New to forum, new to packing light

[Christopher Brown]

Here is a list of the items we will be taking on a 5 day backpacking trip thru the Black Hills. We will be placing 2 food/water/fuel along the way. Our average food weight will be 4lbs. Up to 4L of waters. A's stands for my wife Annie and C's stands for Chris. Let we know what you think and any advise you may have. Thanks

Item To Carry Weight

MSR Miniworks 17.8
Texsport pot 8.3
fork and spoon 0.5
s2s foldsble cup 2.2
Big A aircore pad 23.2
Big A aircore pad 22.7
Towel 0.6
water carring bag 2.1
tent stakes 7.9
tent poles 11.2
C flashlight 1.9
MSR Whisper Stove 11
1L platypus 0.9
1L platypus 1
1L platypus 1
MH pathlight3 Tent 33
MH pathlight3 cover 35
A's Pillow 5.3
C's rain coat 8
C's PJ bottoms 2.8
A's comb 0.5
first aid 8.5
toiletries 4.7
maps 3.4
fuel 13.3
C's waterbottle 6.5
Sleeping bags 83
A's pack 70
C's pack 72
A's glass cleaner 1.5
Wash tub 3
A's pj's 9.8
A's extra shirt 3.2
A's jacket 13.8
C's PJ top 4

[Ken Thompson]

Welcome!

A single flashlight? No headlights? Wash tub and a water carry bag and your Platys? I see some weight saving possibilities there.

This may be of some help.

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/forums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=31018

[Eric Blumensaadt]

Sounds like your tent and fly are 4 lbs. A lot for a solo tent or even a 2 person tent. But ya gotta go with wat ya got.

Lose the pillow and use your clothing stuff sack instead.

BTW, You both may be better off taking light long johns instead of PJs because long johns can easily be used during the day if more insulation is needed. It's a dual purpose item.

And as mentioned above, you really don't need a "water carrying bag". That's for car camping.

[Bob Shaver]

your listing of gear for the whole party is a bit confusing to me. For instance, it appears that there will only be 2 raincoats for 3 people. Would you consider listing the gear as clothing for person a, clothing for person B, clothing for person C, plus group cooking gear and tents?

My food weights come out at about 2 pounds per person per day, a decent rule of thumb for food weights.

[Cayenne Redmonk]

As i read the OP, A and C are two people that travel together, there is no B.

[Mary D]

It would help to have separate lists per person. Of course you have to determine who carries which piece of shared gear! It would also help if you organize the list by systems: clothing worn, clothing carried, shelter/sleeping, pack/cooking/hydration, navigation, etc. It's really hard to figure out what's redundant and what's missing as your list is currently organized. For examples of how to organize a gear list, look at some of the gear lists on this site (see "community gear lists" at right), or this article:
http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/00234.html

What I'd leave home:

Water carrier–you have all those Platys, which are enough.

C's very heavy water bottle should be replaced by a 1 or 2 L Platypus, or one or two quart Gatorade bottles.

Wash tub–take a 2 gallon ziplock plastic bag to wash clothing; any dishwashing/people washing can be done in your cooking pot. Consider eliminating dishwashing altogether by using freezer bag cooking (which is really rehydrating, not cooking, in a freezer bag):
http://www.trailcooking.com/
Can you tell that I hate washing dishes? :-)

Small item, but the fork is not necessary; a spoon is sufficient. If you have to stab something, use your pocket knife (as people did for centuries before the fork was invented).

8.5 oz. for a first aid kit is rather heavy; consider a good wilderness first aid course which will teach you to improvise so you don't need to carry so much.

Pillows; put extra clothing in stuff sacks.

Pajamas, use base layer top and bottoms instead. You probably won't wear them in the daytime (maybe on cold mornings), but they're far more useful if it turns really cold. The base layer top would also substitute for an extra shirt.

A's extra shirt (see preceding paragraph)

What I'd add:

Each of you needs a light source. Headlamps are preferable to flashlights because you have your hands free. (I don't even use flashlights at home any more because I love the hands-free headlamp!) For summer I use the Petzl E+lite which weighs only an ounce.

I didn't see a raincoat for A.

I didn't see a means of treating your water (shared gear)

A warm hat and liner gloves would be a good idea for each of you.

You don't mention clothing worn, but be sure include a sun hat for each of you. (I'm rather paranoid about this since my DIL had most of her upper lip removed due to skin cancer a few weeks ago.)

Extra pair of socks for each of you. That's the only spare clothing I take. Otherwise I only take the clothing I would wear all at one time in the worst possible conditions that could be expected on the particular trip.

Pocket knife for each (light!)

Compass (and learn how to use it)

IMHO your tent, sleeping bags and packs appear unnecessarily heavy, but I'd wait on replacing those–maybe just one at a time. Especially a high quality down sleeping bag is a big investment, so save up. You also want to lighten the rest of your load before getting lighter packs, which would be the last item to replace.

[Diane Pinkers]

Many good suggestions already, I'll just add: the Miniworks is a very heavy filter, you could save some weight using the Sweetwater microfilter, or possibly the Hyperflow microfilter–if you have to have a pump. Many people go with Aquamira tablets or drops, and just treat the water, not filter–but it will depend on where you are hiking. I'm still using a Sweetwater, because I like the ease of having a pump, but I have my waterbags set up so I can pump directly into the bag without having to remove it from my pack. I'm still evolving my hydration strategy.

You could dump a lot of weight going to either a cannister stove or an alcohol stove (my favorite, the Caldera Cone–so easy!) instead of the Whisperlite. I have a Whisperlite, haven't taken it hiking for years. Similarly, 8 ounces is heavy for a cooking pot. Go to http://www.traildesigns.com or http://www.antigravitygear.com for lighter weight options.

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