Our Gear

We are trying to go as light as possible without purchasing all-new equipment. We’ll be using:

Black Diamond Lighthouse Tent
Weight : 3 lbs. 3 oz. (plus a few ounces for p-cord guy lines)

Mountain Hardwear Phantom 32
Weight 1 lb. 7 oz. / 640 g.

Phil’s pad: ThermaRest Neo Air Short
9oz.

Apryle’s pad: Womens ThermaRest Prolite
11oz.

Apryle’s Pack: Golite Lite-Speed
2.3 lbs (minus frame sheet)
Volume: 2,600 cu in (42 liters)… I’m not convinced that my pack is actually larger volume than Phil’s. I think they must be counting water bottle pockets and all sorts of strange spaces.

Phil’s Pack: Black Diamond Speed 28
2 lb 5 oz (but probably a bit lighter since we took out the frame sheet)
Volume: 28 liters (1,709 cu in)

Stove: Home-made Cat Food Can Stove
less than 1 oz
Made from a 5 oz cat food can (thanks Pam Evans!). Burns de-natured alcohol.

Cookware: MSR Alpine 2 Liter Pot
Along with a modified windscreen borrowed from a Whisperlite service kit.

Headlamps
Phil is carrying a 10 year old Petzl Tikka; Apryle a 4 year old Myo XP.

Water Treatment
Polar Pure iodine. Hands down the best option out there. At 3oz, it tastes pretty good. Not to mention that a bottle treats thousands of quarts of water, has indefinite shelf life, and takes hardly any time and even less effort as compared to mechanical filtration.

Hydration: MSR Dromedary Bag 6 liter, along with a 1 liter Nalgene bottle
The bag allows us to get through a dry camp, and the Nalgene lets us drink tea or fill our bladder. Hydration bladder, that is.

What else? ?Up to 14 lbs of food at a time, clothing and sunglasses, a Canon Powershot SX100IS camera and a few extra memory cards, 4oz of Dr. Bronner’s Lavender soap, a small first aid kit, some Eneloop rechargeable batteries, a pair of Rite-in-the-Rain Journals, feminine hygiene products, comb (Apryle doesn’t want dreds), sunscreen, a phone card, credit card, driver’s license.

Base pack weights come in around 13 lbs, pushing 30lbs with food and water. Not too bad. We could probably do a bit better with a tarp tent and down quilt, but didn’t want to spent the $$$ this time around.