Strong Enough for a Man but Built for a Women (Mountainsmith Women's Scarlet Recycled 50L)

Member Name: i_heart_elo

Product:	Mountainsmith Women's Scarlet Recycled 50L
Date:	15/04/09 (177 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: It's made specifically for Women, Extremely Comfortable, Great Hydration Pack

Disadvantages: Material is slightly thing and could rip if you were taking this Mountain Climbing

If you've ever walked into an REI or "Fill-in-the-blank", Sport Goods store, your sure to see dozens upon dozens of socalled, Backpacking-type Backpacks. I say Backpacking-type, because, that's truly what some of them are. Pieces of synthetic fibers masquarading as backpacks.

It's extremely difficult for the novice wannabe Backpacker to navigate through the endless array of these unsuitable packs. Which, is a flashback to me, circa 2005. I had absolutely no clue which pack to choose from. I ended up just trying on every single "Female" backpack in the store and still didn't know what to base my decision on. Should I make comfort paramount or duribility? Or should I consider the ones that just have the coolest features and looks?

To make matters worse, I was a prideful little thing that simply refused to ask the guy hovering over me what I should look for. (I didn't want anyone to know i'd never backpacked before!) Back then in 2005, I was well, a moron.

Because of this and my idiotic, prideful, and uninformed self , I ended up with a completely unsuitable pack. I didn't have a comfortable experience with my first foray into the Backpacking world. It was hard to manage, didn't fit my body style, and the only redeeming characteristic was that it was a fun color.

Of course when I FIRST tried it on, I thought the crappy pack FELT comfy, and LOOKED easy to manage, and SEEMED to fit my body style. I guess the cliche "You Live and Learn" , is appropoe in many circumstances, including backpacks.

I'm sorry if all this backtracking information so far has confused you. The reason I mention my OLD crappy backpack is so that NOW, I can gush to you about my new backpack! Which happens to be this one. The Mountainsmith Scarlet Backpack.

In a way, i'm almost speachless when it comes to this pack. In a word, it's.....Astounding. Or maybe just AMAZ-ZA-ZING works better? It's simply the only backpack I know for a fact is REALLY "made for a woman".

The first thing you'll notice is the lightweight construction. Empty, this pack feels like it's only about 2 lbs (could be slightly more but still, it feels ultra-lite). This is obviously helpful since a lot of backpacks are somewhat heavy to begin with.

The second "perk" this pack has are the shoulder straps. Many packs have these padded type shoulder harnesses but they "fit" in the wrong place. Either they fit too far away from your chest, or they fit too close (which for a "woman's chest" ,is kind of a big deal).

They must have had some female engineers design exactly where the perfect shoulder harness straps should be, because, these literaly are in the perfect spot for the maxium amount of comfort and mobility.

Thirdly, and one of my most favourite little "features", is the hydration pack pouch. Now, while the ports for the tube to the hydration pack are in a funky spot in my opinion, it is still a great design. The pouch is on the inside of the pack, on the back, near the top and is in this elastic type of nylon covering pouch that you can then pull the hydration pack in and out of.

It streamlines the taking out and putting back in process and has never leaked ONCE!!! I've used it countless times so I'm well impressed with it.

Fourth, (wow I could keep going to probably the 100th point but ,this review would be even more rambling than it already is).

The waist harness/strap accomodates all hip sizes and ranges. I'm moderately short (5'3) , so I was worried this would fit strangely like my old backpack. Only it's the opposite and very easily adjustable.

If you took out maybe 5 minutes to learn how several of the straps surrounding the shoulder harness and the waist harness work, you can fit this pack for whatever height you happen to be.

As an important sidenote, I will say that this pack will only work well for someone under 180 lbs. I only mention this because my friend, who happens to be around 180, used this once and had a tough time snapping the waist strap on her because there wasn't enough strap to extend it. It simply ended up being to tight for her liking. I'm about 145-150 and it has always fit me just fine, even when I used it once when I was more around 165lbs at one time.

Fifth and final point about this awesome pack. It's girly looking and full of pockets! I know , I know, some of you might not even care about that, but it does make it that much better in my opinion. It has the trekking stick velcro straps, two side "net" pouches on the bottom, and a front zipper pouch, that is a pouch within a pouch (meaning it has multiple mini pouches in side, to hold your passport, money, personal items that you want easily accesible but don't want to get wet etc....). Then of course the color, doesn't seem that "girlish" in the picture, but once you see it, you'll know this is a "FEMALE" backpack.

In conclusion, I think you might have realized by now, how much I love and adore this Backpack. This review has taken me around 30 minutes so far and i've been non-stop typing off the top of my head and could probably keep on for another 30 about it. Ask any of my friends too and they'll tell you that I have adopted this backpack as my child and it goes with me whenever and wherever.

You will NOT be disapointed with purchasing this. If your a woman in search of a backpacker's pack, and don't at least give this pack a LOOK after reading this diatribe, then I'm disapointed in you. Just, give it a shot, you'll come to love it almost as much as I do probably (although maybe not as obsessively).

*Also under Ciao as TiffanyRHarris*

Summary: This is a great "starter" backpack for the Novice and a good staple for the Intermediate backpacker