I thru hiked the PCT. The one thing I learned as an engineer / technical person:
bring one of everything. No redundancy. The gains from being ultra light, single-item-multi-purpose, are immeasurable
bring one of everything. No redundancy. The gains from being ultra light, single-item-multi-purpose, are immeasurable
In my case, that means bringing aquatabs to back up my primary water treatment system and a second way to strike my stove. An extra 2 grams for aquatabs versus 4 weeks of greasy diarrhea? Check. Ten grams for a second mini bic or small fire steel versus cold soaking meals that I designed for cooking? Check.
But I do agree with you that bringing less in general frees you to move faster, go farther, and enjoy the journey even more.
At the end of the day my trail family had 4 levels of redundancy between us.