PACK THIS When Hiking The Inca Trail

Bom Oliver

Welcome to Channel – A Journey to Explore the World!  This YouTube channel shares a unique lifestyle through global travel, exploring local cultures via street food, traditional dishes, and authentic travel experiences you won’t want to miss.  🎒 From bustling markets in Asia, street food tours in Europe, to minimalist living and local life in remote lands – each video captures real, inspiring moments from every journey.  🍜 If you’re passionate about food, backpacking, and discovering diverse lifestyles, this is the channel for you!  📅 Don’t forget to subscribe and hit the notification bell so you won’t miss our weekly adventures!  #travel  #travel chill #europeantravel #asian travel #food #streetfood

Transcript

00:00If you clicked on this video, you've probably already decided that you're going to hike the

00:03Inca Trail and you're now desperately trying to figure out the packing situation. We were there

00:08too. This will be the first of two videos on packing for the Inca Trail and we'll focus on

00:13what we carried in our day packs while we hiked. The second video is going to cover everything that

00:17we brought in our duffels, which were carried by the porters, so make sure you subscribe so you

00:21don't miss that video. And before we dive into this unpacking video, we do want to call out that

00:26each company has different inclusions on what the porters will carry versus what you have to carry.

00:31So make sure you supplement this video with a read-through on your company-specific website.

00:36It is the morning after our Inca Trail trek to Machu Picchu. We did the four-day, three-night trek

00:43and while everything is still fresh in our minds, we wanted to share with you what we put in our

00:48day packs. The first thing that I'll talk about is the thing that's clicked on the top of my day pack.

00:55This hat. She is not stylish. She will not win any fashion awards, but it does protect your head

01:03from both the sun and the rain, two things that we ran into a lot on the Inca Trail. While it's not

01:09super cute, I was really, really thankful to have it. For the day pack itself, I have the REI Flash 22

01:17day pack. Garrett actually hiked with the Osprey Daylight. I think they're both a really good size for

01:24this trek. I wouldn't necessarily recommend going any bigger than either of these because then you're

01:29going to be tempted to put more stuff in it. Your bag's just going to get heavier. These are a really

01:34good size for the trek. Head to head, I think I actually prefer the REI Flash 22 over the Daylight.

01:42It's a little bit bigger. The only thing that I think that the Osprey does better is it has a place

01:47for your water bag or your camelback to come out, whereas on the REI Co-op, I'm just kind of coming

01:54out the side. They're both really good bags. Anything similar in that range is going to work

01:59really well for you. First thing that you absolutely need is your passport. You have to go through

02:05control points along the Inca Trail, so make sure that you always have your passport in your day pack

02:09and not in your duffel bag. Keep it on you. It does rain. We hiked in November of 2022, so right at the

02:17kind of beginning of rainy season, which starts at the beginning of October. So we made sure to put

02:22everything in plastic bags. The block made some money off of us on this trek. So in this bag, I just

02:27have my passport and then a trail map. I also have two different kinds of chapstick. I didn't want to

02:34lose one. You are at altitude, so even though you're in the rainy season, it does tend to be drier.

02:39The sun is hitting you, so just make sure you have chapstick. This is an SPF 15. I would probably

02:44recommend going a little bit higher. My lips are a little burnt. This bag has a drawstring open,

02:48so you can just pull it open. Another Ziploc baggie just full of like all of the different

02:54essentials that we would need throughout the trek. Most importantly, I have a body sunscreen that we

03:01bought when we got here. I have this Elta MD sunscreen. It's a little bougie, but I like to make sure

03:09that I'm taking care of my skin, especially my face. And so I would really recommend this one.

03:14And you can use this on your body too. It's a good stick. So I would use the face sunscreen in the

03:18tent before I went out, and then I'd bring this out for touch-ups, but you just kind of screw it off,

03:23and then it's a stick. So you just rub it right on your face. We have a little blister kit,

03:29Dr. Frederick's original. I don't know. We ordered it off of Amazon. Thankfully, we didn't have to use it.

03:34I've been hiking in my trusty Merrells for like four years now, and they held up really well. So

03:39thankfully, no blisters, but carry this in case you don't want to be hiking with a blister,

03:45especially not 26 miles. The great thing about these mosquito wipes is that you can actually buy

03:49them in the States and carry them with you because they're not a liquid, so they're not going to hurt

03:54your liquid allowance. They're also like little towelettes. You can just like wipe them all over.

03:58The mosquitoes out there are real. I've never had, you can kind of see it like on my hand if it will

04:06focus, those like little red dots. The mosquito bites like actually drew blood on me, and now my

04:11hand's like very swollen. Like this one's not, but this one is from all the mosquito bites. So

04:16even, you know, like trying to be good about this, I missed it a couple of times, and they took that

04:21opportunity to attack. We both had tiny containers of ibuprofen just in case we got headaches, altitude

04:27sickness, soreness along the way. Thankfully, we were both pretty good. I took Diamox, which is

04:34like a medication that can help with altitude sickness. Garrett did not, so I think he took a

04:39couple of these. I did one day just after a long day of downhill. My one knee was kind of starting

04:44to hurt, so good to have this with you just so you can nip anything before it gets bad. If you have

04:50to wait till you get back to camp, it can be too late, and some of that pain or some of that swelling

04:54could be already there. And then we also had these electrolyte drink mix tablets. Garrett

05:01could nerd out about these longer than I could, but they're more like salt than sugar, so they're

05:07really good electrolytes, so we had these with us along the way. We also had little water bottle,

05:14which we were able to use like for our electrolyte mix, so we kept that separate from our Camelbacks.

05:19Speaking of water bladders, I used this Camelback 3-liter. It worked really well. I think the one

05:28thing about this one is that it's kind of harder to fill within your pack, so it's much easier when

05:33you're trying to fill it at like a water station or something. You hold it out, but you do kind of

05:37have to take it like out of your pack to fill it a little bit more, whereas Garrett had the

05:43Osprey branded water pack. His just kind of folds over at the top, so you're able to just like slide

05:50this thing off and then open it like this, and they were able to just like fill it. I think this

05:55one actually was a little bit better, but both three liters comparable in price. The next thing in my

06:00bag is snacks. We trekked with Alpaca Expeditions, and so every morning they would give us snacks to put

06:07in our bag. Garrett, he's got a high metabolism, so he definitely brought some like extra RX bars and stuff

06:12like that just to make sure that he had enough food throughout the trek, but having these in your

06:17bag is always good for when you need like a sugar boost from fruit or just some carb boost because

06:22you start to get hungry. Next up is my rain gear. So I am about to sound like an REI ad, but I have this

06:30REI deck back. It's really nice because it folds into itself, so when you want to use it, you just kind

06:37of like pop it out. It kind of goes over your bag like this, and then you can close it using this

06:44drawstring, and then when you're done with it, this case kind of turned inside out. You just shove it

06:52all back in really fast, and then close the netting, and it's back done. So it's really easy.

06:59This kind of keeps it from getting bulky. Alpaca does give you like a cover that you can use,

07:04rain cover for your backpack, but I liked having this just because it's a little bit more condensed,

07:09and I already had it, so it was easy for me to bring. So we did go during November. It was in

07:14the rainy season, so we definitely both brought our raincoat. I have the patagon raincoat, and then also

07:21rain pants. Both had these REI rain pants. One thing I will say is that my aunt and uncle

07:32had the ones that zipped up to the side, and I remember seeing those in the store and being like,

07:36why would I want my rain pants to like, they literally zip like all the way up to the waistband.

07:41I was like, why would I need to do that? And then on the trail, when I saw them unzip theirs and like

07:45slide their foot through in like three seconds, and I was like taking off my boot or like trying to shove

07:49it through the hole, I understood. So I think those were a little bit more expensive, but honestly,

07:54probably maybe worth it, up to you, but something to consider if you're going out and purchasing

08:00some rain pants for the Inca Trail. I also had in here a poncho, which I threw away. Alpaca gives

08:06you these like lime green ponchos. They actually work super well. We look super funny in them

08:11because they're like over your pack, so you look like a lime green hunchback, like trying to trek up

08:15these stairs with your poles. The next thing is a little bit gross, but ladies, listen to me. It is

08:22worth the Amazon purchase are these Peabody Stand and Pea. They're like these little funnels. I know

08:30this is kind of a gross topic, but you literally just like pop them open and you can just like slide

08:37this part between your legs and then the pea comes out like the little hole on the funnel, so you just

08:43kind of like lean down. And they worked super well. I was literally like giving them out to girls on the

08:49trail because I got like the value 20 pack because that's what they have on Amazon. There's not a lot

08:54of places to go like off the trail and go to the bathroom. It's really heavy, heavy foliage around

09:01everything, and so you can't like there is no hiding behind a bush, and it's a one-way trail. So with this

09:08you can put your back to like the way that everyone's coming, and that way if someone does come they just

09:12like see your back and you're like a little bit awkwardly like holding your pee funnel, but there you can

09:18use it without like showing your butt. So you don't have to like pull your whole pants down to pee.

09:23I could not be more thankful that I had these. We also have our camping toilet paper. We bought this.

09:30I mean you don't have to be this excessive. You could just take a roll of toilet paper and wrap it

09:34up, but you want to make sure that you're taking it off the like tube because that's going to take up

09:39more room in your pack. We have in here multiple different hand sanitizer. So we have hand sanitizer gel,

09:44just you know when you touch something you feel a little icky. And then I have wipes for when my

09:48hands like actually got dirty so that I could like get the stuff off. Sometimes I feel like with hand

09:54sanitizer you're just like rubbing the dirt around and that gets a little gross. So this helps kind of

09:59get that off. So one thing that I actually didn't have in my pack but I thought was a really good

10:04idea my aunt had was she bought dog poop bags as like little trash bags throughout the day.

10:09Um so like whenever I had trash like wrappers from a stack bar or a pee funnel I just kind of had to

10:15like throw them into like the little like side compartment of my bag that was open like little

10:20just kind of gross. So she thankfully um gave me one of those which I could use but I would recommend

10:26like they're little dog poop bags you can get it for super cheap. Use those collect all your trash in

10:31them and then when you find a trash can or when you get to your campsite you can get rid of those.

10:34Finally at the bottom of my pack I have this little electronics bag. We got these little dry bags

10:40off of Amazon. We wanted to make sure that we had everything that was important to us like extra

10:45protectant. So you just unroll this and then in here I have my headlamp. Yeah! Three levels of

10:54brightness. Um thankfully we made it back to camp before dark every night so things went really well

10:59for us. We had good pace. You will want this like at night though so always good to have it

11:04handy. Um sometimes you might start packing in the dark so good thing to have. I also have um a

11:11portable charger. Um I really wanted to get good photos and videos along the way so I just want to

11:15make sure that if my phone died or something I had the ability to charge it on the trail but um I have

11:21this little like my charge brick and then had a couple extra camera batteries in here as well. So

11:28that's really it. That was everything we carried in our packs on the Inca trail. I don't think I missed

11:35anything. I'm happy. I forgot my sunglasses so I'm squinty but I'm really happy. Again we were there in

11:40November so if you're going in a different time of year um like if you're going in Peru's winter you

11:45might want to pack more like gloves and things to keep you warmer. Um if you're in the dry season again

11:50all of this rain gear including this styling hat are definitely worth the purchase and if you have

11:59any questions let us know. We'll leave links to everything that we can find in the description

12:03below and we're happy to answer any questions. So let us know and if you're hiking the Inca trail we

12:08hope that your experience was as great as ours was. Bye!

Category

Transcript

Be the first to comment

Recommended