Vaucluse Gear Ventilation Frame

It’s typical to look for a ventilated backpack when entering the UL market.
I lived in the low desert, hiked around Joshua Tree extensively for a few years. My Gregory was so plush and felt so good in my hands. How could a bare bones HMG pack even compare? Certainly I expected at best something like a slip and slide. I always drank twice the water of my friends and sweated it all out. Against the smooth back of the HMG.

Darn this pack is light. Packed full of lightweight gear. Even my daypacks stay home. A few concerned emails to Mike at HMG before purchase and I put down my hard earned money for the first pack ever that I didn’t mind carrying. The pack fits, it doesn’t stick to my back. With the stays, it’s not tight to my back. `It rests at the waist, where there is padding and ventilation.
They’ve convinced us that we need back ventilation. We don’t. It’s just weight. Mike convinced me. He was right.

If the Vaucluse works for you, that’s great.  HYOH.  For me, there are too many pack options available to spend time, money and weight attempting to make a non-optimal (for me) pack work. Everyone is different…I recommend taking the time to find the right pack, although I hate to even think about how many packs I’ve gone through.  Every long-timer on this site knows what I’m talking about.  But…having gone through the process, and found that “just right” pack I now fully understand what it is I require in a pack. Knowledge borne of experience is worth it’s weight in gold.