What are the ten essentials, and how in the world do they relate to hiking with your babies? If you mostly go on shorter hikes, you may not have heard of the ten essentials.

But if you want to start doing more challenging hikes with your babies, it’s important to prepare for the possibility that you might be out on the trail longer than you intended to be. Like if you slip and break your ankle. Or get lost.

I connected with a New York State Ranger who does search and rescue missions, to get his opinion on this post before running it. So, the advice here is SAR approved!

He also reminded me that getting help when you’re out in the woods is not a guarantee. As hikers, we are responsible for our own safety, and the safety of anyone we bring hiking with us.

In this post, I’m only going to talk about the ten essentials for babies, because I don’t have a bigger kid yet.

So What Are They?

The “ten essentials” have been updated over the years, but essentially these are things you should bring on every (kinda tough) hike with you. The intent of bringing these things is so that if anything were to happen, you could survive in the outdoors for longer than you originally planned to be out there. This could allow you to make a plan to get back home, or for search and rescue to come and get you if needed (although this should NOT be counted on. If a search and rescue team has a more serious rescue on the go, or thinks it will be safer for them to wait-say for daylight- to extract you, you’d better be prepared to wait).

Navigation

Illumination- Headlamp

Sun Protection

First Aid

Knife

Fire

Shelter

Extra Food

Extra Water

Insulation/ Extra clothes

If you’ve been hiking for a long time, you probably have some version of each of the ten essentials that you bring along with you. If you HAVEN’T heard of the ten essentials, consider learning what they are and thinking about what you want to pack next time you’re out hiking.

Once you have the ten essentials sorted out for yourself, it’s time to move on to getting them sorted out for your adorable baby.

Obviously, a few systems will not apply to little ones (like fire, or illumination- they’ll rely on you to use these systems to their advantage).

But certain things can be very baby oriented. Here’s what we bring for our baby.

Sun Protection

Before hitting the trail, we always sunscreen our baby. That way we can leave the big, bulky sunscreen in the car. She has a sun hat that covers her neck and shades her eyes, and we pack a Coppertone Babies Waterstick so that we can re-sunscreen her if we’re out for a while. It’s really small and light so adding it to pack makes no difference.

First Aid

We bought a first aid kit years ago, and have been adding things to it as we go along. There are a few things in there that we added previously and might one day need to use for her, like tweezers and a tick removal tool. But when we started bringing her hiking, we also added Baby Tylenol, and in the warmer months, Baby Benadryl in case she ever had an allergic reaction on the trail.

Shelter

We bring a 2 Person Bivvy with us on longer hikes. Our daughter is still small enough that she could smush in with us if absolutely necessary.

I’m not sure why nobody talks about bug nets when they talk about shelter, because we all know mosquitoes, black flies, and deer flies can be relentless. And it can make a great hike awful if you’re being bitten nonstop! We bring a bug net for our daughter that can be draped over her carrier as needed. Shelter from the bugs!

Extra Food

This is an area where I sometimes worry we’re actually underprepared. Our daughter weaned herself fully when she was six months old, and so now she drinks formula and is practicing eating real food. We have a formula dispenser that holds enough formula for three bottles, and we bring the same amount of pre-filled bottles. Realistically, on a longer hike she’s definitely having at least one bottle, so that means there’s only two left over. Writing this out, I think I’ll actually buy an extra dispenser and start bringing it along, just in case. They say you pack your fears, right?

Extra Water

Extra water kind of goes along with extra food for little babies-unless they’re breastfed, you’re going to need enough water for them to drink their bottles. I’ve found it easiest to just pre-fill as many bottles as I have servings of formula, and bring them with us. Bottles don’t weigh much, although they DO take up a lot of space. Worth it.

Insulation

Insulation is SUPER important for babies, especially little ones. Because babies can’t regulate their temperatures as effectively as adults, it’s important to have lots of layers and options available for them. It’s also important to plan for a wide variety of temperatures and weather conditions- if you had to stay out on the trail with your baby into the night, could you still keep them warm?

I haven’t dressed my baby for winter hiking in a back carrier yet, because this past year I wore her when we hiked, and she was able to benefit from my body heat. Now that she’s older though, and the seasons have changed, we find ourselves having to plan for a greater variety of factors (changing temperatures, wind, rain, etc.).

We were able to find 100% polyester sleepers* that she wears while we hike (synthetic fabrics dry much more quickly than cotton, which dries really slowly, and can lead to babies getting chilly if they sweat at all). In her pack, we also bring extra layers in the form of a fleece sleeper (usually one size larger so it can go over top), and a rain suit (the Newt Suit) from MEC. Then, we have a hat, small mitts, and socks for her. I don’t know why we bring the socks, to be honest… Just seems like something we should have? We also bring along a fleece sleep sack. This could be used for her as an added component of shelter to keep her warm, and we’ve also had her wear it out on the trail as an extra layer a few times when she was in her front carrier.

I’m sure I don’t have to mention, but diapers and wipes are also pretty crucial! We normally bring a handful and usually change her once if we’re out on a longer hike. If we needed to stay out unexpectedly, we would still have a few extras on hand to make sure she was dry and clean enough.

What’s the Plan?

Whenever you’re going hiking with a baby, it can be good to think through what your plan would be if anything were to happen. For us, we know that if one of us were injured and had to stay out on the trail for an extended period of time, the other would get the baby off the trail.

Having a plan means you can make sure everyone’s on the same page, and can help you understand if what you’ve packed is adequate. For example, if you’re going to split up, hopefully there’s a headlamp for BOTH of you.

Keep in mind- The odds are really good that you’ll never have to employ the ten essentials when out on a hike, because you’re smart, and careful, and know your limits.

But the odds are also really good that if you DO need them, you’ll be glad you have them.

*I’ve recently discovered that polyester is a micro-plastic, and breaks down when you wash it, sending tiny plastics into the water system! I’ll be reconsidering her wardrobe as she grows, to try and get natural fabrics that can also wick away sweat.