Gear Mania

The last few years of the expedition we've focused more and more on preparing students for the trip by making sure they have the right clothing. On the one hand this helps make sure students are well dressed and ready to face the challenges of the expedition. On the other hand this gear-mania can at times be expensive and actually cloud the true purpose of the expedition.

For me the wonderful thing about backpacking is the freedom of wandering in the wilderness, seeing what the world is like at it's most basic and measuring myself against it. I see new things in myself and my companions when so much else is stripped away. There is a huge sense of satisfaction that comes from overcoming uncertainty together.

Having the right clothes should be a tool that allows us this experience, not an end in itself. Back in the day we used to call folks with matching outdoor clothes, "Outdoor Fashion Slaves," and pride ourselves on the functionality and utility of our gear.

To this day I love the prep and packing and shopping for a new piece of equipment. But in all of this we must not loose sight of the reason for it, the utility of it, and the purpose behind it.

Second Group Meeting

The sophomores met with their teacher and student leaders for the second time today. Today we talked about the trails, shelters and mountains we will be visiting and conducted the first round of clothing checks.

The routes are designed to balance beautiful terrain with managable mileage for our students. Each route is a little different and staff selected their routes carefully considering the strengths and weaknesses of their particular group. Each trail crosses a peak above 5000 feet and also includes a rest day in which little mileage is covered.

Here's a map of one of the routes - click on the picture to see it full size. You'll notice among other things that the distance between camp 2 and 3 is quite slight. That's the rest day I mentioned earlier.

Overall the routes vary between 8 and 11 miles total for the week. Here's Ted and student leader Leah talking about their trail. What's the matter Leah - not so sure snow will be off the trail by the end of May? Come on - think sun!
After learning more about where they would be hiking students were to show their teachers their core gear: long johns, rain gear, sleeping bag and boots. No worries that many students didn't have these items quite yet, we still have a few more weeks to get everything in! See our previous posts here for more info on layering and shopping. We're also setting up gear runs this weekend and next weekend to Concord. Jayne brought some gear with her today to show her group what she's looking for. We check all the student gear prior to the trip to make sure it will keep them warm and dry.
Jayne's group was pretty nervous during the first group meeting, but they seemed more confident, and asked great questions today.

Meanwhile behind the scenes we're packing gear, prepping food, hiring wilderness instructors and getting ready to go. It's a massive job to get the crews out the door and a lot of credit before we're even on the trail goes to Dave and Colleen who have been hard at work. Thanks y'all - I appreciate your work! My only question is who's going to be packing that sweet red fold out chair on the trail?
That was the second group meeting, one more to go and just about three weeks before the trip!

Clothing Suggestions

Hi folks - with the gear check coming up and much excitement and stress about having the right clothes I wanted first of all to let everyone know it's going to be just fine. We'll help make sure you have everything you need!

Also we have exciting news - for the first time we're able to give every student their own long john top prior to the expedition! We're very excited to be able to do this to help make sure everyone has at least one solid base layer.

Okay - all that being said having good clothes will help you be happy and healthy on the trail. The gear list is available to download on the right but I wanted to go a little further (thanks Russ for the idea) and give you specific links to products that would be great for the expedition. There certainly are better versions of all this gear out there, and more expensive ones as well, but if you had these items you'd be doing pretty good!

Sleeping Bag - $39.99
Boots - $79.99
Socks - $8.99
Sock Liners - $4.99
Long Underwear Tops & Bottoms - $10.99
Medium Insulating Top - $19.97
Heavy Insulating Top - $29.99
Warm Pants - $22.97
Rain Gear Jacket & Pants - $79.99
Warm Hat - $6.99
Mittens - $5.99

Notice that you don't need to have crazy expensive gear to get quality items. You'll also notice that backpack and sleeping pad are not on this list - that's because we provide them for you!

I hope that helps clear up some of the questions you might have - as always let me know if you have any concerns.

Tomorow is first round of clothing checks - stay tuned for more!

Dressing in Layers

Hi folks - the clothing check is coming up next week. Be sure to download and print the gear list if you don't already have it. Staff will be checking what you have and making a plan with you to get everything in.

Many folks have talked with me and asked why we have so many different layers on the clothing list instead of just a few big warm layers. Also many folks don't know quite what we mean by a medium weight fleece versus long underwear.

To answer your questions we made a little film for you to enjoy that will hopefully help us all be well dressed for the expedition - enjoy!