is there anyone out there that doesnt care about super light hiking?

[Happy44]

everyone i meet and many i met on my attempted thru hike was all about " DAT WEIGHT" like if your pack was not under 24.546323 pounds your were scrub tier! i want to get some opinions on people who people who thru hike not caring about weight, and carry 35+

[hikerboy57]

theres no rule, you can carry however much you want i met a sobo who started from kathadin sept1,2012, about 40 miles south of damascus. he started out with total pack weight of 120 lbs, was carrying a 70 lb pack with 4oo miles left to go.he was obviously doing it wrong.
most thrus will lose pack weight as they go along. nothing wrong with carrying less weight, and no reason to carry more than you have to.

[max patch]

I'll start off by saying that the lighter weight you carry the happier you'll be.

Having said that, on my thru I generally carried 45 pounds leaving town and 35 pounds entering town. I finished in 5 months and a week, which is faster than what many of 25 pound crowd finishes today. I'm just an average guy in average shape with an average hiking pace.

I started with 50 pounds and got it down to 45 by Damascus. When I started the 100 mile wilderness I took extra clothes (it was getting cold) and 10 days of food (didn't want to be rushed thru this section) which was a pack weight of 62 pounds.

But again, lighter trumps heavier.

[max patch]

Remember when Coup of GoLite started with 125 pounds at Springer to prove the GoLites packs were tough? He made it to Neels where although he proved that the GoLite pack was tough enough to handle the load he also proved to himself that his body couldn't. He called off his ultra heavy hike at that point and set the record for most stuff mailed home from Neels. 125 pounds over 30 miles is heckova achievement that I hope I never have to attempt.

[Coffee]

For me, the correlation of weight to comfort level is not a linear one but has distinct "threshold levels" that I have come to anticipate. For a typical 3-4 day trip, I would usually start out with low 20s in my ULA Circuit and my pace and enjoyment level is pretty much the same as if I was day hiking although I am slightly slower. Starting in the low 20s seems to be the sweet spot as the weight eventually decreases to the mid to high teens which feels pretty effortless at the end of a trip. On the other end of the spectrum, I carried 34 pounds at the start of the second half of the JMT this summer and I found that 30 pounds was the cut off beyond which I had to expend significant additional effort and my mileage goals were harder to attain. Below 30 pounds things got progressively easier and I was soon in my low to mid 20s comfort range.

I got back from the JMT all gung-ho about further reducing my pack weight but I can't really justify doing so for the vast majority of my intended trips, almost all of which would involve a total pack weight no more than mid 20 pound range. I can see ways in which I could easily lower my pack weight by 2-3 pounds but it would cost hundreds of dollars to do so which isn't worth it to me right now since what I have is still functional. What I have now is what I'll be using for segments on the AT in the spring, the Colorado Trail in the summer, and local hiking in the fall next year. I will have to re-evaluate everything prior to my PCT thru in 2015 but I don't anticipate huge changes unless gear breaks or wears out.

[off-pher]

I have never weighted my pack. I do carry comfort i have a full sized pillow and a folding stool.
Plus i carry half of of dog's food. My pack does weight more on the FT than the AT because i carry
more water on the FT water is harder to come by on the FT. It really depends on where i'm going
and what i'm doing. Sometimes my pack is light sometimes it's heavy. SO HYOH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[MDSection12]

People love to bash UL... But I don't see anyone carrying bricks either. At some point we can all agree that less weight is better, it's just a matter of opinion when that point is.

[HikerMom58]

Less is better... Having said that, just call me Overload 2. Whoops sorry not a thru-hiker.. I have section hiker pride tho!

[MuddyWaters]

Theres no right and no wrong

But you will be more comfortable ON THE TRAIL carrying less weight.
You will hike faster, and farther per day, things that are good in a thru-hikers point of view.

The less weight you carry, the faster you hike.
The faster you hike, the less food you need to carry between towns, so the lighter you pack is.

[Grampie]

The go light crowd think that the less weight that they carry the easier their hike will be. They soon discover that that's not the case. A thru-hike is just plain tough. What you carry on your back makes only a fraction of what it takes. Just because you are carrying 20 to 25 lbs doesn't guarantee a sucesfull hike. The majority of thru-hikers carry between 30 to 35 lbs,

[Theosus]

I don't know what my pack weight is. I've never weighed it. However - I do know that it can hold a lot more weight than I am comfortable carrying. I know the weights of some of my gear, and I can say that my summer and winter stuff weighs about the same. I use a lighter hammock in the winter, but i have to carry a few more layers. My summer UQ is less insulating, but my winter one uses down, so they weigh about the same. I will say I have endeavored to carry lighter and carry less (I now use an almost weightless alcohol stove compared to the canister I started with), and I even pared down the foods I carry, use smaller and less ropes, but barring spending a whole lot of $$$ on new equipment, I can't go much lighter. I'll probably get a lighter pack when mine wears out, But I'm not replacing it just to save a pound...

[DavidNH]

Happy44 yes there are folks on the trial who carry ""normal"" loads. Its just that the light nicks are more vocal and in some cases like to rub in how light their packs are. In the old days the mark of the macho tough guy was how much weight he could carry.. 80 lbs, 100+ etc. These days it's how far he can hike in a day. I've found the folks carrying the really low weight packs (read day packs with under 20 lbs gear fully loaded) tended to hike like 25-35 miles a day. Then they'd take several days off during which us heavier (ie 40-50 pound load) hikers caught up. Everything comes out in the wash in the end.

People should brag less and enjoy and talk about the wilderness more!

just my two cents.

[George]

the category of hikers that often tend toward heavier packs are ex-military, to them the load is light compared to what they did carry

that being said a lot of them have trashed knees from years of abuse

[Turk6177]

When I started hiking (prior to reading whiteblaze) I carried everything and the kitchen sink in my pack. I made it five miles in a torrential rain and could not move another inch out of fatigue. I had all the goodies: Rambo knife, extra rope, 3 liters of water, 3 outfits, "just in case" items, and a ton of food, etc. I realized backpacking was pretty strenuous, and not a lot of fun carrying all this weight. I ran into a former thru hiker on my first night on the AT. He gave me a lot of tips, not just on hiking lighter, but hiking smarter. For example, a lot of people who start out carry way too much water for the conditions. He told me to carry enough water to get to the next water source, not enough for the whole day. That probably cut 6 pounds off my back right there. I then started to research lighter and lighter options for my gear. I guess I have prioritized over time what I can and can not do without. After I got to my lightest, I found there were certain things I wished I had. For example, I didn't like waiting so long for aqua mirra to activate, so I added a little extra weight to carry a Sawyer Squeeze filter. I slowly started to add those things until I met a fine balance of lightweight and comfortable (as in comfort items). I guess everyone has to eventually get to the point of wanting whatever is in their pack badly enough to carry its extra weight. I believe this is individual to every hiker. If I can cut weight I will, only because it makes hiking more fun. I have made gram weenie mistakes and learned from them as well.

[SS/SB]

like your reply

given how the ultra lighters seem to out mass anyone else on this site, was worried that my planned weight of 45 +/- would be way too much

[1234]

I don't care about "super" lite hiking. The super lite hiking backpack did not make it to neels gap with out repairs. The super lite tent got wet. The super lite sleeping I will never part with it performed good. The alcohol stove I would not bring until May, it is just to slow for cold weather hiking (march and april) days start out short with little hiking time, 10 min wait for dinner is just to long. I refuse to eat remain noodles every day. I want better food and it has weight. I love this one, the tarp, in heavy rain the water ran down the mountain at least 1 to 2 inches deep and I got soaked. the wind fluttered the tarp so bad one night the noise keep me up all night. Snow falls sideways and I was covered under the tarp. It takes lots of stakes and cord to get a good solid tarp set. OH and in the summer I woke up with bugs up my nose and all over my face. I will carry a tent with solid rain fly the covers the pack also. I hate base weight who goes backpacking with no food or water. load up your as you put it on your back that is what you carry. My pack food and water total 36-40 lbs every trip. In the warm months I can get down about 10 lbs. to 26 to 30. I carry nair clipper and a tooth brush and sun screen and deet and duck tape and needle and thread and bandages AND vitimins. and drink mix powers. It adds up, and a phone and a mp3 player and batteries and a charger.

[Malto]

like your reply

given how the ultra lighters seem to out mass anyone else on this site, was worried that my planned weight of 45 +/- would be way too much

you are kidding, right? There are 5 heavyweight BPers for every one ultra lighters on this site if not more. UL is sub ten lb base weight. I could sit by the trail at Blood Mountain next spring and count UL BPers on the AT. I likely wouldn't need two hands.

To the OP. I am one that doesn't care one bit about how much you are carrying. CYOW.

[illabelle]

People love to bash UL... But I don't see anyone carrying bricks either. At some point we can all agree that less weight is better, it's just a matter of opinion when that point is.

I don't carry bricks, but I have been known to carry rocks. Someday I'll get one from Katahdin to add to my collection.
I'm pretty sure I've violated all the laws of ultra-light hiking.

[MuddyWaters]

you are kidding, right? There are 5 heavyweight BPers for every one ultra lighters on this site if not more. UL is sub ten lb base weight. I could sit by the trail at Blood Mountain next spring and count UL BPers on the AT. I likely wouldn't need two hands.

+1 Yup.

I dont know about this site,

But on the trail, it seems to me maybe more like 50 normal backpackers, per UL hiker. Its really not that common on the AT.

[Namtrag]

You never see them because they hike so fast, but they're there!

Seriously, in my meetup group, we have 3 ultralight guys out of about 15 active members who go on trips.