Fast and Light

A few months ago I took the Nemo on a fast and
light kayak camping trip. Since then I’ve started to think a bit more
about honing down my gear and apply backpacking’s ultralight concepts
to my paddle camping trips.You can read all about that on the CPA
website.

In this entry, I’ll detail the camping gear I used
and how it worked out. But first, why do even do ultralight when kayaks
have a near endless amount of storage space when compared to a
backpack? I can think ofthree good reasons:

1. Less to schlep up and down the beach every morning.


2. A lighter boat is easier to paddle and more responsive


3. Less time spent packing, unpacking and setting up camp means more
   time to enjoy the scenery, take a hike, cook a yummy dinner or whatever
   your favorite camp activity.

So I set out to lighten the load. Following is the list of gear I
used
on the trip with weights and comments.

Sleep system:

• MSR Hubba Tent and ground sheet, 3 lbs 4 oz, Worked like a champ.
  I was snug and warm despite temps in the 20s that night. The tent is
  tight so gear needs to go under the smallish vestibules or back in the
  boat.


• Sawtooth Long and stuff sack, 4 lbs, This is my down winterbag.
  It was heavy but worth the weight. I’d like to get a smaller, lighter
  bag for summer.


• Pro-lite 4 Regular, 1 lbs 8 oz, Worth every ounce.


• Pacific Outdoor Insulmat, 1 lb 6 oz, I know two pads? But when
  its going


• to be 20 degrees I opted for it anyway.


• Thermolite bag, 8.1 oz, This is a liner I use. It adds a bit of
  warmth but


• most importantly it helps take up space in the long sleeping bag
  to keep my


• feet warm

Kitchen:

• Gigapower Stove, 3 oz, Great little stove for boiling water.


• Snow peak 700 mug,4.8 oz, Main pot for boiling water.


• Titanium Mug, 2.8 oz, Coffee!


• Bunch of aluminum foil, 1 oz, Really helps to wrap the
  Mountainhouse meals


• in. Keeps the heat in the food rehydrating.


• Lexan knife, fork, spoon 1.6 oz, Does it all.


• 2 small fuel canisters, 7 oz, Fit inside the snowpeak much along
  with the


• stove.

CampClothes:

• Patagonia Mid-weight bottoms, 6.5 oz, Went with mid-weight which
  is lighter than I would normally take in these conditions but since I
  had the puffy pants risked it.


• Patagonia Long sleeve silk weight T, 4 oz, Good under the wool
  and doubledas a paddle shirt under by drysuit on day 2.


• Patagonia Wool 3 top, 6 oz, Better warmth to weight than my polar
  fleece stuff.


• Integral designs PLQ primaloft pant, 8.6 oz, and Moonstone Cirrus
  primaloft jacket, 14 oz, The pants are new and I highly recommend them.
  They are “puffy” like the jacket and incredibly warm. Great as part of
  a sleep system. Combined with my jacket and over base layers I was
  toasty even when the temperate hovered in the low 30’s.


• Hat, gloves, socks, 8 oz.


• Crocs, 7.5 oz, The perfect camp shoe.


• Full set rain gear, 3 lbs, Patagonia Supercell jacket and Rapid
  Style pants. I never took them out of the bag. For spring trips where I
  wasn’t in a drysuit but had a paddle jacket I would just bring that to
  double as paddle splash wear and rain wear.

Misc gear:

• Tikka XP headlamp, 3 oz, The one light was all I needed
  and a space saver over what I regularly take. I did have a small light
  on my PFD so there was some redundance in case one died.


• Optio W20 Camera,1 lb.


• Crazy Creek, 1 lb 10 oz, Pure luxury but in a kayak worth every
  ounce.


• Toiletries etc, 1 lbs, Toothbrush, Toothpaste, soap, sunscreen,
  notebook


• pen, etc.

Food:

• 3 lbs. This was a quick two day trip so food was minimal. Apples,
  cheese, powerbars, oatmeal, 1 mountainhouse meal, bread, snap
  peas,chocolate, coffee.

Grand Total, 25 lbs 4 oz.

All in all I felt that was pretty good. I could
definitely trim some weight from my sleeping system by ditching the
heavy Sawtooth sleeping bag and sticking with one sleeping pad instead
of two. The other big place to save weight is on therain gear since
this was basically duplicating the protection I could have gotten on
land by wearing my drysuit.

Of course I still had all the usual paddling gear
– PFD and attachments (knife, towbelt, light, compass, vhf, chapstick,
flares) and the boat, paddle, pump, sponge, drysuit,first aid kit, so
enabled me to skimp on the camping gear.

I’d love to try this again sometime during the
warmer months and see if I could get it even lighter!