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Carrying a fridge on the trail
- Lea Appleton
- 7 days ago
- 3 min read
Outside my Big 3, which are the basics of a tent, backpack, sleeping system (bag & pad), my next heaviest collection of gear is my medical stuff—fridge, solar panel, and back-up battery. When I told my hiking buddies last summer that I was bringing my fridge for medication they all say they assumed it would look like a fridge and couldn't imagine how I would carry it, lugging a big box up the hills in the backcountry.
If you have medication that you need to keep cold, don't let that keep you from adventuring in the wilderness.
Luckily, it's actually quite small and many will mistake it for a water bottle. After a lot of research I found a portable cooler that keeps my osteoporosis medication at the right temp when attached to a solar panel or battery pack. You can use the special gel pack if you're traveling part of the day and have a place to refreeze overnight. If you have medication that you need to keep cold, don't let that keep you from adventuring in the wilderness. There are a number of options, but the one I carry is the Voyager Mini Cooler from All4Family found here. (This is an affiliate link and if you purchase from it, I earn income to support this blog.)
The metal cylinder comes with a standard screw-top lid I can use with the gel freezer pack or emergency water container that I can fill with ice-cold stream water or snow in the back country, as well as a lid with a motor that shows the temperature inside the cylinder housed inside the bottle with a fun little digital thermometer on the outside. It's quiet and works directly off the solar panel. And at night it was often cold enough that I didn't need to attach to the battery, though I brought it just in case there wasn't enough sun during the day, which happened a couple of times.
The fridge is a pretty cool contraption and it's the only reason I can go backpacking at the moment. I did ask my doctor if I could go without my daily injection for a few weeks and the answer was a definite "no." So, I needed a plan.
There is a part of me that is annoyed that I have to lug this thing on airplanes, attached to backpacks on the trail, and hooked up to the car charger if we are on a road trip. But it is also amazing. It allows me, and so many of us who require daily medication, the freedom to travel and explore.
The only real downside is that with all the pieces together, it weighs in at almost three pounds, which makes it extremely difficult to keep my overall pack weight under the recommended 20% of my body weight, which is especially important because I do hike with osteoporosis. I'll be detailing my experiments with ultralight backpacking in a future blog post, but until then, get outside and hike with a fridge if you need to!
Lea Appleton, PCC, NBC-HWC, is a Wayfinding Guide whose outdoor job is leading Wayfinding Days, Labyrinth Walks, and Team-Building Experiences and whose indoor job is coaching, writing, and speaking. She works with people who sense the path calling—and are learning to trust that it is worth following. Learn more at www.wildwayfinding.com.
