Most nutritional value, least WEIGHT..
 

I have an interesting adventure coming up in November 04. I'm disappearing into a jungle for about 45 days (just fulfilling one of my dreams).

I am hiking in solo about 20 extremely rugged miles. I've done this hike before and it took about 16 hrs. Once I reach the ~20 mile mark, I'll be camping/surviving within a 2-3 miles radius of this final spot for the entire 45 day period.

I am concerned with my food supply. I will be able to spear fish in a lagoon and the ocean and possibly take down a ferral goat, but don't want to rely solely on this. I'm in excellent physical condition, but because of the very difficult hike in, I can't carry in more then 75 lbs total. Clothing, tent, jungle hammock, stove, supplies, etc will be under 20 lbs. So I can bring in about 55lbs of food.

What food rations will provide me with my required nutrients with the least amount of weight? (obviously I can bring in a couple bottles of virgin olive oil to meet my calorie requirements, but i need more then fat calories... :) ). I'm estimating I will need about 2500-3000kcal/day on this adventure. So for the 45 days, I will need ** 135,000 ** calories. Suggestions for food??? Prepackaged ration meals could work.. I understand that sled dogs (huskies), while working, are fed 6"x4"x2" bricks of food that each contain over 10,000 calories and provide the dog with it's required protein/fat/carb requirements. Are there any such things made for human consumption? If so, what's it called?? Cost isn't a terrible issue. But making sure that I can hike in with 135,000 kcalories in under 55lbs IS a big concern.

THANKS FOR ANY SUGGESTIONS!

i don't know of any food in particular, but make sure you bring multivitamins!!! and they're nice and light too.

rice isn't too heavy, and has lots of carbs to give you the engery you need.

McDonalds has plenty of calories in relativly small amounts of food :D

Hopefully you're consulting a specialist for something like this. Depending on distance and pace, you could easily consume more than 2500 calories/day. At 45 days this is a very serious adventure. Plus, you'll need equipment to sanitize water.

Beef Jerkey is always healthy, and dense. Plus it tastes awesome. Different kinds of nuts and dehydrated fruits would be my suggestion as they are healthy and lightweight.

As thingstodo has mentioned, you should probably be consulting a nutritionist for this as well.

One thing that occurred to me is to look into the diets of mountaineers and perhaps artic/antartic trekkers. They need tonnes of calories with minimal weight as well.

One thing you could look into is dehydrated/freeze dried foods. It'll save you from carrying in all that water weight. Basically, you should look into food used by people where weight is a concern, such as space exploration and mountaineers.....

Then all you need is a steady supply of clean water. There's all sorts of nasty tropical diseases you can pick up from drinking contaminated water... .

How are you planning to make fire/cook etc?

did a quick search on google, and found this site that lists some mountaineering/freezedried food manufacturers. Some have pretty detailed nutritional information.

http://gravitydex.com/Mountaineering...acturers/Food/

hope this helps!!!

was looking at this site,
http://www.expeditionfoods.com/aboutfoods.html

and at around 300-600 kcal per 100g, your 55lb works out to be around 25kg, so thats 250 portions of food (100g), say with an average of 400 kcal/100g, you'll get around 100,000 kcal of food, not inclusive of packaging weight.

If you look at the non freeze-dried foods, you'll see that the average calories per 100g maxes out at around 200 kcal/100g. You could get pemmican, though, which was the preferred food of the earliest artic explorers like Scott and Edmunsen. Its basically a VERY fatty and high energy blend of foods.

No way you could get by without dehydrated foods on your weight budget. Even beef jerky has only 270 kcal/100g.

oh, I have no affliation with any of these sites. I haven't even heard of this topic prior to this thread (other than the info about artic explorers..heh.)

You'll definitely need multi-vitamins and whatnot to supplement your nutritional needs.