Packing for our trip in a week. We have a group of 8 so I have 3 of the 30L food grade barrels. We have 3 old military packs that the barrels will fit inside. After packing I’m finding that we might need to carry a barrel and use one of those packs to haul things. Is that a stupid idea? The barrels only weigh about 30 lbs and have handles. Just curious if anyone has portaged these and is it a pain?

Thanks in advance.

Hey JB...we've carried blue barrels before. First couple of days aren't the most fun with one of those in your hands, but it isn't too bad. We planned the food so the barrel getting carried was used first and became the garbage bin thus making it lighter. Worked well for us on a 16-day trip. Good luck and enjoy the adventure!

It sounds miserable on anything except the shortest and easiest portages. Not so much the weight but the bulk and how far in front of your body you have to hold the thing.

Consider making a harness out of rope, something like this:

FIRST CLASS AMATEUR video

For me, hand carrying a blue barrel sounds like a good way to either crank out your back or trip because you can't see your feet as well. Try it out at home somewhere with tripping hazards.

Not sure what the new craze is for blue barrels? Certainly not conducive to portaging. If you must, there are blue barrel harnesses for sale on the interweb. Makes the inefficient blue barrel into an inefficient pack.

They are by no means bear resistant for more than about 2 1/2 minutes.
Tom

tumblehome: "Not sure what the new craze is for blue barrels? Certainly not conducive to portaging. If you must, there are blue barrel harnesses for sale on the interweb. Makes the inefficient blue barrel into an inefficient pack.


They are by no means bear resistant for more than about 2 1/2 minutes.
Tom
"

Agree on using a barrel specific harness to make portage work more enjoyable.

Tom, what do you recommend that’s more efficient than a barrel for group travel?

fadersup: "

tumblehome: "Not sure what the new craze is for blue barrels? Certainly not conducive to portaging. If you must, there are blue barrel harnesses for sale on the interweb. Makes the inefficient blue barrel into an inefficient pack.



They are by no means bear resistant for more than about 2 1/2 minutes.
Tom
"

Agree on using a barrel specific harness to make portage work more enjoyable.


Tom, what do you recommend that’s more efficient than a barrel for group travel?"

We have always just set up different stuff sacks in different colors: breakfast, lunch, dinner and then distributed the food into different packs. This keeps the weight more evenly distributed. At night, we just combine the stuff sacks into one pack to hang in the trees. I use this for group trips of 3-9 people, 3 days-40 days in length.

Granite Gear Packs
Duluth Packs
Kondos Packs
Cooks Custom Sewing packs.
Frost River packs.

All of these brands sell soft-side packs. You can rent these from an outfitter pretty cheap too.

You don’t want to put a barrel in a pack in part that you are using two ‘packs’ to carry the items. You don’t want to put a pack in a pack.

Soft sided packs allow you to cram gear into them and if your pack has cinches on the sides, you can tighten everything up.




In this example, a Granite Gear pack can be tightened up with the side and top straps. No wasted space in the pack. These packs fit nicely into a canoe.
Soft-sided packs are the ideal way to pack your gear, portage, and stow in a canoe.

Tom

I’m guessing 30 lbs is the loaded weight? If empty I would strongly recommend different barrels.

You can rent a harness from an outfitter to carry one solo with a canoe or a light standalone load. Some of the biggest portage packs can accommodate two 30 liter barrels, call an outfitter for specific options.

Split between 8 people the cost of either rental option would be less than $1/day/person. I would never hand carry one.

For what it’s worth barrels >>>>>>> hanging.

tumblehome: "Not sure what the new craze is for blue barrels? Certainly not conducive to portaging. If you must, there are blue barrel harnesses for sale on the interweb. Makes the inefficient blue barrel into an inefficient pack.


They are by no means bear resistant for more than about 2 1/2 minutes.
Tom
"

Tom - I have Bear Vaults, a CCS Food Pack, and a 30 liter blue barrel with a CCS Quad Harness. I sold my Ursack AllMitey's recently. I like the Bear Vaults if we each have our own. Don't have to hang them, nice to sit on, can see what's in them, etc. I have never personally used my CCS Food Pack yet but my brother has used it on a few occasions now and loves it. He actually carries Bear Vaults in it along with many other food items and camp kitchen items.

I personally love the blue barrel with the CCS barrel packs inside. The harness is comfortable and holds a lot of extra gear (stove, fuel, etc.). It holds a lot of food, I use the colored packs inside to sort food, it's basically water proof and rodent proof, I made a cutting board that fits on top, it can be used as a table, it can be used as a seat, it keeps things from getting crushed, it floats, etc. With that said, as soon as I get to camp I do take it out of the harness and it does get tied to a tree so a bear can't just wander in and run off with it while we are in camp. The lid is always secure in camp to reduce odors and keep little critters out. When we are not in camp it either travels with us or it gets properly hung. At night it's always properly hung. Everything in it is always dry. As the food gets eaten, the volume is replaced with other lightweight gear when traveling.

We ditched the blue barrels after the first two years. As others have said, they are a bear to carry. . .even with a harness. We went to Bearvaults. You can see what is in them, sit on them, use them as a table, and if you spread them out one per paddler they are no problem carrying. We tried Ursacks and dropped them as you can't see what is in them, and they didn't really help with bugs or mice. Never went with food packs. We don't like to hang packs so those were out.

If you are basecamping or doing short portages you could hand carry a barrel…I wouldn’t…but to each their own.

I’ll echo others, for a small amount of money you could rent a barrel harness or a pack. I’ve used a GG Superior and now a CCS guide pack. You can fit two blue 30L barrels side by side and they carry comfortably just like any pack as long as you don’t over load them. Then the 3rd barrel I’d use, rent, borrow…either a barrel pack or a small canoe or backpack.

There are just too many good options that would allow you to carry the barrel comfortably, probably more safely…so I just would never choose the hand carry option personally.

Side note…there a few comments that these barrels are hard to haul??? 2 30L barrels in a CCS Guide pack feel just like any other pack. Maybe they are referring to the 60L barrels? But the 30’s in a pack is a pretty easy fit/haul, much easier than my bear vaults. Although I use the bear vault now…you will get some comments about how your method doesn’t work…news flash…no one’s method works 100%. Keep a clean camp and don’t leave food unattended. The most often food cache method breached by bears in the BWCA is hanging…hanging is still a great method…most of the stories I hear of bears getting food from hangers or barrel people is that the food is not secured. Barrels left open while someone walked away to wash dishes, swim or fish or the food is only hung at night so the bear walks in and grabs the food. No method works if you don’t follow it all the time.

I have a CCS Food Barrel Pack. It’s nice.

We have a blue barrell similar to this with a back pack style harness that is comfortable to carry. We also have a small black bear barrell that fits in any pack. Unless you are a 20 year old guy you will probably have to think about making two trips on portages. For two people we do one trip with packs and then one with canoe and barrell.
One thing that hasen't been mentioned is that there are many areas in the BWCA that no longer have trees. As previously mentioned the most important thing is keeping a clean camp and always keeping the barrell closed. If you are cooking something expecially fragrant you may want to consider cooking away from your camp.
Thanks for asking,
Catrina