3:43 p.m. on January 6, 2012 (EST)
I live in the PNW where its been in the mid 20's to 30's at night for the last month. And we were 13" behind in rain fall last month, so we're having a fairly dry winter here.
If I have to pick an order of importance from: sleeping bag, tent, backpack, boots, sleeping mat, stove then mine would be:
1) Boots (Keen Targhee II, $120) I want my feet to be warm, comfortable and dry. I'm throughly impressed with the waterproofness of these babies being that I live where there's a lot of rain, wet foliage, and standing water.
2) Stove (Brunton Talon, $30) So I can cook and boil water.
3) Sleeping bag (REI 15 synthetic, $40 used) So I can be warm and cozy, I can always build a shelter.
4) Tent (Homemade Silnylon Bilgy Tarp Tent $60 in materials/nontions and approx. 18 hrs of labor) Then I won't have to build my shelter and it's much more waterproof.
5) Backpack (TNF Terra 45-$120, Marmot Zelus 25-free I won it, Osprey Stratos 24-$40 used, Kelty Cache Hauler, free as a gift) This would obviously be decided on my length of trek.
6) Sleeping pad (Self-inflating Thermarest lite $30) This is more of a luxury than a necessity for me.
Now then, if it's order of importance of ANY gear (excluding food, since it's not really "gear," it would be entirely different.
1) Clothing. Baselayer to Rain parka, I probably paid around $250 for the outfit, some bought new, some bought in EUC. I want to be warm and comfortable and dry.
2)The boots listed above. I want to keep my feet warm and comfy. I can also use the laces for snares and other things.
3)Flint or some type of fire starter. To keep warm, cook, and boil water.
4)Pocket knife. (Gerber, it was a gift). I don't like going without a pocket knife. Self-protection, cutting kindling, kill food, slivers...uses are exhaustive.
5)Water bottle or water treatment (Platypus 1 L soft bottle-$8, Katadyn Hiker pump-$40, Katadyn Micropur $12) Water keeps you alive. I put this lower on the list thinking I could collect rain water in a piece of bark lined with leaves or something, but this would be much more convenient.
6)Headlamp (Petzel-$20) So I can see between 5:30pm and 7:00am, plus I'm not too fond of the dark, more specifically outdoors....alone is worse.
But that's the inner survivalist in me. I might have taken that list too far.