Denali Prep. 4 Weeks out: Bellies and Food and Such
I’m working on the expedition menu right now. There are some general guidelines that inform the food planning and packing, relative to both home life and other sorts of expeditions. In no particular order, below are the criteria by which we assemble the menu and some general thoughts on what occurs when we mash all those criteria together. And, then, at the end, thoughts on how menu, exertion, and expedition life combine to inform our gastrointestinal experience up there.
General Principles:
It is a strenuous trip. Some of the time. We alternate between hard exertion and hard chilling. We need calories for the exertion and for feeding the furnace during the cold. But some days we will do nothing more than lay around.
We carry all of our food. So, weight matters. However, our progress is limited more by altitude physiology than it is by the weight of our cargo. Because of the altitude physiology realities, we could take very lightweight food and not go appreciably faster, overall.
The environment is cold. Cold like a freezer, except when it isn’t. For at least the first week, it is possible to carry and deal with frozen foods. Throughout, it is easy to deal with dry, non-perishable foods. Foods that require refrigeration, between “room” temp and freezing temp, are more problematic. It is hard to keep foods near the +5 C that your fridge keeps food.
Human-powered food transport is jostling and rough. Our food needs to be able to withstand being shoved in a backpack and dragged as a sled inadvertently rolls over.
First, food is fuel. It is also social. Further, preparing it is a great complexity in the expedition equation. For these secondary reasons, guides do most or all of the cooking and the meals (breakfast and dinner) are prepared and served communally.
Lunches are, generally, on the go. Consisting of snack foods chosen and packed, at the beginning of the trip, by each participant for themselves.
All water, for drinking and for food preparation and for cleaning, is generated by melting snow. Melting snow is laborious and time- and fuel-consuming, As a result, water is a precious resource. Drinking it is a first priority, and we skimp none there. Cooking with it is important, but we try and lessen that when possible. Cleaning (dishes and humans) with it is rare.
Any group of 9 humans will, inevitably, have different dietary needs, restrictions, and preferences.
We mash all those fundamental truths together and out comes a menu. The resulting menu is carb-heavy, more varied than you might envision, and delicious. You might not choose exactly the same meals at home, but you won’t be forcing it down. The complexity of meals diminishes as the trip goes on. By the end, and way up high, we will be eating freeze-dried meals like you might have envisioned. Earlier, though, meals will look more like curry with vegetables, pizza, and multi-part taco extravaganzas.
Exertion, plus stress, plus altitude, plus camping life, plus an unfamiliar diet will likely affect your guts. Few escape an expedition with the same sort of overall gastrointestinal experience they have at home. And, unfortunately, there isn’t much anyone can do about it. The “real” food we serve early in the trip is part of our strategy. Generations of mountaineers have found that varied, real food is easier on the guts than more highly “processed”, dried foods. That said, especially among health-conscious, globe-trotting, intelligent mountaineers, the Denali diet will be more processed than your home diet. We can only do so much to replicate the real nice, real healthy diets we enjoy at home and during our training and preparation.
There are legends of expedition guides steadily deteriorating their own diets in the weeks prior to a trip. The theory being that they can therefore prepare their guts for the expedition diet, gradually and in the comfort of their home life. I personally have never done that. But I also spend a ton of time, all year round, eating outdoor food. Also, it isn’t that much fun to deprive yourself of gastronomical wonders and fresh, varied food in advance of an expedition. I don’t recommend the strategy of “prepping” your bellies…
We can, though, address some of the other variables. Stress and our guts are inextricably linked. You’ve gotten this far in life with your stress management techniques. Employ those before and during our expedition. We can only control so much of our surroundings, but we can control a great deal of our inner dialogue and process. We know the mental advantages of healthy, present processing of stressful situations. Trust the process, trust your preparation, trust the institutional knowledge we lean on, trust yourself and your team to engage with the necessary moves and choices. And, maybe, trust that all that good self-talk might just make your guts feel better during your expedition.