PCT - Gear I reached Canada with List MarcelHikes

  •   Category Weight
  • BIG 4
    2299 g
  • Cooking & Storing
    213 g
  • Clothing
    556 g
  • First aid, toiletries, Misc.
    303 g
  • Water system
    150 g
  • Electronics
    585 g
  • Navigation & survival pack
    100 g
  • Accessoires
    338 g
  • Worn
    1696 g
  • Extra's
    30 g
  • Camera gear
    831 g
  • Total 7101
    g
    • oz
    • lb
    • g
    • kg
  • Consumable 899 g
  • Worn 1546 g
  • Base Weight 4656 g

My “consumables” are items that end up in front of me—either in my fanny pack or hanging on the front. This setup helps distribute weight more evenly.

Overview of my gear list, with a few remarks: • The Bear Vault is excluded. You can rent one in Kennedy Meadows South. It worked fine and saved me some money, but it weighs 1.16 kilos (ouch). • Changed sleeping pad: I switched to a wide sleeping pad. The weight increased by 160 grams, but sleep quality improved by 1000%. Totally worth it. • Changed tent in Oregon: I loved cowboy camping and hiking long days, so I didn’t spend much time in camp. The tent itself was great, but Dyneema doesn’t compress well and takes up a lot of volume. I couldn’t ditch my shelter due to mosquitoes. A bivy got me as close to cowboy camping as possible. • Ditched the stove: Yep—I cold-soaked my food all the way from Northern California to Canada. No regrets. • Ditched batteries: Four camera batteries were overkill. • Ditched lens filters: I only used them about once a week, which wasn’t worth the weight penalty. • Fizan trekking poles: Hated them. They collapsed two to three times a day, and both broke before the end of the trail. My tip: don’t go ultralight on trekking poles—choose comfort and durability. You hike with them anyway, so it’s not like you’re carrying dead weight.

General tips: • Pick your gear before you pick your pack. This ensures you end up with the right pack size. • For couples, seriously consider buying your own gear. You get dirty, sweaty, and smelly on trail, and sharing space can be tough. Also, don’t rely on each other for critical items like food or water—make sure each of you can safely rely on your own setup. • For couples (shelter): I recommend avoiding Dyneema tents. While they’re ultralight, they’re single-wall tents, which means condensation can be an issue. More people equals more condensation and less wiggle room. If you don’t want to wake up with a soaked sleeping bag from each other’s condensation, consider a silnylon or nylon tent. My recommendation is a regular double-wall Durston tent. When you split the outer and inner shells, each person ends up carrying less weight than someone hauling a two-person Dyneema tent 😉. • Don’t only look at weight—also consider volume. A bigger, wider sleeping bag can easily take up 2–3 extra liters. Dyneema tents are great but don’t compress as well as nylon. My bivy and tarp saved me about 3 liters of internal pack volume. • On longer trails, consider camp shoes. I bought Teva sandals for the Sierra and ended up carrying them all the way to Canada. • After a few weeks on trail, you’ll have a much better sense of what you actually need. Most people end up ditching items; some end up buying more. I had hiking experience, so my setup was fairly dialed in, but it still took about six weeks before I went more ultralight—at the cost of some comfort (ditching the stove, water bladders, etc.). • I’m already swapping gear around for future trips. I didn’t use the full volume of my pack and ended up with too much unused space. My plan is to switch to a smaller, frameless pack.