Building your Gear Kit

If you are just starting to backpack, your first job is to get in backpacking condition.

If you have already done that, then we've got to build your gear kit.

Your 1st Considerations

Is your first consideration, not mine. Is your budget an issue? Do you have a propensity to get very cold? Do you have any particular physical issues that must be considered? You must consider all of the issues that define your personal backpacking gear needs.

Building your High Sierra Backpacking Gear Kit

How to approaching building your backpacking Gear Kit

Your gear kit is 1/3 of what externally defines you as a backpacker. One look at a person's kit, their gait, and the look in their eyes reveals almost everything about a backpacker's perspective on the wilderness, their physical condition, and their motivation.

You must look at building your kit from a perspective that suits your personality, your physical capabilities, and your values as a person, as these elements determine what gear selections best suit your capabilities and approach the very real physical requirements of the High Sierras. In other words, you've gotta watch out for any unrealistic or assumptions you may have about nature or about yourself.

Bad assumptions have matching extremes. One end of this extreme is represented by ultralight backpackers who believe that their insufficient shelter, their too-thin of sleeping bag, their too light of layering, and their thin footwear are sufficient for the weather extremes that the High Sierras are capable of instantly producing. A week of fierce cold rains and snow threatens the lives of under prepared hikers. These same storms provide well prepared backpackers with an exhilirating oppertunity to exercise their skills and gear. You must assure that your gear is sufficient for a worst case scenario, not just for optimal conditions.

At the other end of the spectrum are those who pack too heavy. I have seen too many backpackers pack everything and the kitchen sink, and critically over burden themselves. My favorites were the buch of country dudes who brought cast iron skillets, axes, and a cut down full-sized shovel onto a long trip along the John Muir Trail. Really. They made the best out of the situation by using the shovel to bury the skillets and axes. Pack lightened!

The heavy over- packers suffer from the constant pains of a too heavy pack, and exhaustion can be a serious threat at high altitude. Insufficient packers are at the mercy of the weather.

Practicality is the watchword for well-constructed kits. Not too much, and not too little. In my case that requires serious practical budget considerations. Money equals weight in the backpacking world. Budget considerations cannot in any way compromise my security in the High Sierras during any season. If I don't have the right gear, I don't go. But I'm a lucky backpacking bum. Let's put together a backpacker bum's kit.

The Rookie Hiking and Health Plan

This site's goal for novice backpackers is to bring a novice from the couch to the crest. Specifically, to get you on the Sierra Nevada Crest hiking one of the classic long trails between Lake Tahoe and Mount Whitney.

Assess your level of fitness, your injury history, and the selection of gear you have at your disposal. This assessment will determine the start point of your hunt for gear and the fitness to use it.

As I suggest above, non-hikers should set a goal and have a pragmatic plan to achieve it. My goal is to get you ready the hike between Tahoe and Whitney.

Every time I break something on my body or in my gear kit, I have a process to remedy the loss.

Physically, you must first recover from injury, and be ready for rehabilitation, otherwise known as training. We used to call it work.

Start with light streatching, light weight-lifting, and short local walks. Carefully monitor the response of the injury. Back off with inflamation and pain, increase work with successful completition of your current level of training. Gear acquisition is much less precise a science.

Gear selection should be made carefully.

Start studying boots, and when oppertunity strikes, get some nice light-to-medium boots. Add a small day pack, and begin to collect up the backpacking gear that you can use to support some nice car camping. This way you can bring your hikes to the next level, and launch your day hikes from a free National Forest car camping site along the Sierra Crest. If you are not in proximity of the Sierra Crest, bring yourself to your nearest wilderness location where you can car camp.

Car camping is free in National Forests, and no permit is required, though you will need a fire permit for you stove in the High Sierra. Check your local National Forest for information on their car camping oppertunities.

The goal here is to get you fit, get you some basic gear, and get yourself familiar with how to comfortably deploy and use that gear. You will sit in camp and figure out how your layers, your tent, your stove, and sleeping bag work for you. Your day hiking will improve your fitness, break in your boots, and allow you to explore the local areas where you will execute your first backpacking trip.

The classic goal of a long distance backpacker is to have the capacity to hike all day, from before sunrise to just before sunset, for 5 days between days off. This will give you the capacity to walk between 100 and 125 miles on a five day food load. This will be really important if you hope to hike the John Muir Trail. The distance between your last resupply at Muir Ranch and the Whitney is around 132 miles, off the top of my head. Having this physical capacity will allow you to hike most any long distance trail in the country.

Use the Summer time backpacking gear list as a shopping list. The plan is to have your fitness, your camping skills, your familarity with a local backpacking area, and gear all come together simultanously for a wonderful first backpacking experience. This is especially important for kids and first time backpackers.

People who have not accustomed themselves to walking with a backpack are going to have a hard time, and this will only be magnified by altitude and inclination. Think of your worse experience in PE or Boot Camp, then think about it at 10,000 feet. It is pain itself. If you match that pain and exhaustion up with new boots and blisters, you can drive a kid, rookie backpacker, or yourself off the trail forever.

So bring your fitness, your skills, your local knowledge, and your gear all up to speed before hitting the mountains. If you are already a runner, a bicycilist, or are otherwise aerobically fit, you will not be immune from backpacking specific stresses and strains, but you will adjust quickly if you the proper

For instance, let's look at the most expensive gear of all, Winter Gear. My $230 Zamberlin mountain boots were bought at an REI end-of-season returns sale. When they used to hold those. I had my boot gear kit in my citidiot tennis shoes. I pulled out the inserts, popped them into the frkn expensive boots, and Voila!! The boots fit perfectly, and I bought a $230 set of the baddest-assed mountain boots for $32 dollars.

My North Face Mountain Jacket, $270 retail, was purchased for $99 as a return from the Berkeley North Face Outlet. I did exactly the same thing with my Winter Mountain Pants. It took me a long time to find the right gear. But this should not be a worry. Sometimes it takes as long to to build the skills and experience required to use the gear properly, as it does to find the high quality gear you need on the cheap.

If you're rolling in bucks, don't let your desires overwhelm you capacities. Don't buy what you don't need or can't use.

My philosophy, and yours too, should require that you personally have proper shelter, proper insulation, safe water, and copious amounts of good food. You should be able to carry this load over long distances in all conditions. And, you should also be able to provide those resources to a downed backpacker in an emergency situation. Others take quite a different approach, failing to provide for even their own basic needs.

Never carry too much, Never carry too little. Check out the following gear sections for more information.

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Building your High Sierra Backpacking Gear Kit

Getting Started Index

Getting Started: Backpacking

1) Training/Physical preperation

1a) Streaching
1b) Walking
1c) Running
1d) Weights
1e) Resting
1f) Drugs
1g) Hitting the Trail: Testing your Shit

) Local Trails

) Sierra Trails

Getting Started: Backpacking Equipment

2) Gathering the proper equipment
Clothing

2a) Pack
2b) Boots or Shoes?
2c) Socks
2d) Camp/River Shoes

2d) Pants
2e) Shirts
2f) Insulation
2a) Uppers
2b) Lowers
2g) Rain/Wind Shell
2h) Gloves
2i) Hats
2j) Ear Warmer
2k) Face Protection

) Misc

First aid kit

) Camp Gear

a) Tents
b) Sleeping bags
c) Sleeping pads
d) Stoves
e) Cooking Gear
f) Water filtration
g) Water storage
h) Bear Protection

4) FOOD

Getting Started: Planning for Tahoe to Whitney
Resupply

1) Determine Route
2) Determine Distances
3) Determine Campsites
4) Determine Days Off
5) Determine Days for trip
6) Determine resupply points
7) Purchase Food
8) Distribute Food into resupply buckets
9) Shipping

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Background

About me:

I remember getting my first backpack in 1966 or so, it was an old school wood and canvas job. I remember the pancho and peacoat phase, and the invention of goretex. My first alum camp trails pack frame lasted me 21 years before the airlines broke the frame on the way to hike the NaPali coast of Kauai in the early '90s.

I buy the best gear that does the job that I can afford. Good sources of affordable gear are the North Face Oulet store, and the REI returns sales, where you can get low cost top quality used gear.

I customize, maintain, and replace my gear as necessary.

I am trying to keep a full four season High Sierra kit together, but things fall apart. I'm constantly working on something. Right now the whole webbing set up of my external frame pack, including the custom shoulder and sternum straps, are shredded.

I loaned by old North Face soft shell internal framed pack to a "friend," who promptly lost it. I'm still keeping my eyes open for a replacement, but this was an irreplacable piece of early North Face gear from the early 1970s. The North Face was my Winter and Climbing pack.

(Teo Christos is an unreliable, untrustworthy person, who you should not trust, nor loan a grain of salt, let alone a treasured piece of your equiupment. Beware of GREEDY people with corrupted spirits.)

At the present I have no Winter pack, and my Summer pack is hurting.

I built my gear kit as I built my skills, starting with basic wool insulation and shell layers that were sufficient for Summer Backpacking.

I am what would be called a heavy-weight backpacker. On August 28, 2009, I exited the Whitney Portal ending my 4th complete Lake Tahoe to Mount Whitney trip. There's a hang scale on the wood structure marking the trailhead. My pack weighed 37 lbs with not a bit of food in it.

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Gear Selections

The Basic Set-Up

Building your Kit

Boot Basics

Upper Body

Lower Body

Gear Seasons List

Summer

Spring & Fall

Winter

Your Base Layer

Your base layer is the layer that sits next to your skin. This is the layer that you will wear for the duration of your trip.

Your base layer must reflect the fundamental degree of insulation you require for daily travel through the terrain. Your base layer is your fundamental protection against the elements, and must accurately reflect the conditions you will experience.

Your base layer must also

During Summer, Spring, and Fall my base layer is a pair of nylon zip to shorts pants, and a thin polyester tank top.

This thin layer reflects the huge amount of heat that you generate carrying pack in the Sierras. This base layer can be instantly supplemented with the required addition: if the temps drop, the long sleeved poly is instantly applied. Rain brings out the shell.

During Winter, I employ a thin polyester thermal base layer on both upper and lower body. If the conditions are really cold, I supplement that with a second medium weight polyester layer.

These are the layers that I plan on hiking in, so if I over layer, I will have to strip a layer off to avoid sweating out.

Note that your base layer is NOT designed to keep you warm when stopped, only to keep you comfortable while hiking. When you stop, make camp or lunch, you may have to immediatly employ the proper insulation layering for the temp.

In Summertime, early Fall, and late Spring my lower body base layer is Zip to Shorts nylon pants. more

Your Insulation Layer

Your insulation layers sits between your base layer and your shell. Your insulation layer must reflect the degree of insulation you will require while sitting in camp at night during the worst conditions the Sierras throw at you.

In Summer time, my lower body insulation layers consist of one additional layer above my zip to shorts pants: Medium weight fleece pants. more

Your Shell Layer

Your shell is your external wind and water proof layer. During Summer an ultralight approach is sufficient for both upper and lowers, but a medium weight coat and pants may be substituted. During Winter I highly recommend heavy-weight uppers and lowers.

Serious high winds at low temps cut right through light and medium shells. Never rely on light weight gear in mid-Winter in the High Sierras.

There is a point in each snowy Spring when the temps rise, and the Winter shell can be replaced with the lightweight gear. The same is true with the onset of Fall. A light shell can be run deep into Fall, until that point in time when the temps drop, and heavy Winter gear becomes mandatory.

If you are unsure about seasonal change in the Sierras, always bring the heavier Winter Gear.

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Meeks Bay to Echo Summit / Segment: Camp at Highway 50