Here’s a detailed gear list and weights from my Cairngorms trip. Apologies for the less than perfect formatting, but WordPress doesn’t seem to like cutting and pasting from excel.
| kg | in pounds | ||
| Clothes | 2.29 | 5.04 | |
| Equipment | 7.34 | 16.14 | |
| Base weight | 9.63 | 21.18 | |
| Consumables | 0.77 | 1.69 | |
| Food | 4.44 | 9.77 | |
| Total weight | 14.83 | 32.63 | |
| Clothes worn | Wt | No. | Sub total |
| Paramo Viento Jacket | 870 | 1 | 0.87 |
| Montane Terra trousers | 354 | 1 | 0.35 |
| Leki Carbon Poles (x2) | 380 | 1 | 0.38 |
| Icebreaker Kent | 177 | 1 | 0.18 |
| Adidas running shorts | 98 | 1 | 0.10 |
| Smartwool thick socks | 80 | 1 | 0.08 |
| Jack Wolfskin cap | 52 | 1 | 0.05 |
| Smartwool mini crew socks | 46 | 1 | 0.05 |
| 2.06 | |||
| Clothes | Wt | No. | Sub total |
| Berghaus Infinity Light smock | 310 | 1 | 0.31 |
| Nike Mayfly | 250 | 1 | 0.25 |
| Smartwool zip | 236 | 1 | 0.24 |
| Lowe Apline Dryflo powerstretch tights | 230 | 1 | 0.23 |
| Berghaus Extrem overtrousers | 212 | 1 | 0.21 |
| Montane sportwool long sleeve | 166 | 1 | 0.17 |
| Sealskinz long socks | 120 | 1 | 0.12 |
| Montane featherlite pants | 112 | 1 | 0.11 |
| Trekmates gaiters | 106 | 1 | 0.11 |
| Montane featherlite smock | 88 | 1 | 0.09 |
| Smartwool thick socks | 80 | 1 | 0.08 |
| Lowe Alpine mountain cap | 75 | 1 | 0.08 |
| Extremities Velo gloves | 70 | 1 | 0.07 |
| M&S Microskin hipsters | 58 | 1 | 0.06 |
| Smartwool mini crew socks | 46 | 1 | 0.05 |
| Microfibre buff | 38 | 1 | 0.04 |
| Polartech buff | 37 | 1 | 0.04 |
| Outdoor designs polartech inners gloves | 29 | 1 | 0.03 |
| MH Beanie | 26 | 1 | 0.03 |
| 2.29 | |||
| Equipment | Wt | No. | Sub total |
| Akto tent | 1,617 | 1 | 1.62 |
| Golite Quest | 1,423 | 1 | 1.42 |
| Alpkit Pipedream 400 | 740 | 1 | 0.74 |
| Old Thermarest 3/4 light | 457 | 1 | 0.46 |
| Stuff sacks | 430 | 1 | 0.43 |
| Snow Peak + pans/windshield | 359 | 1 | 0.36 |
| Washkit inc shaver | 335 | 1 | 0.34 |
| Aladdin insulated flask | 250 | 1 | 0.25 |
| Inov8 RacePro pack | 200 | 1 | 0.20 |
| Olympus Mju 770SW camera | 174 | 1 | 0.17 |
| Aquagear survivor | 144 | 1 | 0.14 |
| Mobile phone | 121 | 1 | 0.12 |
| 1st aid kit | 113 | 1 | 0.11 |
| Thin foam pad (sleep mat) | 112 | 1 | 0.11 |
| Mapcase | 100 | 1 | 0.10 |
| Garmin Gecko 101 | 85 | 1 | 0.09 |
| Toilet trowel | 73 | 1 | 0.07 |
| Silva ADC | 70 | 1 | 0.07 |
| MSR towel | 63 | 1 | 0.06 |
| Olympus WS-331 MP3 player | 61 | 1 | 0.06 |
| Note pad | 58 | 1 | 0.06 |
| Antigravity Gear Cozy | 54 | 1 | 0.05 |
| Folding bowl | 50 | 1 | 0.05 |
| Platypus 2L | 42 | 1 | 0.04 |
| 250ml Pee bottle | 38 | 1 | 0.04 |
| Compass | 30 | 1 | 0.03 |
| Petzl e+lite | 27 | 1 | 0.03 |
| Highland Spring bottle | 25 | 1 | 0.03 |
| Next folding sunglasses | 24 | 1 | 0.02 |
| Sporteyz | 19 | 1 | 0.02 |
| Long spoon | 17 | 1 | 0.02 |
| Pen | 17 | 1 | 0.02 |
| Light My Fire spork | 10 | 1 | 0.01 |
| 7.34 | |||
| Consumables etc | Wt | No. | Sub total |
| 250 gas cannister | 375 | 1 | 0.38 |
| 100 gas canister | 170 | 1 | 0.17 |
| maps | 111 | 2 | 0.22 |
| 0.77 |
Good load there not to heavy, what would you leave behind next time?
I could reduce the clothes a bit. The big diffference in weight would be switching my pack to a GG Mariposa Plus (more news on that later) and using the Laser Comp. That would save me 1.5kg. I could also use a lighter sleeping bag. I thought it too risky to take my WM HighLite. If I could justify it an intermediate bag between the HighLite and the PD400 might be appropriate (ME Xero 250?). I’m not going to use a meths stove as I like the convenience of gas. I could probably leave some gadgets behind and some odds and ends. Also I could have made some savings on food weight (no chocolate and peanut bars!). I could probably save a bit on stuff sacks as well, but they all tot up! All in all I think I could push the weight down by 2-3kg.
I like to have enough gear to cope with almost any eventuality, especially when I’m on my own, so that limits the weight savings.
A shameless plug I know but if you’re after a ME Xero,then I have a brand new one for sale on E Bay.It’s a great bag but I simply have too much gear and need to raise funds for a forthcoming trip.
The little things do add up. Hard to get the balance right if you like a bit of comfort in camp vs the weight in the bag on the trail. I tried an esbit stove last week and agree with you that gas is the way, clean simple and quick. I’ll look out for that GG Mariposa Plus review.
Have fun
Trenthamwalker, very tempting but a purchase of yet another sleeping bag may disrupt domestic harmony!
great set of trip reports – hanks
When I saw your recent pictures of the Quest with stuff strapped outside it I thought ‘that’s a hell of a lot of gear…’. Perhaps it came from the clothes section: I only ever take one set of spare socks, and that’s it. Outside winter I use my LiteSpeed pack which is 49l + big mesh pocket.
The list doesn’t mention a pack liner: is that included in ‘Stuff-sacks’?.
Another thing people never seem to mention is ‘valuables’: my pouch is a significant weight, including car keys, house keys and cards.
When we see all these gear lists it would be interesting to discover the all-up weight of the loaded pack, I’ll bet it would be significantly more than the sum of all the listed items – probably in my case too!.
I’ll have to publish my lists and see how they compare. I have 3 Excel spreadsheets for Summer, Winter and Spring/Autumn.
I used mainly Alpkit Apollo stuff sacks. They always make gear look more bulky when it’s unpacked. For my sleeping bag, I used a Mountain Equipment waterproof compression sack, which is a bit on the heavy side but doubles as a pillow. I also used some Exped roll top bags for some bits and pieces. I didn’t use a packliner. The only thing I didn’t count was a plastic sandwich box. I’m afraid I’m a terrible packer, so I usually need more volume that you might think.
Actually there wasn’t much lashed to the outside: my Viento jacket (when not worn), the thin foam sleeping mat and sometimes my Mayflys if they needed to dry. I also carry a map on one shoulder strap and a water bottle on the other. The tent was under the lid pocket.
I didn’t need to take keys and made sure I wasn’t taking much in the way of coins. Using a hand held weigher the total packweight was a shade over 15kg, so very close to the individual weights where I used some digital postroom scales (Salter).