DD,
My brother and I did an early October wilderness elk hunt (went 2 for 2 on mature bulls!) and we were out for 8-days. Here is a list of our equipment and some answers to your follow up questions.
1. Tents - I used a Eureka solataire 1-man bivy and my brohter used a lightweight Eureka 2-man tent. They both worked great, but were not tested hard as we had no rain or snow.
2. Packs - I used a $49 (on sale campmor) High Sierra internal frame pack and my brother used the $349 Badlands 4500 pack, both worked great. I had a bit more room in the high sierra and the it was easier to use, the badlands is a tough pack, very technical, plan on spending alot of time adjusting-messing with this pack. One thing the Badlands had that my pack did not was a place to latch on your gun, I was wishing I had this capability on the long hike out.
3. Bags and Pads - I used my old North Face 15F down bag with a Insul Mat Max Thermo air mattress. This pad/matress was comfortable, but I got a bit cool one morning when it hit 29F. I will not use this mattress again when the temps are 40F and below. My brother used the prolite mattress with his new Big Agnes bag and he was warm. The Thermarest prolite as recommended by others may be the best sleeping pad for size, weight and thermal value. I will have one of these on my next wilderness elk hunt in 2008. Also, recommend a 0 degree bag in perhaps synthetic material.
4. Stoves, Pans, Utensils - I used my MSR Pocket Rocket nad it was flawless as usual (we were at 10,000 feet elevation. I got 16 boils over the 8-day period off one 8 oz can, had a small amount of fuel left. My brother used his new jet boil and it worked flawlessly, he used about 1 and 1/4, maybe 1 and 1/2 of the small butane canisters. He did not take any pans/cups as the jet boil serves this need. I took a titanium cup (with measurements on it in oz) and a titanium pot and a titanium spork. My cooking package was a bit lighter and less bulky the way I packed it than the jet boil. My recommendation, if you have not invested in a stove yet, give teh jet boil serious consideration. However, I still love my MSR pocket rocket!
5. Boots- Both had Vasque GTX boots. Great boots, but would give the Cabelas perkect hiker by Meindel a closer look. One rookie mistake my brother made, was he put in these new super duper, thick insoles that elevated his foot in his boot and did not test them enough before the hike in and his heels rubbed the inseam and he got blisters, big time rookie mistake!
6. Water Treatment - We treated all of our water and ee used a MSR water purfication pump 85% of the time and iodine the other 15% when we ran out of water on a couple very long day hikes. We just treated all water, did not want to take any chances, jus too much time and money invested. Recommend always carrying iodine tablets with you at all times just in case you end of further out than you expected. We went out one morning scouting with the intent of a 4-5 mile trip and ended up doing 13-miles that day, glad we had the iodine as we refilled from streams on several occassions.
7. Radio - We had a radio to call our previously arranged packer and this worked but not without radio contact problems. Next time we will take a satellite phone for sure regardless of the extra weight and cost.
8. Headlamp - We both had small petzel lights, I believe same model as recommended in one of the other post, very samll and lightweight with long burn time. Check burn times closely on whatever you purchase. I took two extra batteries.
9. Knives, Saw, Game bags - Browning big game knife with blade+guthook+saw. Recommend the Redi-Edge knife sharpener and not any of the cheap ones. We took a couple of the small cheap Gerber ceramic sharpeners and they did not get it done with respect to two bulls down. We used the Gerber saw with the retractable blade into a slim balc handle andit worked great, it is light and very sharp. Game bags, definitely the light weight but tough Cabelas Alaskan game bags. I was using the heavy canvas bags until one of the boys on this site, early this year, turned me onto these new lightweight, tough as nails bags and they worked great.
10. Optics - I used some low end Zeis 10x30 and got the job done. I used a cheap Burris 20x50 compact spotting scope and it helped but was only marginally better than my brothers binoculars. He used the Bushnell Elite 10x42 and these nocs are unbelievable, the light gathering was amazing, he could use this at night and see like you would not believe. Felt like cheating with these awesome binoculars, on the few times he let me use them.
11. Clothes - Essentially took 3 sets, one set for the hike in and scouting prior to the five day hunt and two pants, two base layer, one middle fleece layer, one poly type button down outer layer, one jacket - rivers west, but did not use this much, was overkill but had it for unexpected weather. Took extra socks, like 5 pairs just to be safe with the feet. Two sets of poly long johns and underwear, washed these in the stream and the poly drys quick.
Hope this information helps based on our experience in the wilderness this past year.
Regards,
JL
