I used the Zpacks "chest pocket" this year on my second
Camino Frances. It was great. It comes with additional straps to easily convert the bag to a shoulder bag, waist bag, or chest bag. I originally tried mine as an upper-chest bag as the company shows on its web site.
However, two days out, at Roncesvalles, I reconfigured the straps so the bag would ride lower, over my tummy. That allowed my hands to rest on top of the bag while walking if desired. It also made getting to everything in the bag much easier.
The Cuben cloth is highly water resistant. The zipper is well made and quite tight against rain. However, I would not consider this bag waterproof. To take it into a shower, the contents should be in a ziplock type bag for proper protection. Mine got rained on regularly with no harm to the contents.
Snacks, guidebook, my buff, walking gloves (no fingers), tissues, toilet paper, a pen and a small notebook went into the Z Packs "tummy bag." There was room for an orange too.
Here is the website for the ZPacks bag:
Here is a photo of me, with the tummy bag at Sahagun:
View attachment 11898
The free, reusabel, recycleable half-liter water bottles you see in the photo above the ZPacks bag are hung from my upper rucksack harness with these:
http://www.niteize.com/product/Drink-N-Clip.asp
I use an appropriate sized silicone "O" ring from my local DIY store to secure the clip to the bottle's neck. It absolutely works! Generally, two bottles are hung, with two more ready in a rucksack side pocket. I swap them from the front to the side / rear as they get emptied. Works like briliantly!
Coming out of Carrion de los Condes, where all are advised to bring extra water to cross the Meseta, as local fuentes are frequently NOT potable, I simply hung four bottles from the upper straps as above, and sternum / chest strap, and placed a single 1.5 liter bottle of spring / mineral water in each side mesh pocket of my Osprey Kestrel 48 rucksack. I also strapped an additional 1.5 liter bottle to the bottom of my rucksack using the sleeping pad straps. That gave me six and a half liters of water coming out of Carrion.
Yes, I KNOW it was heavy. But water is the one thing you must have to continue. The day was bright, sunny, and dry, with very little wind. The sun was HOT. Plus, I gave water to several others who had not planned ahead. Once I warned them about some of the local water sources, they were only too happy to take one or two half-liters of water from my load. So, my burden got lighter as I went along. After a couple of hours, you do not feel the additional water weight.
I still think a minimum of about three to four liters is needed to cross this stretch of Meseta. Then again, everyone is different. I would rather have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.
This past May, I walked 31 Km to a friend's home in Moratinos. By the time I arrived, I was down to less than .5 liters of water.
