I use trekking poles and I use bottles. Yes, I stop and take my pack off when I want a drink, usually at my hourly rest stops. I also have a sustaining snack. Any excuse to stop, admire the view and smell the flowers!

I now give my dog Hysson a drink from his water bottles at rest stops, too. Why, you ask, when there are all those streams out there, which he prefers to drinking from a dish? A little over a month ago he came down with giardia and almost literally exploded in the car! I fortunately had a couple of old towels and a garbage bag for the worst of it, but I spent the rest of the drive (a very long hour and a half) with the car windows wide open, trying not to breathe, and stopping every 20-25 minutes to let him out for more. It took several hours to clean up and disinfect the car after I got home. Despite all the cleaning, I ended up having the car detailed, which wasn't cheap. Fortunately, a course of Flagyl took care of Hysson, and he's fine now. From now on, all his backcountry water will be filtered and carried in his pack!

It's chewing on those mouth valves that causes me the pain. Strange, because that's the only time I've ever had TMD joint problems! Admittedly, I never chew gum, or I might have gotten symptoms from that, too.

Re the compactor bag size--if it's too big, cut it down to fit--just leave enough at the top so you can use the "candy cane" method to close it (twist the end closed, wrap it with string, and then double the end back on itself and wrap again so it's water tight). You may find that you need the whole bag so you have enough to make the closure. Many brands of compactor bags are now scented--try to find an unscented brand. I haven't found any in the supermarkets or Walmart (all store brands) that aren't scented. You could also cut down a contractor trash bag to fit, avoiding the scent problem.

The good thing about the compactor bags is that everything inside is waterproofed and you can do away with a lot of stuff sacks. The bad, at least for me, was my rising blood pressure as I would shove a small item down into my pack only to have it repeatedly pop back out thanks to the slippery plastic. That's why I went to dry bags for my insulation.