Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2016 13:21:24 GMT -8
My wife and I have considered going stoveless as a weight saving measure . In the summer of 2016, we had planned several trips going stoveless but decided to bring the stove for a warm dinner. Our breakfast and lunches have been stoveless for the last 2 years.
Two years ago we used the stove for dinner and coffee, this year we stopped using the stove for coffee, using caffine energy gels, and just went with a warm dinner.
My wife, summer 2016, did a 100ish mile, 5 day, solo trip where she went stoveless.
For me and my wife going the reduced route has not been a discomfort. I just asked my wife, she was not overly distressed by not using a stove on her solo trip.
I plan most of the meals for the trips we take and I find that there are meany enjoyable meals that can be had without the need for a stove.
We have tried various bars and have settled on Pemmican Bars for breakfast. We can strike camp and eat as we walk. By eating bars for breakfast we find we are packed and on the trail faster then when cooking a breakfast. We like getting up to get going in the morning.
We typically spend about 30 to 40 minutes at lunch. A no cook lunch allows us to eat and go.
A single 7.4 ounce canister provides, for my wife and I, 6 nights of dinner.
I know going no cook or reduced cook is a matter of choice and that there are pros and cons to each but no cook or reduced cook does not mean that the trip has to be one of suffering. And it feels dang great to have a gear weight of less than 11 pounds on my back.
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Post by paula53 on Dec 27, 2016 17:49:14 GMT -8
I am surprised that the PCT hikers as a whole did not use tarptent, or similar designed tents for their journey. They were originally designed for the long trails. Is that a trend that is coming to an end?
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zeke
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Peekaboo slot 2023
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Post by zeke on Dec 27, 2016 18:00:57 GMT -8
@idahowalker re: Stove fuel weight Is that 7.4 ounce canister the weight of the steel can as well as the gas within? I ask because switching to alcohol, and carrying it in a lighter container, will save you many ounces over a week. 1 ounce of alcohol per meal will boil 1 qt of water over a White Box stove. That fluid ounce of alcohol weighs less than an ounce. I also carry it in a recycled water bottle, with a wrap of duct tape to keep me from mistaking it for drinking water. When I used a Pocket Rocket, I could get 2 weeks of meals for 2 out of an 8 ounce steel canister of Iso-Pro. It was that 5 ounces of steel that convinced me to swap over to alcohol. Well, that and always knowing just how much fuel I had left. Partial canisters of gas required me to develop a way to track how much fuel was left inside.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Dec 27, 2016 18:09:56 GMT -8
zeke Yes, that is a 7.4 ounce fuel cansiter, full. Yes, I am a gram weenie and yes, the numbers of using an alcohol stove do remove a lot of grams. We get stuck on having an off switch. I put water in my pot with water and float the canister to get a measure of remaining fuel in the canister.
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daveg
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Michigan
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Post by daveg on Dec 27, 2016 21:08:01 GMT -8
Here in the west I only see old guys using alcohol stoves. Are they popular with younger hikers on the AT?
On my 26 day/190 mile AT hike this past summer I camped with over 100 different hikers (mostly young thru-hikers but not all). Besides myself, only two older hikers used alcohol stoves. A couple of guys hiking together cooked with a campfire every night they could but had a canister stove as a backup for when they could not. A couple of hikers were stoveless. But everyone else (90+ percent) used some sort of canister stove.
And like the PCT hikers, 90+ percent of the AT hikers I encountered were using the Sawyer Squeeze or Mini for water treatment. There was one group of four hikers that I saw using a gravity filter, but that was it. Several hikers used pump type filters. One hiker used UV treatment, one used drops, and one was not treating.
The other thing I noticed was the sizable number of hikers carrying cuben fiber dry bags. I didn't see many last year but they were quite common this year.
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rebeccad
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Post by rebeccad on Dec 27, 2016 23:00:35 GMT -8
We get stuck on having an off switch. It adds a half ounce or so, but I carry a can just a hair bigger than the alky stove. When I want to turn the stove off, I pop the can over it and it smothers it pretty much instantly. This saves more in fuel than it weighs on even a short trip, as it prevents ever having to let fuel just burn off. As soon as it's cooled, I dump the fuel back in the bottle. |
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RumiDude
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Marmota olympus
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Post by RumiDude on Dec 28, 2016 10:18:26 GMT -8
There are basically two ways to reduce pack weight, get lighter gear and take less gear. There is a slight bit of overlap in the two, but for the most part they each represent a different way. Getting lighter gear can often times be expensive and eventually the reduction in weight becomes minimal. Taking less gear can mean just doing without or making some gear do double or more duty, and this is where the comfort level kicks in.
Backpacking is by its nature doing with less than one has at home, after all you have to carry everything. So deciding to only take a spoon rather than knife fork and spoon saves weight but makes eating some things a bit more challenging. But that is an adjustment which is small and thus easy to make. And that is a mild example of what I call the fiddle-factor. And alcohol stove is another. As stated by RebeccaD, it takes some cajoling to get an alcohol stove to work properly. By comparison, a canister stove is very easy to use. And this is where the HYOH comes in. One doesn't need to convince everyone else that their way is better, they only need to state that they prefer that way. I will fiddle around with my tent which is not free-standing and let you fiddle around with your alcohol stove.
I know I have changed my mind about gear and food choices many times and undoubtedly will change again in the future. I can remember eating the same thing every day for almost two weeks while backpacking. I hope I never try that again. I did it and it was very simple but ...
Anyway, back to the PCT thru-hiker survey results. I have found many thrus and section hikers carry standard tents like Big Agnes, REI, MSR, Mtn Hardware, etc. Often times it's because they just go with what they got. The same goes for the other gear choices. Many people only have enough money to make one or two significant gear changes for their PCT journey. Many don't do as much research as most of us do. Many have little or no backpacking experience. That is just my unscientific yet somewhat experienced mental survey.
Rumi <~~~~~mental
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