Looking for buy as you go + drops advice

imported
#1

Hi I’m starting my thru hike in 2012 and planning to mainly buy food as I go. I’ve done a ton of research and have a pretty good handle on the food part.

I’m curious about people personal experience regarding items that are either:

  1. hard to find on the trail - I’m not a picky eater by any stretch but there are some things I like a lot and prefer a certain brand etc…

  2. are very expensive on the trail - I like to night hike, and tend to go through a lot of headlamp batteries. Is it worth it to buy online in bulk and then ship them to myself?

  3. usually found in much larger quantities than you’ll want to carry at any given time

I live on the east coast and wonder if there is any sense in shipping certain things to myself or paying more on the trail for them.

Please share your experiences!

Kwijibo

#2

The PCT was my first thru hike so I did the typical newbie blunder of making too many food drops to start with. For the second half, I bought as I went, and made my own drops to mail ahead as I got into the larger towns of S Lake Tahoe and Ashland, OR. If I were to do it again, I’d do that hybrid approach and only do a few mail drops.

I don’t know about batteries. I only night hike in full moon and a set of batteries lasts me a whole season.

One thing I have a hard time finding in small quantities is powdered milk, but I’ve learned to live without that much of the time and it’s light enough to carry some bulk when I do find it.

If you do drops, try to mail to private businesses (inns and outfitters) to avoid the rush into town before holiday weekends when the PO will be closed for three day. (And then you see the little market in town has everything you just mailed to yourself. They can be more of a pain than they’re worth.)

The exception is seasonal gear and guide book sections.

Garlic

#3

I just completed the PCT and used primarily food drops. Sorry Garlic, it wasn’t a newbie mistake. There are reasons to do or not do food drops depending on how much planning you are willing to do and what type of trip it will be. In my case I did a very fast hike, under 100 days and I didn’t want to spend valuable time trying to figure out how much food I needed. But I also spent many hours developing a huge variety of foods and never got sick of any of it. I also relied heavily on an homemade energy drink that would be impossible to get on the trail. Finally I also had all non-food items needed for the next leg including batteries. The major downside IMHO with food drops is that you could either have to speed up or slow down a leg if you are getting to a PO at a bad time, and some of the PO have strange hours.

As far as batteries go I was thinking the same as you that I would be doing a lot of night hiking, which I do believe was a newbie mistake. I bought about $50 worth of great lithium batteries and then discovered there was little reason to night hike. I could do up to 40+ mile days in the daylight. So I ended up doing no night hiking until northern WA and most of my expensive little batteries went into hiker boers for lucky hikers later in the trail. So if you plan to send batteries send feet than you think you’ll need. You can find them in either hiker boxes or buy them locally at most stops.

If I were to do my hike again I repeat the drops but I would every effort to avoid PO and use other businesses or trail angels.

Malto

#4

These days, it costs me about $2 per pound to send out resupply boxes from CA. Those things that seem expensive in towns might actually be cheaper if you consider your shipping costs.

Also, food that looks great at home may make you gag after a few weeks of it on the trail. Town reupplies force you to buy more variety and more of what you’re craving.

bowlegs

#5

In 2000 one of our “meadow” stops (forget which one) we walked out with small bags of M&Ms, cartons of yogurt, a couple of bananas, and not much else. And it cost us a great deal. Needless to say, I would do my research well.

Marti /Swannee

#6

I never want to work that hard so I always buy as I go and use the “hybrid” method for towns that dont have much. Sure I ate slim jims and candy bars a few times. But the PO is very unreliable and I doubt you save anything when you factor in postage and extra meals and even lodging while you wait for a box. I am happy that some of the more wasteful PO’s will be closed. I’m sure other store will take up the slack and maybe you’ll get your box at an outfitter and buy something instead of waiting for the postal people to finish lunch. Maybe if you have special diet issues. I’ve seem many people dump all sorts of food in hiker boxes. Also every trip you end up eating in towns way more than you think and you get to have a day of fresh things like fruit and baked goods, This is making me hungry so I gotta go.

bamboo bob

#7

good advice - many thanks everyone

Kwijibo

#8

Wedid maildrops on our first pct hike also but fnd it fairly easy 2 shop in town …I did notice things like luna bars cliff bars spendy or nonexistant but tht was awhile ago …shippg from alaska also very expensive…always seem 2 head in2 the grocery anyhow and oftn double buy as we got sick of our boxes…

yappy

#9

I did the hybrid in '08, and i found i was happiest on the trail when i had shipped myself a resupply. To do again, i might actually ship MORE and buy less. As you can tell though, this is very personal. I think the only non-viable version is to ship to every single post office on the trail.

The other thing i did was send a bounce bucket, which included batteries (and a battery charger). That turned out to be more expense than it was worth. To do again, i’d try something i haven’t heard of anyone doing: a bounce ENVELOPE. I’d get a sturdy manilla envelope and put a few batteries, cell charger, some future maps, and a couple other small items in it. It would cost way way less than a bucket but achieve most of what was important about it. Your battery issue could perhaps be solved by this method.

markv

#10

Ah, the battery resupply problem. This is year I finally liberated myself. I now carry a USB fast solar charger on the trail, along with USB-rechargeable devices, namely two: an iPhone and the Petzl Tikka XP headlamp.

The iPhone, employed with various free or nearly free apps, replaces:

GPS | eReader | iPod (audiobooks)| Pocketmail / Peek | voice recorder | backup LED utility light | camera (in theory anyway; results not great) | non-essential paperwork (converted to PDFs)

The only drawback is that the solar charger itself weighs half a pound. Yet it can charge up either the phone or headlamp is less than 2 hours in full sun. And to an extent the weight is negated by virtue of the fact that it’s charging a device (the iPhone) that replaces several others.

Besides a USB cord, I’m also carrying the small Apple-branded USB/AC wall adapter for indoor charging in towns.

I imagine the iPod Touch could likewise replace many of the same devices, minus the expensive phone contract. Not sure whether the Touch has built-in GPS. The iPhone GPS is every bit as good as my old Garmin eTrex, and probably better. It certainly locks onto a signal faster, although accuracy can take some time, especially without the benefit of cell reception. Using the iPhone with the Gaia GPS app has proven nothing short of revolutionary.

Alas, nothing yet replaces paper topo maps for navigating off the beaten track. Certainly nothing with an on/off switch, anwyay.

Bottom line: I’ve neither bought nor thrown away a battery in months, whether on or off the trail. And that feels pretty swell.

blisterfree

#11

If I had to do it again I would do less mail drops, but in many places they are still needed. But doing them from say east coast can be expensive. There are enough large towns close to the trail you can do it as you hike. I can’t imagine doing the trail without mail drops through the Sierras at lodges, or OR & Washington at many points. What they call a “resort” in these areas is often a campground witha small store, often less than you find at a gas station. Email me if you have questions about trail towns & anything else

Mountain Mike