- Joined
- May 16, 2006
- Messages
- 2,724
For the last 2 1/2 years I've been using only one pack for all of my outdoor adventures, a Golite Dawn. Now this is a fine daypack, supposedly rated up to 20 pounds, and I've carried it on one and two night camping trips overloaded and with gear attached to the outside weighing close to 40 pounds. It's very sturdy and has never let me down but loaded even below 20 pounds and it gets very uncomfortable, very fast and you spend a lot of time adjusting the straps to shift the discomfort back and forth between shoulders and hips and sternum. I learned ways to pack it better but still that only made a marginal difference.
I'm not a big gear head and I'm even less of a shopper but still I knew I needed a new pack. So I was checking out Campmor online getting a sense of what they had, figuring I would take the 20 minute drive out there and compare in person the ones I had chosen based on spec, though knowing full well that I probably wouldn't get out there before the model year had changed
I wasn't really looking too much based on price but I happened to notice they had a "Hot Deal" on a Golite Quest. Marketed as "supremely comfortable", weighing only 3 lbs. 3 ozs. with a 4400 cu. inch capacity, I decided to pull the trigger after figuring out my spine length and the size to get.
When it arrived I immediately started stuffing it with gear, full tent, sleeping bag, stove, pots and pans, camera, 2 liters of water, lots of clothes, a bunch of flashlights, etc. The thing must have weighed well over 50 pounds. I hoisted it onto my back and tightened the straps and the angels started to sing
I walked around the apartment for 20 minutes marveling at the comfort, it was tight against my back and perfectly contoured. My wife was working and started to get annoyed with me walking from room to room and popping in to tell her how amazing it was, so I unpacked it and put it away until today.
So today I loaded it up with lots of extraneous stuff for a dayhike, tons of clothes, 3 liters of water, sleeping bag, several flashlights, tube tent, jetboil stove, my favorite 'bear' mug for tea, and lots of other little items, the whole pack weighed 26 pounds when I was finished, well above the comfort level for the Golite Dawn.
I did 8 miles, up and down small mountains, over icy rocks and narrow trails and it felt AMAZING. The padded hip belts and shoulder straps were in fact "supremely comfortable". The side compression straps and the top strap, along with Golite's compacktor feature (basically two loops and hooks at the bottom of the pack which when closed reduces the capacity of the pack when carrying less spacious loads) kept the load tightly together, making maneuvers like jumping from rock to rock feel natural and easy. It has some great features like a hydration sleeve with an opening on either side for the tube, a removable top cover with a zippered storage compartment, two zippered pockets on each wing of the hip belt easily accessible while wearing the pack, a whistle built into the clasp on the sternum strap, and a huge front zippered pocket. All in all I think it's a fantastic pack. The only thing I don't like is the depth and width of the side pockets, I can easily imagine a liter size water bottle wriggling itself out on rough trails or while bushwhacking. If I end up using these pockets for carrying say a 38 ounce Guyot, I will definitely secure it with other means.
While this pack is really comfortable for me, I can well imagine that it might not be so for a bigger hiker. If your upper torso and shoulders are very thick and wide I would suspect this pack might not be very comfortable, but for me, 150 lbs., 5' 10", its fantastic.
Today's beautiful view
A stop along the way for tea
One of my favorite features of this bag, these two pockets are great for securely storing things you want to use repeatedly along the way without having to remove the pack
Just a smart idea, the whistle built into the clasp of the sternum strap
I'm not a big gear head and I'm even less of a shopper but still I knew I needed a new pack. So I was checking out Campmor online getting a sense of what they had, figuring I would take the 20 minute drive out there and compare in person the ones I had chosen based on spec, though knowing full well that I probably wouldn't get out there before the model year had changed
I wasn't really looking too much based on price but I happened to notice they had a "Hot Deal" on a Golite Quest. Marketed as "supremely comfortable", weighing only 3 lbs. 3 ozs. with a 4400 cu. inch capacity, I decided to pull the trigger after figuring out my spine length and the size to get.When it arrived I immediately started stuffing it with gear, full tent, sleeping bag, stove, pots and pans, camera, 2 liters of water, lots of clothes, a bunch of flashlights, etc. The thing must have weighed well over 50 pounds. I hoisted it onto my back and tightened the straps and the angels started to sing
I walked around the apartment for 20 minutes marveling at the comfort, it was tight against my back and perfectly contoured. My wife was working and started to get annoyed with me walking from room to room and popping in to tell her how amazing it was, so I unpacked it and put it away until today.So today I loaded it up with lots of extraneous stuff for a dayhike, tons of clothes, 3 liters of water, sleeping bag, several flashlights, tube tent, jetboil stove, my favorite 'bear' mug for tea, and lots of other little items, the whole pack weighed 26 pounds when I was finished, well above the comfort level for the Golite Dawn.
I did 8 miles, up and down small mountains, over icy rocks and narrow trails and it felt AMAZING. The padded hip belts and shoulder straps were in fact "supremely comfortable". The side compression straps and the top strap, along with Golite's compacktor feature (basically two loops and hooks at the bottom of the pack which when closed reduces the capacity of the pack when carrying less spacious loads) kept the load tightly together, making maneuvers like jumping from rock to rock feel natural and easy. It has some great features like a hydration sleeve with an opening on either side for the tube, a removable top cover with a zippered storage compartment, two zippered pockets on each wing of the hip belt easily accessible while wearing the pack, a whistle built into the clasp on the sternum strap, and a huge front zippered pocket. All in all I think it's a fantastic pack. The only thing I don't like is the depth and width of the side pockets, I can easily imagine a liter size water bottle wriggling itself out on rough trails or while bushwhacking. If I end up using these pockets for carrying say a 38 ounce Guyot, I will definitely secure it with other means.
While this pack is really comfortable for me, I can well imagine that it might not be so for a bigger hiker. If your upper torso and shoulders are very thick and wide I would suspect this pack might not be very comfortable, but for me, 150 lbs., 5' 10", its fantastic.
Today's beautiful view
A stop along the way for tea
One of my favorite features of this bag, these two pockets are great for securely storing things you want to use repeatedly along the way without having to remove the pack
Just a smart idea, the whistle built into the clasp of the sternum strap
