backpacking evolved from long-distance through-hikers on trails like the Appalachian Trail (AT) and the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT). When you’re hiking every day for six months you really come to understand what it means to carry extra weight, and these hikers quickly learn just what they need and what they don’t need on the trail. If you should be lucky enough to speak to people who have completed one of these trails, they will tell you about all the stuff they shipped home along the way because they just weren’t using it.
I’ve always been an “overpacker,” bringing stuff I think that maybe I might need or just want to have. I end up huffing and puffing with a huge pack, and a good 20 percent of it never gets used. During my first trip to New Zealand I had to cut way back on what I took with me, and that changed my perspective dramatically. If you know the area and the conditions you are going to encounter, and if you know your own body (what you need to keep warm, dry, and comfortable), you don’t have to carry tons of gear. There’s been a revolution in the availability of ultralight clothing, sleeping bags, packs, stoves, and shelters, so you can now go out and be comfortable without breaking your back. The person who is perhaps best known for leading this revolution is Ray Jardine, whose book Beyond Backpacking is a classic text for anyone who is serious about the ultralight approach. Ray is a visionary who accomplished his goals of dramatically reducing equipment weight through his own ingenuity. He went from a 75-pound (34 kilogram) pack on his first PCT through-hike to under 12 pounds (5.4 kilograms).
Trained as an engineer, Ray has always been an inventor, so sewing his own clothing, packs, and shelters wasn’t anything new. Most of us aren’t visionaries and don’t have time to sew our own gear. Thankfully, major equipment manufacturers have recognized the demand for ultralight gear and now produce a wide range of products, including clothing, packs, shelters, and sleeping bags. The very lightest gear can be too fragile for commercial production, so the cutting edge of this type of design is often done by hard-core ultralight techies. Check out some of the resources in the Bibliography.
When you are planning a route, you make a set of assumptions on miles per day based on the 2 miles per hour formula (3.2 kilometers). That’s an average hiking speed for an average person carrying an average weight pack. As you drop equipment weight, your daily hiking mileage is going to increase. Experienced ultralight hikers routinely cover 25 to 30 miles per day (40–48 kilometers). So keep this in mind if you are planning a trip with ultralight gear. One caveat: just taking lighter gear doesn’t mean you can hike long distances. Through-hikers have either trained or build up to those mileages. Of course, just because you can hike farther doesn’t mean you have to. You may head to the same place as you would with a heavier pack and have more time for exploring side hikes along the way, a long stop for nature photography and journaling at lunch, etc. If you are planning a trip with friends and some have ultralight gear and others heavier gear, you’ll need to talk about the goals for the trip and how you will manage different hiking paces and timelines.
One important thing to understand about the ultralight approach is that it is both a philosophy and a continuum. The philosophy is to take only what you need and need only what you take. The continuum is your personal choices and strategies. You might reduce weight with clothing, sleeping bag, and backpack choices and still decide to take a tent because it’s black fly season, and for your enjoyment of the outdoors (or so you don’t go insane) you’d like to be in a tent. Someone else might be comfortable with a lighter weight tarpaulin and a mosquito headnet. Here are the principles my friend Bill “Tigerpaw” Plonk suggests based on his ultralight through-hike of the Appalachian Trail.
Take only what you need.
Take the lightest gear that will do the job.
Use gear with multiple functions.
Reassess regularly and discard whatever you haven’t used.
There isn’t one “right” lightweight approach (and don’t let purists try to convince you otherwise), but I can guarantee you, once you start to shed pounds, you’ll never go back.
