After more than two years of development, the Mountain Equipment Company (MEC) has introduced the ‘2 Kilo Project,’ a capsule collection that includes a tent, sleeping bag, sleeping pad, and backpack that is innovative, warm, extremely lightweight, and just might be perfect for an off-road motorcycle adventure.
I’ve gone through my fair share of camping gear. I was a Boy Scout and spent countless weekends hiking into remote parts of the Pacific Northwest as a kid. My teenage years were spent surfing and camping along the Washington and Oregon coastlines, sleeping on the beach with as little as necessary, or camping out in the back of my Volvo station wagon. In my twenties, I took a job with an adventure motorcycle outfitter and applied the skills I’d learned as a Scout, scaling down my camping kit to fit into the panniers or saddle bags on a bike. Ounces become pounds, as they say.
I’ve photographed cross-country rally racing for more than a decade now, including three trips to the Dakar Rally - once in South America and twice in Saudi Arabia. To be out ahead of the racers at the start of each Special Stage, we remote camp every night in the desert, often with only three or four hours to sleep. That means my camping kit needs to be easy to set up and break down, as well as lightweight and durable. So, for the last decade, I’ve settled on a two-person MSR tent, along with a Therm-a-Rest sleeping pad and sleeping bag. It all packs down into a waterproof Wolfman Luggage duffle bag and weighs no more than seven or eight pounds. It’s a good setup, and one I’ve used on countless dual-sport motorcycle trips.
What I’ve found, though, is that while everything has become “ultralight” in the backpacking world, a lot of that gear can’t hold up on a motorcycle adventures. The glue holding the seams of my MSR tent together, for instance, gave up after one too many hot days strapped to the back of my dirt bike, riding through desert. And my sleeping pad was punctured while camping in a remote, rocky section of coastline on the Baja Peninsula. Every inflatable pillow I've used has failed, and my attempt to keep my tent poles straight has failed, time and again.
So, when I saw that MEC wanted to create an entire ultralight camping kit that collectively weighs just 2 kilograms - roughly 4.5 pounds – I was skeptical about its durability.
According to Mark Knight, Director of Product Creation for MEC: “Each product needed full standalone performance. We identified where components naturally overlapped to reduce weight in smarter ways without sacrificing durability, comfort or performance.”
The Delta Pivot 2 sleeping bag is built with materials developed by NASA, while the Alpha UL 1-Person tent – a hybrid single-wall design with double-wall vestibule - features carbon fiber tent poles created in collaboration with camera tripod manufacturers to get weight down to just 89g. To keep you warm, the Bravo 6 sleeping pad uses stacked internal loops that reflect heat back to your body to lock warmth in and block out the cold. All of this fits into the Charlie 32L UL, a backpack crafted using fully waterproof Challenge Sailcloth TX70 and weighs just 350g when you remove the back panel and waist belt.
While the armies of ultralight backpacking enthusiasts have marched forward, seeking ever lighter, ever smaller gear to take into the backcountry, I can’t help but remain skeptical, even though the sound of a 4.5-lb camping kit - roughly half the weight of my current setup – appeals to my do more with less mentality.
So, can NASA tech, carbon poles, and America Cup sailing fabrics hold up to the rigors of long distance, off-road motorcycle adventuring? It had better given the price!
The four-piece ‘2 Kilo Project’ kit will run you $1830 USD according to our friends at GearJunkie (Alpha UL 1-Person tent: $650, Delta Pivot 2 sleeping bag: $600, Bravo 6 sleeping pad: $280, and Charlie 32L UL backpack: $300), and is currently only available at select store throughout Canada (Vancouver, Nanaimo, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa and Montréal), as well as on the MEC website.
