Gear to Leave at Home during a Thru-Hike

Hey guys it's Darwin. So today I wanted to talk about the five pieces of gear that I think you should leave at home if you're planning to do a through hike. Alright so there's a lot of great gear out there that you should definitely be bringing if you're planning on doing a long distance trail. Today I wanted to talk about five items that I see a lot of people add to their gear or maybe even consider taking when they're going to do something like a long distance trail. So not only is this gear that I think is really unnecessary to take on a long distance trail but also a lot of items that I saw in hiker boxes when I was out on the Appalachian Trail in 2015 and 2016. So you can leave this stuff at home. Okay so the number one thing that I've seen in a lot of hiker boxes especially in Georgia when I was starting my through hike of the Appalachian Trail was a trowel. So this thing has been a standard for backpacking for years and years and years. Obviously it's a good idea to dig a hole to put your crap in. However these things are unnecessary. Why are they unnecessary? Because you can use either a stick or the end of your trekking pole to dig a hole. So the trowel is kind of a pointless item. It's just adding weight to your gear setup and taking up space in your pack. I'd probably say the trowel is the number one item that I've seen in hiker boxes over anything else. So do yourself a favor and leave that guy at home. Number two again in a lot of hiker boxes in Georgia is extra cookware. So something like a bowl or an extra cup or a plate. You don't need that stuff. Just use a regular cook pot like the system that I use. I use a Snowpeak light max stove and a Snowpeak 700 milliliter mug and I use it for everything. So I use it as my cup. I use it as my cook pot. I use it as my bowl for everything. You don't need a plate. You don't need a bowl. You don't need a cup. You don't need fine china. Just something simple that you're going to use day in day out. So before you go out to REI and buy all that extra super fun cool backpacking gear just get yourself a really good cook pot and leave it at that. Number three is a big cutting tool. You don't need a huge Rambo knife, a machete, an axe, a saw. You don't need that stuff out on a long distance trail. In the beginning of the trail you will see a lot of people with this massive knife hanging off the side where they look like they're Crocodile Dundee. The reality of it is you're always only going to ever need a small little pocket knife to be able to cut string and cheese. Maybe to pop some blisters every once in a while. So having this big massive knife that weighs like a pound is totally worthless. There's no point to it. There's no need for it. If you want to go be like a survivalist and a bushcrafter out in the Canadian bush, awesome. That's not a long distance trail and you just don't need it. As far as a small axe or a saw, you shouldn't need to cut wood in the forest anyways. Grab twigs and sticks from off the ground if you're going to make a fire. There was never a time on the AT or the CDT or the Arizona Trail that I ever needed an axe or a saw to chop down a tree. Now a lot of people have that mentality, well what if just in case. For six months out on the AT I never needed anything like that. I never needed a big knife to protect myself from an animal. I never needed to kill something. I never needed to chop down a tree. So leave those big cutting items at home. Just bring a small pocket knife. It's going to take up less room. It's going to weigh less and it's going to be more efficient than having this big ass knife. Speaking of knives, number four is a gun or weapons. People please for the love of God do not bring a gun on the trail. That has to be one of the most common questions asked to through hikers. Well are you going to bring a gun? No I'm not going to bring a gun. Why do you need a gun on a long distance trail like the AT? You don't. You're not going to hunt anything. You're not going to kill anything. There was never a time when I was on the trail and I felt unsafe like I needed to protect myself with a gun. If you feel unsafe, simply get away from the situation but don't carry a gun. Number one, they're super heavy and bulky so why would you want to carry something that's going to weigh like five pounds and take up a ton of room. Number two, think about the people that you're hiking around. You're going to scare the hell out of people when someone sees a huge pistol strapped to your chest or your hip where you look like a gunslinger. So leave a gun at home. There's no need for one. It's just going to be overkill and you're going to scare the hell out of the rest of us. So number five is kind of a controversial one and that is bear spray. So this is AT specific and from what I hear also PCT specific. You don't need bear spray especially on the AT. The only type of bear that you're going to run into is a black bear and those things are scared of you way more than you're scared of them. Super skittish. They're going to run away. You don't need bear spray. That is another huge item that you see a ton of in hiker boxes at the beginning of a trail. People bring bear spray with them thinking that they'll need it to protect themselves from bears and then realize what bears. Yes there are bears out on the trail but you don't see a lot of them and whenever you do see them they're pretty damn far away. Now if you're on something like the Continental Divide Trail and you're farther up north, yes there are grizzlies. You might want to carry some bear spray for some of the states but still you don't need it for the entire trail. So before you get out on the AT and you stay in your first hostel and someone gives you the trail name bear bait, which yes there are a lot of hikers with that trail name because they brought so much bear protection, leave that stuff at home. You're not going to need it. Alright guys so what are some of the pieces of gear that you think that you should be leaving at home during a long distance hike? Leave me some comments in the comment box below and let me know your thoughts. If you haven't got a chance yet go over and check me out on Instagram. I'm posting a lot of new photos lately of some of the things that Snuggles and I have going on throughout the week plus some pictures from some past hikes so go check those out if you haven't already. If you found any value in this video go ahead and hit that like button, subscribe to my channel if haven't already. As always guys, thanks for watching!