The Dog Day Pack I Wish I Had Bought Sooner

For the first two years I hiked with Moss, I carried his water myself. Two bottles in my own pack, plus the bowl, plus the treats, and by mile six my shoulders knew about it. I told myself that was just what hiking with a dog costs you. Then one Saturday on a Cascade trail I added up what was actually in my pack and realized most of it was his.

I bought the Ruffwear Front Range Day Pack two years ago, size Medium. It weighs 15.84 ounces empty, which is less than one of the bottles I used to carry for him. Moss is a 46 pound Australian shepherd mix, about 21 inches at the shoulder and 28 inches around the chest, and the Medium fits him with room left in the straps. I wish I had bought it two years sooner than I did.

I had looked at dog packs for a year before that and talked myself out of it twice. I thought Moss would hate it, and I thought I would be the person on the trail with the over-equipped dog. Both turned out to be wrong. The Ruffwear pack was the first one I actually ordered, and it is still the only one he has worn.

The first two short outings he walked a little stiffly, the way a dog walks when the thing on his back is new. By the third outing he had stopped noticing it. I started him with the pack empty, around the block, before a bottle ever went in it.

I fitted it in the driveway the evening it arrived, cinched the compression down over two bottles, and it has not needed adjusting since.

The load stays light and it stays even. One 20 ounce plastic bottle from home in each side pocket, poop bags in one zipper pocket, a handful of treats in the other. That is the whole list. The saddlebags are cut weight-forward with passive compression, so once the bottles are settled the pack rides close to his ribs instead of swinging out at every step.

Balancing the two sides takes me about a minute. That is the honest cost. Load one pocket heavier and he drifts a little on the trail, and I notice it before he does.

It weighs 15.84 ounces empty, and it took two bottles of water off my back. My shoulders stopped arguing with me at mile six.

On the days he wears it, the pack replaces his harness entirely. The leash clips to one of the three attachment points on the pack and we go. I like that better than layering a harness underneath, and Moss walks no differently either way. His flat collar with the ID tags stays on, but on a trail the leash never goes on the collar.

Those three attachment points matter more than I expected, mostly at a busy trailhead where I want him close to me while I get my poles sorted out.

At each rest stop the bowl comes off the outside of the pack, I pour about a third of a bottle into it, and Moss drinks while I eat a bar and look at the map.

The pack is what turned our five mile Saturdays into seven and eight mile Saturdays. Not because Moss got stronger, he did not, he is the same dog. Because I stopped carrying his water and started carrying only mine.

On the one or two night trips we do each summer, he carries his own kibble and the bowl rides clipped to the outside of the pack. Two nights is our limit, and the pack has never been the reason we turned around.

Two things I will tell you straight. It is warm on a hot day, so on the hottest Saturdays in August it stays home and the leash goes on his harness instead. And it does not come on snowshoe days. Those are harness days, always.

It gets hand washed in the sink a couple of times a season and hung by the back door to dry. The zippers have given me no trouble and nothing has torn.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

I would tell you the pack did not change my dog. Moss hikes the same trails at the same pace he always did, and I am not going to pretend a piece of gear did that. What changed was my back, and my mood at mile seven.

I would tell you to load it light for the first month. Empty around the block, then one bottle, then two. A dog who is new to a pack does not need a full load on day one, and neither do you.

I would tell you to measure your dog before you order instead of guessing. The Medium is what fits Moss at 46 pounds and 28 inches around the chest, and that chest number is the one that matters, not the weight.

I would tell you not to buy it for a dog who is finished after two miles. On that dog it will hang on a hook by the door and stay there.

And I would tell you that the two years I spent carrying his water were not a disaster. They were just two years longer than they needed to be. If you are doing five miles or more with your dog, the Ruffwear Front Range Day Pack is the piece of gear I would replace first if it walked off tomorrow.