Seven Steps to a Backpack That Packs Itself

If you open the main compartment of your backpack during the day, your packing system is working against you. Every zipper you fumble with, every sack you dig through, and every rain cover you peel off burns energy you could spend covering ground.

That single idea drives the seven-step method Dave Morrow built across 22,000 miles as a full-time wilderness photographer. Morrow packs the same way every time, so his hands move gear to fixed spots without conscious thought, and a missing item announces itself immediately. He prefers Hyperlite Mountain Gear packs like the Unbound 55 because they behave like one long, nearly waterproof stuff sack with no interior clutter. Inside goes a trash compactor bag as a liner, a trick that keeps his down dry without adding the dead weight of an external cover. He skips stuff sacks entirely, and the reasoning becomes clear the moment he starts loading gear.

His food bag rides straight up the center of the pack, aligned with his spine. Morrow, who spent years in aerospace engineering, wants uniform density across the whole pack so no air pocket tilts his weight and forces his legs and core to compensate. He stuffs his down quilt and jacket loose around the food, filling every gap until he can't feel a hollow spot anywhere. His tent goes on top, ready to grab in a downpour before anything dry gets exposed, and he explains exactly how he handles a soaked tent when the rain won't quit.

The outside of the pack is where the day happens. Morrow keeps that day's food in a stretchy exterior pocket so he can eat without ever opening the main compartment, and he offsets his water bottle weight against his camera on the opposite side. His small essentials, from toothbrush to camp layers, live in a single Ziploc pod near the top, so nothing scatters across a dozen little pockets. He carries a titanium bottle and a Vargo Bot 700 instead of plastic, wind layers from Enlightened Equipment for warmth and sun protection, and a small shammy towel that dries tent walls and skin alike. He also lays out a strong case against hydration bladders, and it comes down to how much water you actually end up hauling.

The larger principle here connects to a shift that's been building in the backpacking world for over a decade. Ultralight thinking used to mean shaving grams off a spec sheet, but the smarter version treats the pack as a system where placement, access order, and balance all compound into less fatigue by day's end. Morrow's habit of moving one item, say microspikes or wool gloves, from inside to outside based on the coming day's weather is a repeatable decision framework anyone can adopt regardless of brand. Pick fixed homes for your gear, keep only the day's needs accessible, protect what must stay dry with a real liner, and load the heaviest mass against your spine. Those four rules translate to any pack you already own, and they pay off most on long, back-to-back days when small inefficiencies add up into real exhaustion. Watch the full breakdown above to see the packing sequence in action and hear his reasoning for every layer.