I had a 2 night camp coming up and visitors coming to stay the night before so I hastily packed a rucksack with the essentials for late autumn camping. I haven't hiked in and camped for years so I expected I would over pack - it's just natural to do so. So, I treated that first pack as a necessary mistake and would repack it while I chatted with my visitors. Rather than an article about loadouts, this is an article about how I trimmed my pack weight. As with all outdoors gear articles, the value is in the reasoning behind choices because you must decide what suits your activity, style, skills and climate conditions.
Here is my monster pack at 25kg (55lbs): it's heavy. I expected a 45min night hike along an easy track. Yes, I could have carried this pack if I needed to, but why risk it? I was fortunate one visitor, my uncle, is an experienced Bushman and he helped a lot.
Here's the contents of the pack excluding most of the sleep system. Going from top-left we can see, a fold out Bundeswehr style sleeping pad, underneath that is a pouch carrying a memorial flag, an inflatable pillow, food bag, tools/possibles bag, poncho, steel water bottle, dump pouch and load strap, ball of twine, PSK, Serbian mess kit pot and bowl, 2x2m tarp, Powerbank and charger, warm base-layers hat and gloves, inflatable mat, magic puzzle, and tent and poles.
That's a lot of gear: all important categories covered, but over covered. Time to start trimming.
Gone: I like these rice packets, but at 250g for only 400 calories these are too heavy. Replaced with one instant noodle, Harcho soup mix, and some OSM bars. For the weight of one rice pack that is half a meal, I got a couple of meals worth of food instead.
Gone: pillow and pouches. Replaced by a smaller airplane pillow and a spare sleeping bag sack. The food was in the MOLLE II Waistpack which is great, but too heavy. The possibles bag was unnecessary too. Food, tools and first aid all went into one light sack. I left behind a memorial flag that I keep in a grenade pouch and the dump pouch I intended to use as a haversack.
Gone: ECWS / MSS bivvy cover, Bundeswehr style folding mat and Israeli army wool blanket. Kept: green patrol bag from the ECWS / MSS sleep system, fleece bag liner, and USMC poncho liner (woobie). I had bought enough to both bivvy camp and tent camp. Why kid myself? My first time out in years I should just tent camp. The wool blanket was extremely heavy and only gets heavier in damp conditions. The green patrol bag is too light weight for the expected overnight lows so a fleece liner and woobie were essential.
Gone: peg and guy line kit for tarp, black bungy cord for tarp, collapsible drinking cup, medical tape, Milo (chocolate drink) powder, spare gas cannisters. I wasn't tarp camping and if it unexpectedly rained I could still fly a tarp to provide outdoors shelter by using the contents of my possibles kit. I would drink from my Serbian army mess kit bowl and eat directly from the pot. All of my food could be eaten uncooked if necessary and the water from the nearby stream was potable even though everybody boiled or purified it as a precaution. So, no need for extra gas.
Stainless steel bottles are heavy. I carry them to have something metal to boil water in, but I already had a pot and my PSK has a metal cup. This bottle has a very small mouth which is hard to refill. Replaced with a sports drink bottle I've been using for a couple of years now.
Gone: MOLLE II Rucksack large with an attached Waistpack. Over 4kg just for the pack - yeah it's a monster that'll haul loads but weight is weight.
And here's the final load out sans an extra fleece top strapped to the side. This pack is a USGI MOLLE II 3 Day Assault Pack Airborne model with about 30 litres of space. Tent on outside of pack, sleeping bag and fleece bag liner slung below using a long load strap (woobie in the pack helping fill void spaces). The load strap became my tool belt in camp. The sleeping gear is not compressed because size wasn't a issue but I did have a plastic bag internally to keep the sleeping gear dry.
Here's the front of the pack. The hike in would be at night so the grenade pouch on the strap carried my headlamp. The water bottle carried a minimal amount of water for the hike in because there was water at camp. This load out, including food and water, was 14kgs (31lbs)
Here's the load just as I packed it before leaving camp. The blue wash cloth is on the outside to dry off. And, same with the poncho because I'd spread the poncho over the wet grass and used it to sort my gear out upon.
Could I save more weight? Yes, of course. An even lighter pack is probably a wise purchase, especially because the paratrooper pack rides high on the back to fit over military webbing. I could take less tools, but I did use them all. I could use a lighter cook system than the Serbian Army pot and bowl. I could use a smaller power pack because I only needed to recharge my phone once. I could use a lighter tent and carry lighter food.
But still, 10kgs off a packweight made for a very comfortable hike in. I'll have more posts about the camp itself later.