The Mountain People - How to carry 50 kg and save your back

First of all, I have to say that any extra weight on your back is going to be dangerous anyway, this tips are just to minimise the impacts on your back making it last longer. Oh, well, some people do drugs, other people smoke, other ones watch Big Brother, and other ones climb mountains carrying 45 kg, that's it!

Before packing anything, have a look at your friend's gear, they might be taking the same already. Do not wait until a week later to find out that you are taking hand moisturising and your friend too. Stupid thinks like this weight too much! There are lots of things that you have to mind when you're packing, the main one, of course, is the weight. Sometimes, even been a mountaineering veteran, we end up taking useless things that we are only going to find out it at the worst possible time. So, if you are not sure about taking something with you, do not take it!
Even one battery, a plaster or a porno magazine... makes difference at the end, and you will make a big favour to yourself not taking it. The best way to organise your stuff is sharing it into bags. So you have a food bag, a clothes bag, a climbing gear bag, a perfumes bag, and all those useful things... Doing this you keep everything tidy and also save some time when police searches for drugs.

After finally decide what you are taking with you, it's time to share the weight properly into your rucksack. Concentrate all the heavy objects at the middle of the rucksack, as close as possible to your back. If you are going to carry it for some weeks, never put heavy stuff on the top, otherwise it becomes a nightmare. You might also loose some balance and will probably fall many times. Another thing to have in mind at packing time is to share equal amounts of weight on the left and right hand sides. Both sides have to weight the same!

Never leave things hanging outside your rucksack. Pans, little cans, cutlery, etc... are made to be noisy. This noises will change your walking rhythm a lot, and you might get use to it, starting to walk faster or slower because them. Also, by some way or another, they will hit your head, so, avoid loose objects outside your rucksack. Always keep emergency objects, like cameras and toilet paper into the easy pockets. Tight up all the strips on your rucksack, making it part of your body. The smell will also become part of you. Everyone, apart from you, will realise it!

- hipbelt - the most important part of your rucksack. It basically supports the weight of the whole sack and transfers the load to the hips. Keep it more tight as possible. A long scare will appear on your waist after a while.
- shoulder straps - different than small backpacks, it doesn't mean too much talking about huge loads. It only balances the weight on your body.
- chest belt - is quite useful if you are moving a lot, when climbing for example, but it brakes most of the times...
- internal/external frame - it use to be a internal aluminium structure, but is quite common to see it as external glass fibre frame. It expands the sack's capacity, and helps to balance the weight. Also, avoids too much weight on the shoulders. It's better that your backpack features a expansion/contraction system because you suppose to use the same bag to carry all the gear along the approach and even for vertical climbing. Nowadays is quite hard to find heavy load rucksacks, over 100 litres. They're not making those old huge models any more, but you still can modify one for yourself though. Mine one, after lots of "plastic surgeries", supports about 130 litres!!
- f**ing ice axe webbing loops - I decided to mention this stupid accessory, because it seems very funny how people try to fit random items in it, and the only reason to have this "ice axe webbing loops" is to put f**ing ICE AXES, for god's sake!!!. They try to hang bottles by the neck, trekking poles... I saw magazines and clothing... but never ice axes. It is a little loop shaped sling at the bottom of most of the rucksacks, even school and everyday ones!!! It is becoming a kind of fashionism nowadays.

After packing the whole load correctly, balanced the weight, is time to put it on your back and walk! Usually, after walking 10 minutes with this huge thing on your back you will probably feel uncomfortable. Don't worry, it's quite normal, try to whistle a little bit, or singing. This things help you a lot, specially if you are going to feel it for a couple of weeks! Your mates might have the same problem. There's nothing to do about it, try to get use. It usually get worst. You might loose some arm strength because the poor blood circulation... As I said, sing!!
You'll have a strong butt after a couple of weeks, it is quite painful at the beginning though.

Besides walking properly, the trekking poles are the best way to save your back. They give you balance, allow you to jump little rivers, to catch things on the ground, to remove snow from your boots, to stand up when you are on the ground, to keep flies away, to hit things on bad moments... the profits are endless!! It became essential for me like a third and fourth leg. The best ones are those that feature a telescopic adjusting system, then you can make them taller on downhill and shorter on uphill.

Certainly, the best pleasure that we (people who carry 45 kg) have, is to find a place to sit and rest without taking the rucksack off the back. This is actually a very hard thing to find, because the only rocks where we can sit, have to feature very straight conditions. They have to be about 1 meter tall, and be flat on the top, so we can balance the weight. I don't mind if it has a little step to put the rucksack on, so not that much of energy is going to be spent on standing up. The direction that it faces is also very important!. If you intend to take photos or do some filming, it's impossible to turn the whole body, then you have to find one that faces the direction you're going. But don't worry, after a while you develop a kind of x-ray vision to find this special rocks from far away.

At the moment you walk with lots of weight, the body's part that suffers more are definitely the knees specially at the time you walk down. Never "lock" your knees after one step, try to use your thigh muscles instead mechanical brakes, like your knees. Although much more energy is going be spent using big muscles such as thigh region, no damage is going to made on the knee articulation.

With or without trekking poles, getting down a high slope is going to be hard anyway and you might find no rocks to sit and rest, although it will be faster. Is hard to not loose the balance and not fall down facing the ground. Remember to use your thigh muscles instead knees. There's nothing to minimise the pain and anger along your way down. I recommend laughing a lot!


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