As always if you don't want to wade through the people stuff you can jump to down to the Equipment Mini-Reviews.

Link to equipment list. - Link to food list.

First a pitch for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (www.suwa.org). They are an effective and critically important land preservation group. They do a lot of important fieldwork to provide data for the ongoing battle with the BLM over wilderness status for Southern Utah lands. They were critically important in the work that paved the way for Clinton to create the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument (legislation which our current president and his Interior Secretary appear to be trying to weaken). The SUWA is an active and important member of the Utah Wilderness Coalition - the group that has authored the Utah Wilderness Bill (HB 1500) that has for years been doing battle in the Congress. Please support this valuable organization.

Mark and Peter, my hiking partners, are strong athletes. Peter runs a 2:48 marathon and does 100 mile self-support mountain bike trips in the Nevada desert. Mark is an ex-college runner who can still do a sub-40-minute 10K. Against this vigor I had to reduce my pack weight down, down, down if I was going to have any hope of keeping up.

This was the first time in many years that I've hiked with a group of in-shape, experienced and independent hikers. I can't think of better hiking partners than Mark and Peter. Covering ground was never an issue. Most of the time we went at a moderate two mile per hour pace and were good tourists. It's hard to move too fast with everything there is to see in the Southern Utah canyons. Yet we had the capacity to move very fast if the situation required. Group camp duties were done without any difficulty. People just figured out what needed to be done and did it. If I cooked coffee and oatmeal, the pots were whisked away and returned clean. Water was already filtered and a snack ready for the day hiker returning hot, dry and hungry late in the day.

Mark was fairly convinced by my relentless pitching of the ultralight approach. My guess is that his base pack weight was in the 14 to 16 pound range. He bought a 3+ pound conventional pack and a Thermarest ultralight pad for the trip. I lent him an Arroyo bag and a Cirrus vest. This combined with sharing my tarp, light stove and cookware completed his weight savings. Mark was delighted with the freedom and mobility of his light pack and tackled all difficult terrain without hauling his pack up after him. (So did Peter but that's another issue.)

Peter benefited from light the tarp and cooking stuff. He was delighted with the lightest pack he'd ever carried. But in my terms Peter still carried a weighty load. Everything Peter brought was heavy. Winter Polarguard bag, deluxe Thermarest, 6 pound backpack, a full set of pile pants and jacket, Polarguard booties, 3 quart Tupperware container for his dinner, etc. Peter was completely prepared for a winter outing. Given the weather the first day, he had a point. But Peter is such a strong hiker, I don't think his heavy pack even fazed him. It would take a lot more than that to make a dent in Peter's stride.

Mark and I compromised on the trip itinerary. I wanted to do a longer shuttle trip of 7-8 days. Mark didn't want to be out that long. He wanted to break the trip into two parts and have a night in a motel with a hot meal and shower. The final agreement was to do the trip in two 4 day, 3 night sub-trips as Mark wanted, with a night in a motel in between. But that the second sub-trip would be would have some more challenging routes to entertain me. This proved an excellent compromise. I enjoyed reduced weight of the two part trip and the ability to get accurate weather reports to fine tune gear selections. Mark really enjoyed the more challenging routes on the second sub-trip.

As usual we got a bit of cold weather for the trip start. At 9 AM of day 1 there was still snow on the ground. At 2 PM on the same day we were sheltered under an overhang in 30 degree weather waiting for a squall of snow and sleet to pass. We were prepared for the weather, but it wasn't what we expected for early May in Southern Utah. Each day of the trip got warmer until we had 80 to 90 degree highs at the end of the trip. The warmer days had precipitous temperature drops of 50+ degrees at night. Going from 85 in the late afternoon to near freezing by dawn.

Water: I don't think I carried much more than 3 liters of water at any time. This is light in desert terms. It was a damp spring and the longest we went between water sources was around 6 to 7 miles. This can be a bit of time in canyon hiking terms, but still not bad. We camped near a water source each night and this is where I filtered all my water for the next 24 hours. I purified about 6 to 9 liters at one time using my SWA gravity filter. The 3 liter Zip Hoser for dirty reservoir is a good combination with 2+ liter Platys for clean water. If I quickly switched a full 2+ Platy out for an empty one, I maintained the prime on the gravity system. Just ladled more water into the Zip Hoser and I was off and going towards the next Platy of purified water. I then chained on my 1 liter Platy and was done. This usually left me with around 4.5 liters of water for the morning. I drank about 2 liters before hiking and consumed the other 2.5 liters between camps. Only one time did I filter water mid-day before camp.

Equipment Mini-Reviews

GoLite Breeze Pack, A:
Still a winner. Carried everything I needed including water without a moment's discomfort. I was concerned before the trip that the Pack would not be up to the extra weight of carrying the large amounts of water required for desert travel from spring to spring. First, it was a fairly wet year and I didn't carry much more than 5 pounds of water at any time. Second, the Pack just carries beautifully. No soreness anywhere. I didn't have much difficulty with perspiration between the pack and my back either. The desert is so dry the perspiration evaporated almost as fast as I could sweat.

Rab Top Bag, A:
Kept me warm and comfortable even on the nights in the 30's. This was sleeping out with a moderate breeze through camp. The perfect desert bag.

Oware 10x10 silnylon tarp, A:
We never used the tarp even though it snowed the first day and rained a bit the second day. It sill gets an A for inexpensive weight reduction for a group of three hikers. The other two people on the trip were not ultralighters. In an effort to reduce group weight I purchased the tarp from Oware. This with the Leki trekking poles provided shelter for the group at around 12 oz. per person, saving each of us around 2 to 3 pounds over a tent.

SnowPeak Giga stove, Evernew Titanium Cookset, A:
Started first time, every time. Very fuel efficient. We boiled over 12 Liters of water, half in 40 degree temps and half in 70 degree temps, at around 5,000 feet altitude. We had fuel left over in our 8 oz. canister. I think we would have been near the sea level, 70 degree temp, capacity of 15 liters for the canister. Not bad for in the field. Titanium cookset was great. Good fuel performance, easy to use lids and handles, easy to clean inner coating. Near perfect. After the trip, I cleaned a bit of desert scale out of one pot with a paper towel soaked in vinegar.

Leki Titanium trekking poles, B-:
Link to detailed report. I took these mostly as supports for the tarp. They proved fairly useful hiking as well. More useful than I expected.

SWA Gravity Filter System, C-:
The system worked fine for about 4 days. Around day 5 the filter's flow rate was cut in half. I suspect algae-laden spring water. The filter continued to work at half-performance for the rest of the trip. The system never failed and I didn't need to resort to iodine for water treatment. I'm still trying to figure out what happened. But... I would think twice about taking this setup in the desert again.

Nikon compact 9x25 binoculars, A:
Great for route finding in canyons. Perfect for looking at those high and inaccessible ruins. Nice for looking at Golden Eagles and Peregrine Falcons.

Merril Terrator Trail Runners, A-:
A solid shoe. Great grip on slickrock. Durable sole. The only shoes I've used in 10 years that I haven't blistered in. I've already worn out my first pair and am working on my second. Desert sand is amazing stuff. I believe it could penetrate steel. After a 16 mile day hike I discovered 1/8 inch of sand between my socks and my feet!

What I envied the non-ultralighters for having:

Tevas:
It was hot and my feet warm and damp. But since I brought no extra footwear, I walked around camp in my trail runners. Mark and Peter's feet were nice and cool in their Tevas. To compensate, I did go barefoot around camp some of the time. The desert is a spiky place and I spent a fair amount of time picking pointy objects from my feet. Next desert trip I'm going to do some research into the lightest sandals I can get for camp use. A light covered shoe wouldn't do, as what you want most is cool and ventilation.

Special Snacks:
Smoked oysters on crackers and a nip of something at dinnertime. Actually, envy was not required here since Mark had brought these as a treat for all of us. I could see bringing a few nips and small can of oysters for each night on my next trip. A wonderful evening routine. Great for esprit de corps.