Words by Tom Gale
- Atom Packs Founder
Laura got to the meeting place first, an amazing feat considering her usual record with timekeeping. Soon the rest of the rabble would arrive: 11 excited and eager Atom Packs employees who had spent the week cutting and sewing their own backpacks for this very moment. Their backpacks (along with a few hastily added last-minute items) were now piled up, spilling off the pavement. The three dogs were yipping expectantly, with Fable being the first to get a little too excited and having to be taken off for a time-out lap of the car park by Warwick, his ever-patient owner.
In the six and a half years of running Atom Packs, this would be one of the few times that every team member would be in the same place and, for some, the first time they had used their backpacks for their intended purpose - to journey outdoors.
Our aim was to walk from Buttermere back to Keswick, a simple 20-mile hike following Buttermere lakeshore, over Haystacks, across Honister Pass, and down to Seatoller for a night in the campsite, then home to Keswick via Castle Crag and the western shore of Derwent Water.
We climbed aboard the minibus and began a bouncy and twirly 40-minute journey down the narrow mountain roads. There was excited chatter among the team as they all compared what did and did not make it into their backpacks. Playing Dad, I pointed out parts of the route we would be hiking past on our journey back. Some members of the team sat quietly, in a battle with themselves against the onset of travel sickness, silently waiting for the journey to end, while the dogs all panted expectantly.
At Seatoller, we picked up the rest of our team, who were joining us for the first day, leaving their car at what would be the end of their journey. The gang was all here now, and I thought of the Atom Packs workshop sitting silent, a rare thing on a weekday.
As we piled out of the minibus in Buttermere, an anonymous hiker walked past wearing a well-used Prospector pack. That must be a good omen. I heckled him over, and soon enough the whole team was cheering as he proudly did a pirouette. His pack brought the total number of Atom Packs in that one space to fifteen; outside of our workshop (or my loft), that might be some kind of record.
As the team set off towards the shore of Buttermere, I held off to the back of the group, taking a moment to listen to the excited chatter and watch all the colorful backpacks bobbing along down the track. I noted that I felt very content. I used to lead guided walks from this valley, the cloud-covered summit of Red Pike often being our first objective: The first time I climbed up to that ridge alone, I got completely turned around for several hours in terrible visibility before finally making it back to the valley, and, even after several years' experience and a mountain leader qualification later, my feelings of dread leading a group towards that ridge never left me. We’d have none of that today though - the weather was perfect: a gentle breeze and blue skies with a good amount of cloud for atmosphere.
Jo’s dog Seren (Lab x Alsatian mix) was out of her mind, having never been over to this valley before. She spent a lot of time excitedly running through the forest, down to the lake, and back again, hotly pursued by the somewhat infatuated Fable (Vizsla). Winnie, our rescue dog (Heinz 57), was doing her usual antics of following us parallel to the trail but 20m up the hillside from us, climbing onto every rocky outcrop and peeping down at us, her forward-folding ears showing us how happy she was.
In this fashion, our happy rabble followed the shore of Buttermere, stopping for a quick swim (brr!) and then some impromptu singing with cake, cookies (and candles!) that Gayle and Mim had heroically packed out for Sam’s birthday. Birthdays are taken very seriously at Atom Packs HQ, and I was pleased to see that today was no exception. I was delighted to see our resident Canadian, Jen, going back to her canoe guide leader roots, taking excellent care of the swimmers, who by this point had been in the water long enough to find getting out again a challenge. She ran between backpacks and lakeshore, transporting towels, sweets, shoes, and shoulder rubs to those in need.
We have been so busy for the last few years that entertaining a trip like this has never felt possible, not during work time anyway. This journey was the final act in a full three days of preparations; we had spent the previous few days rummaging through our scrap piles and building backpacks for every staff member, even those who don’t normally sew being coached by one of our sewing team through the whole process. Rowan, who spends two days each week sewing most of our hip belts, for the first time sewed the part of the pack that the hip belt connects to, and then the rest of the backpack above it. Will, who joined us last November as a webbing cutter/frame prepper/general stock wizard, was really interested to see the numerous parts that he labors over daily interacting with each other to become a finished feature or product. This level of learning and experience should be mandatory in all companies. I kept thinking to myself, “Why on earth have we not done this sooner?!”
We had only 8 miles to hike on this first day, but our real mix of experience levels meant that we probably needed to keep pushing on. The last thing I wanted was to arrive at camp in the dark and, with the 500m scramble up Haystacks between us and camp, I wanted us to start making progress.
Soon enough we were back on the trail again. Most of the swimmers were now wearing a lot of layers, hiking along happily comparing which parts of their bodies had lost/regained sensation. We all enjoyed getting the blood flowing again!
Jo and Seren left us at the end of the lake, the 4 miles completed being quite enough for one day, and the remainder of our team headed off up to Scarth Gap, the rocky pass between Haystacks and High Crag, rapidly shedding layers as they went.
I always say that you can read all you like about lightweight or ultralight hiking, but the only way to truly understand the philosophy is to carry something heavy up and over a mountain. This level of context is unlearnable from a book or forum. That thing that you packed because, “Well hell, it might be useful!” is now taking up valuable space, every gram of it bearing down on you as you climb… See how you feel about it at the top of your first 500m climb, then decide how useful it may or may not be!
It was interesting seeing how the team split off; some who were chatty and keen swiftly gained a significant lead on the slower members of the group. It doesn't matter how tight a team is, in my experience this will always happen: people often find it hard to walk at a slower pace than they are used to. Jen and Laura were at the back, cheerfully chatting away to Dexter, who was gladly accepting undesired items from people’s backpacks, him saying the extra weight was all good training, even at one point stopping me to compliment the padded hip belt on his Pulse 50L. This was a big moment for Dexter, an avid ultralighter with a sub-4kg base weight, and, ever the fan of an extreme statement, once loudly proclaimed to the workshop that “I'm never going to wear a hip belt again, they’re completely pointless” - I’m not sure what brought on this change of heart… I made a mental note to check his lighterpack stats when I got home to find out what his base weight is up to these days.
Soon enough we had all reached Scarth Gap and we were soon sitting on a nice overlook, chomping on our lunches. Viktorya, our strong-willed Bulgarian seamstress, proclaimed she would be eating her lunch on the summit and took herself off for the remainder of the climb - this is something I do personally, never enjoying climbing on a full stomach. There was a great array of foods brought out for lunch; mostly it was squashed supermarket sandwiches, but Warwick had his usual extravagant tupperware of leftovers from his previous night's dinner. Some had brought cheese and crackers, and Ellie even had some weird full dried bananas (which we universally agreed looked very, very bad, but the brave who tried them assured us tasted better than expected!).
The remainder of the climb to the summit never fails to be boring, it being all scrambly and ledgy. There are a few moments of exposure that require careful negotiation. Luckily in the dry, the difficulties are easily managed, but there are a few locations where a slip could become quite serious. Care was taken with the less confident team members, and some of my old guiding tricks came in handy. It felt nice to be using these skills again and to see Jen and Will coaching some different balance and movement techniques. You honestly couldn’t buy this level of team building. It felt great to be out of the workshop.
For a good 30 minutes we felt like we were climbing using our hands as much as our feet, and eventually, the summit cairn finally hove into view. I’d accidentally lied to Laura a few times on this climb: “This is the last hard bit,” “It’s pretty much flat from here,” or “The summit is literally just over this next bit”... She’d taken it all in her stride, having worked with me long enough to know when I might be bluffing.
On the summit, I gave her a squeeze, congratulated her for her effort, and apologised at the same time. Everyone has different levels of adventure, the point at which they are pulled out of their comfort zone. Standing on that summit, it was clear that nobody had worked harder or overcome more than Laura had on that day. This always thrilled me about guiding; it never mattered that it might be my hundredth time there, it was that person's first time, and that was always a really special thing to be a part of. Nobody can discover the world for anybody else.
Warwick, who had boldly volunteered to be the trip photographer, managed to corral us all into a frame, and after a few attempts got a photo we were all happy with.
In between shots, I started thinking about the group standing around me and began to feel a rare swelling of pride. Each one of them was there because of this impossible idea that I dreamt up while walking several thousand miles of trail. Very few of this team answered advertised positions, most of them sort of just turned up at the workshop one day and, after a short chat, never left. I like that. I don’t often have a plan, or rarely a fully formed one, yet there we were, a glorious team of misfits, weirdos, and lovable rogues, each with our own story, united on the summit of a mountain by the backpacks that took us there.
To be continued....
If you are keen to read part two, let us know you enjoyed the first half!
