Serious Survival: How to Poo in the Arctic and Other essential tips for explorers. Bruce Parry

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       Carrying on your back all you need to live in an extreme environment can give you an enormous sense of freedom, but it can also be quite a pain for a number of reasons:

      • What seems manageable for a few minutes back home may feel pretty intolerable after six hours of trekking up and down slippery slopes in humid, dense jungle.

      • Getting the amount of kit down to an acceptable weight may be an almighty struggle.

      • The item you desperately need always seems to end up at the bottom of the rucksack, requiring everything to come out (usually in torrential rain).

      WHAT SHOULD I TAKE WITH ME ON EXPEDITION?

      There are of course some absolute essentials, but the principle is to take as little as possible. Constantly remind yourself that anything that goes with you will almost certainly have to be carried on your back in a rucksack in extreme conditions – and on most expeditions you will also have to make room for group kit, such as food and pots and pans.

      Your actual kit list will depend on where you’re going (see appropriate chapters for details) and on personal preference. People get very attached to particular items of kit. But a few basic principles apply:

      • You generally need far fewer changes of clothes than you imagine. It is not at all unusual to manage for weeks on expedition with just a couple of sets of clothes and around three sets of underwear.

      • Most personal toiletries are a complete waste of space and time. Take advice before taking hair products, creams and deodorant to, say, an environment where you’ll be dripping with sweat and covered in mud all day. Once you’ve decided what is really essential, transfer the minimum amount to small plastic bottles to save weight. Replace bulky spray cans with more compact products. For example, ditch the shaving foam and use a tiny bottle of shaving oil.

      • Draw up a checklist well in advance of departure to ensure you have all essentials. Then treat them with extreme care – your life may depend on it (and replacing invaluable items once on expedition is often impossible).

      EMERGENCY KIT

      When travelling in an extreme environment there are various essentials you must keep with you at all times in case of emergency – primarily if lost or split off from the group.

      Where you keep the kit will depend on the environment, but it should never leave your side except when safely inside camp.

      In the jungle or desert many like the flexibility of the military solution – the belt kit with a series of pouches slung round the waist. (This can, however, interfere with the positioning of your rucksack waist strap, and is completely impractical if also wearing a climbing harness.)

      The exact contents of an emergency kit are always the subject of debate, but as a general guide they may include the following:

      In a humid or potentially wet environment the emergency kit should be packed in zip-up plastic bags, such as freezer bags.

      PACKING RUCKSACKS

      Packing your rucksack is quite an art. It’s not just about getting everything in, though that may be tricky enough. The load has to be balanced so it’s comfortable to wear, and you need to be able to get at essentials in a hurry. For most expeditions it all has to be waterproofed to withstand torrential downpours – and even possibly immersion in a river.

      For waterproofing the principle is: ‘In a bag, in a bag, in a bag’. In other words, three layers consisting of a) smaller waterproof bags called stuff sacs, which go in b) a large waterproof rucksack liner, which goes in c) the rucksack itself. Not only will this arrangement keep the contents dry, it will also help you organise your kit as you can use separate stuff sacs for different sorts of items. You should put items you’ll need in a hurry in the stuff sacs nearest the top of your rucksack.

      Any particularly heavy items should also go near the top to keep you balanced when trekking. Take expert advice on adjusting straps. Many modern rucksacks can be fitted to your body size to help distribute the weight comfortably, but you can spend many an uncomfortable hour trying to sort it out by trial and error.

      If you’ll be spending several days based at the same camp, you may also want to take a much smaller rucksack with you for use when going out for the day.