First backpacking trip for 6 yr old boy

My son happily slept on a closed foam pad for a long time. A Thermarest Z-Lite in the short length. Light and manageable bulk.

If you have any kind of budget, the sleeping bag is where I would put it, and I would get a down one to be as light and compact as possible. My son started out using one of my hand-me-down down bags. I'm a 5'2" woman so my gear is relatively small and I found that adult "women's" gear was usually lighter than gear labeled for "kids", and almost always better quality. You might consider trying to buy a good quality *used* women's down bag instead of a new kids' bag. If you have a bigger budget, Enlightened Equipment makes down youth quilts that are super light and their prices are very reasonable for what you get.

My son was a really picky eater and food was a challenge. In my experience though, kids seem perfectly happy eating the *same* thing day after day. Mine loved the Mountain House Lasagna; he literally ate that every night of the trip. Anything "Italian-ish" worked for him. Breakfasts were harder since he didn't like oat meal. I took a big bag of Cheerios and peanut butter and made Cheerio-PB "balls" (Cheerios held together with a blob of PB.) I never worried about nutrition on the trail, just made sure he had enough calories. We have a tradition of taking gummy bears. He's 18 now and we still hike together and we still take gummy bears.

I'm the mom (and it looks like you are, too) and, for me, carrying a 50lb pack wasn't an option, so I really concentrated on outfitting *both* of us lightweight as possible. He used (and wore) a lot of my hand-me-downs and I upgraded my gear -- for us, this strategy worked better in the long run than outfitting him with less expensive kids gear. He was able to use all the gear until he outgrew me and started replacing items with adult men's sizes.

Great advice here.

I found some old lists of what my boys carried, over the course of several years. They started out with tiny REI Little Teton Packs, and graduated to Deuter Fox 30, then 40, and finally adult-sized packs when they were well into their teens (mine were small for their ages and slow to grow).


Here's the list. As a note, the older boy is an October baby, so his summer age is 3/4 past the year, while the younger was a May boy, so on our trips he was barely the listed age.

On the 2004 Sangre de Cristos trip (3 nights, 13 or 14 miles total), the boys (ages 5 &6) carried in their (Little Teton) packs:
Rain pants
Wind breaker
Stuffies and little cars
Water
2 energy bars each

Eldest Son carried his fleece jacket, and we should have added:
Flashlight
Whistle

In 2005 (ages 6 & 7) they carried the same plus I think all their clothing, which is about all their packs would hold.

2006, Weminuche (5 nights) (ages 7 & 8). They carried (in the new Deuter Fox 30 packs):
All their clothing
Stuffies & little cars
Notepads, pens, and a book
Water (lemonade)
Bag of candy
Whistle
Pack cover
Bowls, cups, plates, spoons for all (Eldest Son had most of this)

2007, Sawtooths (6 nights) (ages 8 & 9):
All their clothing
Stuffies & little cars
Notepads, pens, and a book
Water (lemonade)
Bag of candy
Whistle
Headlamps
Pack covers
Bowls, cups, plates, spoons for all (Second Son, mostly)
Cookpot (Second Son, for the first 2 days; move to my pack when we'd eaten enough to make room)
Sleeping bag (Eldest Son)

This was the first trip when they charged ahead of us on long climbs, looking back to mock our plodding progress.


I can't find specific lists for the next couple of years (we continued doing week-long trips every summer), but from there out they were carrying all their own personal gear, and a little food, while we carried their tent until they were about 10 or so. I carried their closed-cell foam pads until they got the larger packs around 2011, just because of the bulk which didn't fit on the little packs. I don't think they were carrying their full share until high school. But bear in mind that at age 10, Eldest Son weighed 55 lbs fully clothed, and was about 4'2". His younger brother was about the same size (at the same time; i.e. 18 months younger).


I want to comment on food, as Eldest Son has food issues. I found that it was a constant frustration, as what tasted good at home or on a previous trip might be rejected. I ended up packing LOTS of granola bars, as a go-to for him whenever a meal didn't work, and feeding both boys lots of candy, which was partly just a bribe to make backpacking extra special, as they virtually never got candy at home. From an early age I let them pick out (from left-over Halloween candy) what they wanted to take, and they were in charge of portioning it out for themselves. It worked well!

Sleeping bag: we started with "kids" bags, but because they were synthetic and cheaper, they were bulkier and heavier than an adult bag, so once we were securely past bed-wetting, we just put them in adult down bags. You can fold under or tie off the end if it's too much space and makes them cold.

Pads: closed-cell foam until they were teens and we upgraded our own to Neo-Air pads and gave them the self-inflating pads.

Check the Kids' forum here for possible used gear. All our kids' packs are floating around in the forum-o-sphere somewhere.

:( Hope she comes and sees this!

When I'm camping or hiking with my son I always make sure to bring him a chair for him to sit when he's tired or just to sit and enjoy the nature and he loves it! campsandtrails.com/best-kids-camping-chairs/ I got him the Kelsyus Kid’s Canopy Chair. It's lightweight, made of heavy-duty steel and it's very easy to set it up!

For ticks the best reppelant is permethrin:

www.walmart.com/c/ep/permethrin

Lots and lots of snacks