In this guest post Phil Turner, an ultralight backpacking specialist, shakes his head, tutts, and slaps my wrist for persisting with old, heavy, cheap kit!

“I’mve been corresponding with Alastair for a while now regarding his gear choices for his upcoming walking and packrafting trip to Iceland. I have to admit I was slightly horrified by the picture above, taken from his last trip across Scotland in January with Andy Ward. That’s a big, big pack, and that’s without the raft in/on it!

As the Iceland trek will be far longer, Alastair recognises the need to try to pack lighter pieces of equipment to offset having to carry several weeks’ of food. It is pretty simple to apply some of the basic principles of lightweight backpacking to an ‘expedition’ kit list. There are many fine examples of minimal, lightweight multi-mode adventuring, most recently Andrew Skurka’s Alaska-Yukon Expedition and Hig and Erin’s Journey on the Wild Coast, both travelling several thousand miles over land and water.

The extreme distances involved here aren’t totally relevant when it comes to kit selection – I could use my weekend kit for many continuous months if I were to be able to resupply every few days (many do just that on the TGO Challenge), but this kit would be woefully inadequate for a three week expedition with no resupplies. Three weeks of food alone is a huge weight. This is the key variable rather than distance.

The ‘big three’ items of kit that allow you to drastically cut your overall weight are: shelter, sleeping bag and rucksack. Reduce the weight of these and watch your packweight plummet.

Shelter

A 4-season mountain tent might look pretty cool, and withstand a storm on Annapura, but is it really necessary? There are several manufacturers of small pyramid shaped shelters, ranging from the Black Diamond Megamid to the Mountain Laurel Designs DuoMid via the Golite Shangri-La 3. This style of shelter has the advantage of being able to shed wind and snow well from all directions, as well as having fantastic, flexible living space and loads of headroom. There’s no built in floor, allowing you to dig down into snow (and create a nice living room with integrated sofas) cook and bring wet footwear inside. For solo use a half-floor allows you to maintain this vestibule area whilst having a clean and dry sleeping area.
Many people choose to use a lightweight water-resistant breathable bivvy bag inside single skin shelters to protect against any unexpected wind and/or precipitation that manages to infiltrate the shelter when the edges are raised for ventilation.

A key principle of lightweight travel is relevant to this style of shelter: multi-use items. Why carry tent poles that can only be used as tent poles? Trekking poles make a perfect adjustable centre pole. If packrafting, why not use the paddle? If you’ve got a packraft, why not sleep on the raft to supplement or replace your sleeping mat or groundsheet?

Sleeping

In almost all cases high quality down insulation is the way to go. The dilemma is bag or quilt? I’mm a year-round quilt user. But I’md advise caution here – rather than dive straight in and spend £400 on a Nunatak Arc Expedition quilt, spend some time sleeping in the outdoors under a normal unzipped sleeping bag to see how you like it. It just doesn’t suit everyone. Quilts offer weight savings by eliminating all the down that is compressed under your body. It doesn’t insulate, so why carry it?

For sleeping bags you can’t go wrong with a bag from Peter Hutchinson at PHD Mountain Software. Remember the multi-use principle? That applies here too. Why carry a down jacket only to take it off to get into your sleeping bag? By utilising your clothing you can use a far lighter sleeping bag and layer to suit the conditions. Too warm? Take off the jacket. Too cold? Put the jacket back on.

For long, cold expeditions a Vapour Barrier Liner should certainly be considered to prevent the water vapour released by your body from condensing within your insulation. If it’s cold enough, this vapour will freeze within the insulation and accumulate over several days to leave you shivering in a porridge-filled bag. Contrary to popular belief VBLs are not sweaty, and not like sleeping in a carrier bag. See Stephenson’s Warmlite for an admittedly fairly opinionated explanation of the concept.

Rucksack

Until the weight of the contents is known, it is hard to choose an appropriate vessel to carry it all in. Rest assured that for a long trip with limited resupply, the weight of the food will ensure that an ultralight, cuben rucksack just isn’t going to carry comfortably.

In selecting a rucksack, it’s important to avoid all the unnecessary straps, pockets and gimmicks in favour of the features that you really need. There really is no need for complex exoskeleton back systems that weigh upwards of 500g on their own. Again, multi-use comes to the fore – why not use the sleeping mat you’re already carrying folded inside the bag as additional (or even primary) back padding? Something like the GoLite Pinnacle (76 litre) is a superb pack for longer trips, and weighs in at under 1kg.

But the key with rucksacks, as with shoes, is fit – body shapes vary, so it’s essential to try on a rucksack loaded with a representative weight and check for rubbing or if it just doesn’t ‘feel’ right. Choosing your pack is a very personal choice, and one that really shouldn’t be made on the advice of a guy on the Internet. Hike your own hike.

If you are interested in learning more about ultralight backpacking, or if you have any questions, then please do visit my website. “