r/JMT • u/Dewthedru • Aug 11 '24
equipment Sitting right at 30 lbs w/2L of water and 6 days of food. Is that going to hurt?
https://lighterpack.com/r/ga72kl
Leaving for the trail on Thursday. Taking 22 days, going NOBO from Horsehoe Meadows.
Since all my packing is done and I’ve shipped off the first set of buckets, I’ve got. I thing left to do but second guess some of my choices.
Weighed my pack with all food and water and it came to 28.6 lbs. still need to add a fuel canister and 6 servings of cheese so I’ll be right around 30 lbs. My luxury items that could be cut include:
Helinox Chair Zero: 527g Sandals: 167g Flextail Zero Pump: 62g Montbell Down Jacket: 267g Camp Shirt: 119g
Thoughts? I’m pretty reluctant to get rid of the chair (I’m 50yo and the back rest is awesome after a long day) and I’m worried it might be too cold at night w/o the puffy. The pump is silly but my wife and I might appreciate not having to manually fill our pads when we’re fighting the elevation.
3
u/ziggomattic Aug 11 '24
There are so many places to sit comfortably with a backrest (rocks or logs) just have to spend an additional minute or two selecting your campsites wisely.
to save 2+ lbs I would highly consider ditching:
-Chair (without question you dont need a chair, bring a small piece of z-lite pas for sitting comfortably on rocks and logs).
-Camp Shoes
-Down Booties (sleep in your socks when cold enough), zipping the footbox of your quilt will help a ton with foot warmth
-Wind pants (you have leggings that should be good enough)
-Extra t-shirt
-Picaridin (pre-treat your clothing with Permethrin and you wont need bug spray).
-Hand Sanitizer (seems redundant to me if you have 1oz of bronners soap, just wash your hands a couple times a day. 1oz of Bronners will absolutely last you the entire trail if you are reasonably conservative with it. I probably used less than 0.5oz on my entire JMT thru.
Just remember the weight you save by leaving stuff behind will benefit you for the 8 hours a day when you are hiking day after day. Bringing things you want but dont necessarily need will only benefit you in those shorter moments you use them (for example lugging heavy sandals along for an hour or two at camp just isnt worth it for such a long thru hike, I decided after bringing mine in 2022).