Category: Going Lighter

Going Lighter

Why lighter backpacking?

I touch up on this a bit in my about section on this website, and I get the question quite a bit. Why should one go light? I think it’s pretty obvious really but I will try and break it down a bit. I will tell my story first and my move to the light side. It was about 5 years ago now when I made my first solo long distance hike – before that I had done a lot car camping and overnight stays, but never a long distance hike. I was going to walk 50 miles in 3 days. Not too long, but horrific with a heavy pack. Read More

Going Lighter

Going lighter – The first step

The first step:

I just got back from a week long hike in the Swedish mountains above the artic circle with a friend from Denmark. My friend Mike is nowhere near an ultralight hiker – or even a lightweight hiker for that matter; his bag alone weighs 3.6 kilos his tent closer to 2.5. Through no fault of his own of course, he just didn’t know any better. How could he? he was raised with the scouts and for him anything that was green and said fjällräven was of course the best way to go. Read More