Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board JMT in July/August 2012 advice and Rx.

I used to, until I found it at the local grocer, in the "ethnic isle"

Large can, 3.52 pounds, $12.99 - about half of what you pay online

I recently spent 8+ days hiking in the Sierra at a pace of around 25 miles per day and 5000+ feet of elevation. I expected to be hungry as I have been on all of my previous trips of a week or more in duration. But apparently everything I thought I knew about myself is wrong. I ate relatively sparingly, felt fine, and wished I had packed less food.

I consumed about 3500 Calories per day, less than the 4000+ Calories I had on much shorter hikes with a similar pace, and much less than the 5000+ I anticipated needing. I did lose some weight, a little over 5 lbs, not too much. What was different?

I did pack a higher fat content than I have in the past, something around 45%. And my choice of meals was repetative, boring, and by the end reached the point of being horrifying to even think about. Maybe that was it? Maybe (lack of) quality of food trumps hunger? I sure felt hungry and swallowed a hamburger mighty fast once I got out.

I'm still learning.

Mike,

Just did JMT #11 so if you have any questions about the trail, I'm around. As for diet, I am pretty lame––I just head to trader joe and costco and don't get too scientific about it. I don't weigh and repackage or add everything up . . . I do have a few tricks to make the last half doable, food wise.

Bob

Bob, I haven't seen any new JMT videos lately! The couple that I saw of yours in the past were a kick!

Regarding the wood-burning stoves - for years now I've used the titanium Sierra Zip stove, and have been really happy with it. It has a small fan under the double-walled chamber that runs on a AAA battery and acts as a bellow… I can boil water pretty fast.

I'm hoping to do the JMT again next summer as well, and will certainly check with the "powers that be" that these stoves are still acceptable, but the last time I did it (2009) I was told that it was acceptable to pick up some wood in lower elevations and carry it up to the higher elevation where I’d be camping. It only takes a small zip-lock bag of woods chips, picked up along the way, for my meal at night.

The biggest drawback to this stove, of course, is the soot. My pan is BLACK, but I’ve learned how to deal with it, keeping it in a separate stuff sack to prevent anything from getting on my other gear.

Burning wet wood is possible, but takes more time.

I've used the Sequoia Kings Packers a couple times for resupplies in the past. The supplies were delivered to Charlotte Lake - really handy. NOT inexpensive, but I often go solo, so it's a matter of weighing out the cost vs. time vs. weight on my back. It's what I choose to do.

Hi Anyone notice the pattern working on getting "That topic to the second page and then into the "history file" if this fails the other option is the vapor button. Thank Doug

WIMPS!* I hiked the JMT twice, both times in the 1960s (before there was today's ultra-light gear) and wasn't resupplied either time.

The first time was from Tuolumne M. to Whitney Portal with a detour at Trail Crest to bag Whitney summit. I was with a friend so the weight of the tent and cooking gear was shared.

The second time I started from T.M. and hiked out the High Sierra Trail. That time I went solo so I carried everything myself. My starting pack weight was 60 pounds which I admit was too heavy for comfort until I ate the weight down some.

After 50 years I don't remember many details of what I carried. In those pre-computer days I didn't run a spreadsheet to calculate energy needs.

I know that for the longer solo trip I had made a batch of flour tortilla mix and every night I would add water to some, roll it out with my bamboo hiking staff (this was before Lekis were very common) on the bottom of my pan, and make enough tortillas for dinner and next day's lunch. I carried a lot of cocoa mix and had a surplus of that which made up for running short of lunch stuff. I didn't fish.

My stove was a beautiful and reliable Svea liquid fuel job. My pack was an old REI cruiser external frame pack.

I didn't push for speed. I think I averaged about 10 miles a day and allowed a couple lay-over days. I really got into the solitude on the longer solo trip and would not have wanted to break it by going out to civilization half-way through.

*OK, I don't really think any of you are wimps and I hope you all have great trips. Doing the JMT is a wonderful accomplishment and when you get to be old codgers you can talk about your days on the trail. And maybe if I had carried less weight, especially on the second, longer hike, I wouldn't have so much arthritis in my hips and knees now. But that's why there is Tylenol.

Have a wonderful time. I wish I could be with you.
Burtw

Hey BurtW, we might have been on the trail at the same time! We made our first JMT attempt in 1969… we started out from Happy Isles, hoping to do it in two weeks. Unfortunately we realized early on that two weeks was a bit too ambitious for us. Our group was comprised of my Dad and seven kids – me being the oldest at 16, and the ages decreased to my youngest brother at 8. We exited the JMT at South Lake, and finished the trail two years later.

Our gear was all army-surplus; we cooked over a fire then, so no stove or fuel. I don’t remember all our meals… we had some dehydrated meals called “dry-light food” (or something like that), they were SOOOOO bad! We also had dinners like Rice-a-roni. We always had Jell-O for breakfast, sometimes with re-hydrated fruit, and cereal.

I’ve never tried making my tortillas as you did… what a good idea! I think I’m going to try that out before next summer.

Rosabella

That's possible. I moved to California (Bay Area) from Colorado in 1964 and started backpacking right away. I don't remember how long it took me to get the JMT bug but probably not long.

(In Colorado, my friends and I didn't do backpacking for its own sake. We were into peak bagging and only hiked and camped as much as you had to in order to get to the peaks. (My 14ers were all Class 2 and 3 walk-ups. I didn't do any that required any special skill or courage. A level of stupidity helped sometimes, though.))

Jell-O for breakfast?

Be well,
Burt

recently discovered - how it was done in 1958:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygin-fTfChU