Why your outdoorsy friend suddenly has a gummy bear power bank

Why your [ultra-light hiker] friend suddenly has [the world's lightest] power bank.

I remember Colin Fletcher, years ago, writing in The Complete Walker about trimming the borders off his paper maps to save weight, which seemed like an insane over-optimization to me. But then, I'm not an ultralight hiker.

I am impressed folks are getting their loads down to 10 pounds though.

I mean, maybe that makes sense if you carry 50+ pages of maps, but carrying a whole book of maps on a single expedition doesn’t.

Paper is very heavy. Even if you just carry a single map, you could likely save much of an ounce by trimming the borders.

And then there are things such as maps printed on silk...