My dad's buddy Phil shut down my whole pack weight theory in 5 minutes

I was bragging to him about my new 30 liter pack with a base weight under 10 pounds, thinking I had it all figured out. He just looked at me and asked when I last carried more than 2 liters of water on a trail. I said never really, I just filter along the way. Then he pointed out that my ultralight setup fell apart if I did a dry canyon route where water caches were 15 miles apart. He had a point. I've been so focused on grams that I forgot about real world conditions like carrying extra weight for actual trips. Now I'm wondering if I need a middle ground pack for those situations. Has anyone else had to rethink their whole system after talking to an old school hiker?

2 comments

2 Comments

hernandez.brooke13d agoTop Commenter

Bruh Phil just roasted the whole UL movement with one question. RIP your gram counting.

lee62713d ago

Three years of tracking macros down to the gram and Phil's question just hit me like a truck @hernandez.brooke. He got right to the heart of it - nobody I know has ever actually maintained that level of counting forever. It's like we all pretend the endgame doesn't exist while we're in the grind. The hard truth is sustainability matters more than perfect numbers. Makes me wonder if anyone here has kept it up for more than a couple years.