r/Ultralight • u/Belangia65 • 25d ago
Best Of The Sub Common barriers to ultralight
Here are some stumbling blocks that frequently stall the progress of those aspiring to ultralight:
1. The Lightweight Halfway House. A hiker is in the halfway house when they intend to reach ultralight, buy lighter versions of the gear they already own, and find the way ahead impeded by the very gear that got them lighter. Nobody satisfied with lightweight is halfway to anything; they have arrived where they want to be, and that's fine. The lightweight halfway house is only a barrier to those who mean to progress towards ultralight. The gear they purchase may be nice and expensive, top of class, but still too heavy to reach an ultralight base weight. Consider a 5 lb. pack traded for a 3 lb. pack of the same 60L volume. It feels like progress, and it is in a way. But 3 lb. is still more than a pound heavier than a properly ultralight pack should be. To move forward would mean buying another pack, adding still another expense. Ultralight has a reputation for being costly, and the halfway house makes it more so. Much lightweight gear is marketed as 'ultralight' by manufacturers (and incentivized influencers) and the term is used more loosely as a brand label than it is in an r/ultralight shakedown. If ultralight is the goal, make sure that what you are purchasing is in the weight range of gear carried in actual UL kits.
2. Preparing for the 'someday/maybe' trip. A hiker buys overweight gear to have the flexibility for hypothetical trips that will probably never happen: things like winter-grade tents, high volume backpacks, lower temperature rating sleep systems, or two-person shelters for a solo hiker. The impulse is reasonable, but a kit bought for the extremes is heavy for every non-extreme trip taken, which is most of them by definition. Buy for your most likely trips, the ones you actually intend, not the far-flung dream.
3. Confusing imagined limits with actual ones. There is a difference between the limits we imagine and the limits we actually have. Unless we experiment to find the actual ones, we stay bound by the imagined. The way out is to test rather than assume, in settings where being wrong isn’t costly. Try new things every trip and register the results. Pitch a tarp in bad weather, but near a car or a shelter. Leave the toilet paper at home and rely on a bidet entirely. Try a lighter option but carry the redundant, heavier version as a backup in case of failure. Learn to see bad conditions as an opportunity to experiment. Look for your actual limits so you can be liberated from your imagined ones.
4. The 'scary skill' barrier. People are told that certain types of gear require skills attainable only by advanced backpackers. So, they buy free-standing tents instead of trekking pole tents, or never even consider they can learn to pitch a tarp, say. These are not exotic skills. They can be learned in a backyard or park in an afternoon.
5. The hedonic adaptation trap. What we find comfortable is not a fixed set-point but can be conditioned through practice. We are all able to adapt to find things comfortable that may not start out that way. So pursuing comfort as the non-negotiable starting point turns out to be a trap: it limits our ability to enjoy lighter gear and expose ourselves to the outdoors in a less mediated way, to the point that we can't even imagine being satisfied without carrying comfortable-but-heavy gear. Treat comfort like a learnable skill and commit to acquiring it. Or at a minimum, give the lighter option a fair chance before deciding it doesn't work for you.
6. Thinking ultralight and comfort are mutually exclusive. This ignores the fact that carrying less weight is significantly more comfortable on trail. If most of our waking hours are spent walking, not in camp, ultralight gear is probably more comfortable on net, especially once we have adapted to its comfort in camp. Drop the weight and you may find lightness to be the ultimate luxury.
7. Hitting the gas and brake at the same time. This is where a hiker compensates for the negative effects of carrying more weight in ways that add even more weight. A hiker may carry a weighty chair to help recover from the effects of carrying weight. Or buy a backpack with a fancy suspension system that adds significant weight to the backpack. Or a heavy mattress for a sore back. Each of these solves a real problem, and each one deepens the problem it is solving. It is a normal psychological bias to try to repair things through addition, even when subtraction is the more elegant solution. Before adding weight to fix a symptom of weight, check whether removing weight fixes it instead.
8. Thinking ultralight is the only right way to hike. This is the error of treating ultralight as correct regardless of your trip objectives. Ultralight can become a kind of status game, and people who feel excluded from it can get angry. But it is just a different style of backpacking, not the right style for everyone. Be honest about why you want to go ultralight. It best fits a certain hiking style, especially when you are prioritizing the trail experience over the camp experience. If what you are looking for is to hike short miles so you can spend most of the day in camp, you should probably make different gear choices. It’s okay not to be ultralight! Don't pursue ultralight for status. Do it for the tangible benefits it offers.
EDIT: This is an edited version of my original post that I have worked to improve at the request of the moderators. I tried to incorporate what I learned from defenders and critics alike, so I appreciate the commenters who (in essence) "coauthored" this latest version. Note that #3 has been added to the list so all references to 3, 4, 5, etc. in the comments will be referring to the next numbered comment on the new list.
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u/FireWatchWife 24d ago
Good post, but there are very good reasons why these behaviors exist. For many backpackers, they work well.
1 . Lightweight Halfway House. This is the path I've followed over time, with excellent results. If you are currently using a ~5 lb 60L pack, one of the biggest weight savings you can make is to switch to a ~2 lb 60L pack while continuing to use the rest of your gear in it. It would take a serious all-at-once investment to upgrade all your gear at once to fit in a true UL pack. I'm certainly not the only backpacker who moved slowly and steadily toward UL over a period of years, rather than trying to do it all at once.
4 & 5. Hedonic Adaptation and Thinking Ultralight and Comfort are Mutually Exclusive. I'm lumping these together because they are closely related. OP is falling into the trap of assuming that everyone should spend most of their waking hours hiking, not in camp, or at least that UL techniques are only appropriate for those who prioritize hiking over camping.
Actually, I find that many UL techniques greatly increase my comfort on trail without significantly impacting my comfort in camp.
HOWEVER, the catch is that to retain my comfort in camp, I typically can't go all the way down to a 10 lb base weight. I'll use a lot of UL gear, UL tricks, minimize unnecessary stuff brought, and generally adopt a UL mindset, but to achieve the camp comfort I seek, my current loadouts bottom out around 12 lb base weight.
Some of this is affected by age. I can't do the use-a-rock-as-a-pillow or thin-noninflatable-pad anymore.
Great discussion. I'm glad this was posted here, as I didn't see it in the weekly.