The hiking rucksack, together with the ice axe and the boots, is the soul of the mountaineer, without which mountaineering outings would no longer be the same.
To make your outing a pleasant time you only need to follow a few simple instructions; here's how to pack your rucksack in the best way:
1) First of all, bear in mind that it is absolutely essential to keep your rucksack in order during your hikes, because when you need something you can't waste time searching nervously for it. This is even more true if we're sitting on a ledge or on a steep slope. We should manage to put the things we're used to carrying always in the same pockets or in the same places.
2) When you have few things to carry, it's best to prefer small, compact rucksacks that sit snugly against your back.
The rucksack straps must be pulled tight around the shoulders; the small straps and fastenings must be pulled tight too, so as to make the bulk of the rucksack as compact as possible.
3) The rucksack should be filled and loaded so that the heavy weights stay close to your back and not positioned too high in relation to the overall bulk of the rucksack itself.
Light weights go on the outside and on top of the rest of the gear you're carrying. Arranged this way, in fact, most of the weight is concentrated near the centre of gravity, and this makes the body-and-rucksack unit more stable; otherwise the rucksack would risk throwing the body off balance just when you most need to rely on your balance.
4) The rucksack should also have a strap that lets you tie the shoulder straps together, so that you can fix it firmly on your shoulders and so avoid sideways movements that push the body into tilted and/or unbalanced positions.
5) It's best to avoid weighing yourself down needlessly with things such as plastic boxes or too much clothing.
Remember that trying out the weight of a rucksack at home is very different from carrying it on your shoulders for four or five hours. What would normally seem an acceptable weight can seem unbearable after just a few hours.
Even the steel thermos, which does let you carry very useful hot tea on winter outings, can be very heavy if we consider the material it's made of.
What to put in your hiking rucksack?
In your hiking rucksack you put the essentials, and these depend on the season in which you decide to walk. Of course you mustn't overdo it, but above all you need to bring the useful things.
Lately there's a rather bizarre fashion of going out without equipment and with a super-light rucksack, giving up everything, even cutting water and protective clothing to the bare minimum.
Personally I'm against this kind of extremism. I'm of the opinion that those who go to the mountains for pleasure (and not for sporting competition) need to go to the mountains with all the necessary precautions.
To learn to carry the most important things we've put together a section on mountain equipment.