While waiting for the next Saharan expedition I started to reconsider how to optimize my hiking and camping equipment. In the European sport shops it is easy to find high tech stuff designed for hiking in the European mountains but it is hard to find stuff really suited for hiking in the dry conditions tipical of the hot deserts. Actually hiking in the desert is not enough popular to justify the production of specialized equipment. The classic hikes in the central Sahara have always been proposed with the support of camel or mules. On the contrary, our hike have always been self-sufficient in relation to food and water. When the load of a back-pack is mainly water, may be nine to ten bottles of mineral water each weighting 1,5 kg, you become very conscious about the weight of every other thing you intend to carry.

My old backpack, a 65 litres Bergaus, just died after my November 2010 expedition to the Jebel Uweinat. It served me pretty well for thirty years but it was a classic backpack conceived for trekking in the our European mountains. It weighted nearly 2,5 Kg. By reviewing on the Internet all the modern production I quickly noticed that the vast majority of backpacks in the 55 to 65 litres in carrying capacity was featured by a weight well above two kilograms, many near the 2,5 kilograms threshold. This is in part the result of a technological evolution toward complexity; by adding straps, zips, compartments and accessories, wristles and bells, the modern colourful backpack evolved into a heavy moster nobody can eat or drink. I searcher extensively for something light and functional. Finally I found a very simple streamlined backpack with very few straps, weighting only 1.51 kg, with top-load access, hydration compatible. It is the XXXX Serie 50 XXXX (52 litres) backpack, XXXX branded. This backpack has a very interesting feature: it stand upright even when it is void. In the desert, dust is a major nuisance thus the absence of lateral access helps in preserving clean the backpack content. In this case simplicity is a real bonus. The smooth outside allows for a solar panel to be mounted. I look forward to test this backpack in a true desert.

Hydartion packs are now very sophisticated piece of equipment. The XXXX model branded XXXXX seems perfect o be combined with the Caliber 50 backpack. We will test it and see.

Hiking without a stove will make you miserable and less performing very soon if your hike is contempating a bivouac. A minimal stove is absolutely necessary to warm a soup, prepare a coffee or a cappuccino. Solid alcohol (produced by EXXXX) is the answer.Very effective and lightweight. If you carry with you solid alcohol you do not need a stove. A pot will suffice. I did all my hike in the Sahara this way but sometimes, in windy places, I had to borrow a stove for solid fuel from my companions. A stove specially built for solid alcohol helps a lot.

EXXXX produces a cheap foldable steel mini-stove, usually sold with his tablets of solid fuel. EXXXX produces also a mini-stove in aluminium with its dedicated pot, a much better solution in comparison to the cheap foldable stove made of steel, which is quite difficult to re-pack after use beacuse of the dirty residual products of the combustion. Total weight of the kit, stove plus pot, is only 197 grams.

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