2012, 23:30
I like gear grams and use it. I like that you can virtually pack your bag with it.. It works really well for me. My only complaint is that it doesn't work on my mobile but that's not a huge deal. The conversions are nice too.
It's a very nice site. I've only used it and other spreadsheets to share my packing list with others, or when I could buy lighter replacement gear. I don't use it for myself. The way I figure, if I pack light, and can tell if one piece of my gear is lighter than another, then I don't need to know what it weighs. Either I'm going to carry certain things or I won't, and the final weight isn't going to matter.
A couple examples.
My ride was on the way to take my from the hostel to the trail head. I carried enough food to get me to the next town, enough water to get me to the next water source, and visited the post office to swap out gear. On the way out the door another hiker suggested I weigh my pack. I wanted to know why. At that point, what changes would I make? Did I plan poorly before weighing my pack, or was I going to suddenly make a poor choice at the scale?
Recently I read about another hiker that weighed her pack at a popular resupply spot along the trail, and when she found her pack too heavy, she unloaded a bunch of food into the hiker barrel. I wanted to ask if she had been carrying way too much food, or now planned to starve...or planned poorly while packing and was carrying way too much food. I'd further assume she had planned to skip a resupply, but changed her mind after weighing her pack. Assuming all that, I don't understand why she didn't make that decision upon hoisting her pack.
That said, I'd like to see the spreadsheet idea extended to include all gear, listed by category. There'd be a way to filter the categories by type of trip, ie, day hike, overnighter, snow, packrafting, etc. Then an item or items would have to be selected from each category. Assuming it was set up correctly, this would ensure all necessary gear was packed. Gear, category and total weight would be easy to incorporate. It should account for multi-use items too.