Vision issues make backpacking heavy

Not quite the same as your needs but I hike with transistion progressive bifocals. The transition lenses mean I have sunglasses in the day and clear glasses at night. I had the bifocal addition in these lenses placed lower than in my normal daily glasses to give me a clearer view of the trail at my feet. I have to look at maps/books/gps right at the bottom of the lens but it’s a small price to pay.

If you only need glasses for night driving, then the easiest option is to leave the prescription glasses at home and buy a cheap pair of non-prescription sunglasses. Things may be a little blurry, especially at night, but if your vision is not too bad you can deal with it fine for a backpack trip. And leave the books at home to save more weight and not worry about reading glasses. If you’re in the Sierras in summer, you’ll have lots of daylight and good weather to enjoy time around camp with no need for a book.

On the other hand, if you enjoy sharp vision so you can take in all the beauty of the mountains, then take prescription glasses and prescription sunglasses along with two light weight cases. You can make up for the extra five ounces of weight elsewhere in your kit. Here are two cases that have worked really well for me – one for regular glasses and one for curved sunglasses (2.1 and 2.3 ounces each):

http://a.co/d/fWCxvK0

http://a.co/d/175pbaM

Was just going to make the same suggestion Matthew did if you have the money. That can be a little steep though $$$$ especially if you have estigmatism like I do. So I will likely be getting something similar to these…

https://cocoonseyewear.com

They aren’t the ugly boxy things they used to be any more.

Here is a good article on how to select them.

Audiobooks.  An iPod nano weighs just over an ounce and gives 30 hours battery life.  Since it weighs so little I prefer it to using my phone, since I don’t have to worry about using up the phone battery that I might need for other purposes.   Vs paper books – you save weight, can bring many books, you can get comfortable in any position without needing to prop yourself up, no need for reading glasses or a flashlight.   Pretty much every book comes in a decent audio version now.   A great solution for hiking and long drives, I get through ~30 audiobooks a year now in the evenings when hiking & when driving.   Audible.com (owned by Amazon) has everything.

Sunglasses: these rollups weigh nothing and should be in everyone’s emergency kit as a backup for loss or breakage:

As for the more general need for vision correction…  well, laser eye surgery is cheap and safe.   It won’t obviate the need for reading glasses as we age, but it can correct pretty much anything else now.

Sorry, I guess I wasn’t clear in my initial post. For daytime use, I don’t need any correction; I have 20/15 vision. So regular sunglasses are good enough, just have to make sure I don’t break them (which I often do). I’ll check out the roll up ones, might be a good option.

For nighttime, laser surgery doesn’t correct it; I’ve already had the laser surgery and it’s great for daytime vision, but not perfect for night. I guess I’m “packing my fear” that I might need to move during nighttime, and without correction I would be stumbling about. But what are the odds? Probably not needed. Maybe I just leave this pair in the car.

I do have an old iPod nano – I think I can cross off the reading glasses and just listen to books, good idea. Although I do love to read. But maybe that will be the mode for longer hikes. I also need to check maps and watch face, etc. just before I go, in case my reading vision gets worse in the next year. Or I just bug every passerby on the trail “can you read this for me?!”

Thanks for helping me think this through a bit.

I’ve been juggling three pairs of glasses for several decades – prescription distance glasses, prescription sunglasses, and prescription reading glasses – so it’s both second nature to me and the price of playing outdoors. I’ve really needed all three during trips too often to leave them behind. At least I don’t carry spares anymore.

Besides reading maps, you might need reading glasses for first aid and equipment repair.

While hiking, I’m always wearing one pair, usually sunglasses. In the pack are two pairs in lightweight cases – total 4.4 ounces. Crystal Light 2 quart packet containers work well as lightweight cases; this thread discusses those and other options.

— Rex

I wouldn’t recommend bifocals on trails – I got a pair of bifocal sunglasses a while back thinking I could carry just the one pair. Unfortunately going downhill it was very hard to focus on the trail with the bifocals especially moving fast.

So I’m now back to having two pairs: sunglasses and regular reading glasses.

I do need the reading glasses to look at maps and of course to read.

I have progressive lenses and they work fine. I don’t know if they are better than regular bifocals for hiking or not. Of course, tendon issues mean I don’t move fast, even on the downhill.

I wouldn’t go out without glasses that let me read normal print for the reasons Rex mentions. But I’ve also never taken a spare.

Karen, this pocket lens works really well and is thinner than a credit card. I’ve used it to read small type on maps.

Pedestrian, YMMV but as mentioned above you can ask the optician to move the bifocal addition very low on the lenses aiding downwards vision. I’ve found it to be quite comfortable. You need a taller frame for this to work well.

+1 on Matthew’s credit-card-magnifier lens suggestion. More and more, reading glasses (really, computer glasses) aren’t enough for really fine work, so I keep one in my first aid kit.

But that might be all you need.

— Rex

Low Light Myopia, effects me as well. I simply accept it and carry what I need as for some of us it is an unavoidable part of aging. TBH the Tupperware container I keep my spectacles in isn’t a big deal volume or weight wise. My goggles on the other hand are a real PITA

Insert emoticon for shock!

Karen, I hadn’t really given this much thought, but I am backpacking with exactly the three pairs of glasses (light sunglasses, my prescription glasses, and a pair of cheap readers) that you are describing AND contacts with a small container of cleaning/storage solution!  I much prefer contacts to corrective glasses and love my Maui Jim sunglasses, but would be pretty blind if a contact tore or got lost on a trip.  Honestly, I don’t think it’s the vision stuff that’s adding the weight to my pack; more likely it’s the three fishing rods, but those have to come along, too.  I know you’re wondering how you might eliminate some of those glasses, but I haven’t really found them to be an issue.

I also love to read and used to take a paperback along but have found that the Sunday newspaper with two TWO! crossword puzzles weighs next to nothing and packs smaller than any book.  The NYT crossword alone can take me 2-3 sessions to complete.  That might be an alternative if you like crosswords.

I can’t speak to your low-light issues, but I gave up hard-sided cases years ago.  I carry both reading glasses and sunglasses and put them in soft foam “bag” cases that I hang on the front of my pack straps.  They’re the only things I’ll allow to dangle on my pack.  I could probably break them if I did a face-plant fall, but otherwise, hard cases are really only necessary if I put the glasses in my pack.  Plus, I bought a cheap pair of glasses for backpacking trips from zenni.com, so it’s no biggie if I do break them.

My solution: Prescription eyeglasses with progressive lenses, plus flip-up sunglasses.

Since having Lasik surgery 15 years ago I don’t need any correction for distance vision. But I am an old man, and I darn sure need reading glasses; and I don’t like to have to put glasses on every time I read or need to look at something up close. So I wear eyeglasses all the time, with progressive lenses. They work for driving, hiking, and reading. I leave them on all the time, and during the day I leave the clip-on sunglasses on all the time. The clip-ons are light–only 9 grams–so it’s no bother to leave them on, and I can instantly flip them up in the woods or to read a map.

Clip-on sunglasses are a great and old-fashioned solution, but the clip-ons must be the flip-up/flip-down type for maximum utility. I don’t want to have to remove the clip-ons when not needed. I just fip them up and leave them on.

I wear progressive contacts in normal life. Sometimes when camping, I wear my progressive transitions. I do have daily disposable progressive contacts that I’ve tried, too.

When I first tried progressive lens (distance correction looking straight ahead, mid-distance correction below that, reading correction at the bottom, varying continuously) it was different enough from the glasses I’d worn for decades that I didn’t like them.  A few years later, I like them.  They’re what I usually wear each day.  If they were auto-darkening, they’d do everything you need in one set.

As for cost, I’ve been very pleased with Zenni Optical (online).  What the local dispensing optician wants $250-$300 for (progressive, coated, auto-darkening), Zenni is about $70.  And for a single prescription lenses in frames, they’re around $19.  So I have computer-distance glasses that live at my computer, a distance pair that’s always in the car, and an extra set in case anything breaks or gets lost.

In addition to the little magnifying card described above, you can use your phone’s camera to zoom in on small print.

I, too, juggle several pairs of glasses – well, three – on trips.  I wear graduated transition lenses or prescription polarized sunglasses.  My vision is too poor to go without.  I carry an extra pair of graduated transition lenses just in case.  I’ve never needed hardshell cases.  The spares are in a small case wrapped with clothing in my pack.  Whatever pair of the other two I’m not wearing is in a glasses case my optometrist gave me either buried in the pack or in an external pocket.  Never lost or broken my glasses on a trip – knock on wood.

My go to reading glasses, in town and in the backcountry.  Light, compact folding glasses in a hard case.

https://fostergrant.com/store/reading-glasses/gideon-readers-fg

For books to read, would you consider reading ebooks on your cellphone? (assuming you bring a phone into the backcountry).  All the ereading apps I have allow the text size to be changed — you could make it big enough to read without reading glasses (though you will have more frequent ‘page turns’).