Advice- pack for both travel and backpacking

[Cornelius Jaeger]

forget to mention the laufbursche huckepäckchen has 28L extended, its half full when i pack everything except tshirt and shorts and flipflops. enough space for 5 days of food left over.

[david]

A pack cover that doubles as a duffel bag has been pretty useful in protecting my backpack while traveling.

[Rishi Sugla]

Great suggestions all around. I'm almost more confused than I was before I asked! But basically what it comes down to, it seems, is that they're a lot of different set ups that I could use.

David- what pack cover do you have that can double as a duffel?

Cornelius- Thanks for the tip. Most of my gear right now isn't completely UL and the transition will be made slowly due to finances. I'd like to get to the point where I could use a setup like yours, so I'll definitely keep it in mind. It sounds pretty awesome. Where have you been traveling where you can sleep outside like that? I know in some places they don't allow it.

[Ian]

Hi Rishi,

The ULA CDT is 50L per your stated requirements. As Dale mentioned, I think I'd prefer a frameless pack for what you are describing. You can adjust the contents of the pack to make it work as a carryon. Remove a stuff sack, claim it as a personal item, and then throw it under the seat during the flight if you need to make the pack squishier to conform to the official dimensions. I've found internationally the enforcement of the carryon dimensions to be hit and miss but I wouldn't count on the airline to be merciful. Down side of this is that I wouldn’t want to carry a 50L pack for day to day sightseeing so maybe buy a S2S silnylon day pack or one of the smaller flashes to serve that purpose.

+1 on carrying an extra duffle bag. Not only is it great for checked items, often times you will find that your hotel/hostel is willing to store your extra gear for free or a small fee after you check out to go exploring. If not, just find a locker at the local bus/train stop or airport. Finding cheap duffle bags shouldn’t be a problem as you travel in case one is ruined while you are traveling.

A couple other things I'll note:

Obviously try to only bring clothes which can be washed in a sink and dry in ~ 24hrs. I can get away with two sets of clothes indefinitely but it's easier when I'm in a hotel vs a hostel where I can hang them in shower to dry and not worry about them walking off. Have an option to cover your legs and arms when sightseeing. Some temples will not let you in wearing shorts for example. I used street side laundry services in Cambodia a couple times. They charged by the lb and the price was very affordable.

Mosquitos are no joke. Dengue fever and malaria are of a real concern over there. My boss suffered from Dengue fever while in Cambodia and was a hurting unit. Visit your local travel clinic but you'll find that one species of mosquito will be diurnal and is a vector for disease X while another species is nocturnal and is a vector for disease Y. I'd at the very least treat your clothes with Permethrin. Another option is to send your clothes to Insect Shield and have them professionally treated: http://www.insectshield.com/PDF/IS%20Your%20Own%20Clothes%20-%20U.S.%20form.pdf

I've never had trouble finding a pharmacy and rubbing alcohol traveling in SE or SW Asia. You may want to consider a stove which is designed to burn rubbing alcohol cleanly http://flatcatgear.com/zencart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=20

Good luck and safe travels.

[Rishi Sugla]

Those are some great tips Ian, thanks. I think I might go with Robert's suggestion of using the using the granite gear vapor flatbed and using it with two dry bags. It seems super versatile and would be really convenient to be able to separate my bag in order to have a smaller pack when walking around.

I don't see much downside to it, assuming I can find a way to attach my water so that they're easily accessible. Then again, I haven't tried it yet so I'm not sure if that set up will work as well for me as Ian. Only way is to try, I suppose.

[Larry De La Briandais]

I would not compromise on the backpack. Get one that perfectly fits you and carries what you plan to carry. If the pack doesn't carry well you will regret it. After you find the pack you need/want, find something to put it in (duffel bag for example) when you fly. That allows you to not compromise on either the pack or the luggage. :^)

[Marko Botsaris]

Though on some airlines and some flights in some countries the limit is smaller, in US the carry on limit dimensions comes to 46 liters total *external* volume. So if you have more than about 40 l, and this is conservative, packs above 40 Liters are NOT carry-on. A personal peeve for me – the lady who brings a way over-sized bag for the overhead, and whose "purse" is several feet wide and stuffed to the gills. It makes everything slower and harder for the rest of us.

So if you have much more than 40 liters gear compressed that is a checked situation, IMHO. The OP has more or less stated he has 50+liters.

@Rishi The site is probably not a very good site for general travel. If I were you I would look at onebag.com and the forums by that name for light travel tips. There were a few good travel-specific suggesting above, but they are mixed in with some less good stuff based more of a backpacking mentality, as is to be expected here. Also keep i n my that this is a gear-head, price-is-generally-no-object crowd here. I tend to be that way too. However, keep this in mind when you sift suggestions here.

From what you have told us, you are in the check-in category unless you want to radically re-think your whole kit at this point.

So START with the gear and backpack you would take on a real backpacking trip independent of travel. Buy a cheap $20 nylon duffel on amazon, or anything up to a "fancy" patagonia black hole duffel of the size you need. When choosing a duffel your FIRST consideration, before anything else, is do you need to pack it, and everything in your carry-on INTO you backpack when you arrive, or can you manage with having an extra bag for periods of time. Since you will be backpacking the latter would imply you could safety leave some stuff behind on these trip. If no then your primary consideration is the *packability* of the duffel. If you want packability of the check-on itself then that totally limits the options, but that is the cheapest too.

Only after you have this pinned down should you worry about the more minor issues. If you get a packable duffel, then you can afford to get one a little over-sized so you will not have to over think the size too much.

[Sean Passanisi]

I'm nearly done with a 4 month tour of SE Asia. Under the schooling of our own Ben2World, I learned that just like with UL backpacking, you can use UL to enhance your experience. Ben recommends a 30L pack. Depending on what you are doing, 50 or 60L sounds massive unless you are carrying a lot of wilderness gear.

Against Ben's advice, I went with a "huge" ULA Ohm because I didn't want a pack exclusively for travel and purchased one I can use for backpacking too. The Ohm is not much larger than a typical campus pack when compressed without the frame. The pack is somewhat fragile, but I use a duffel in the unusual case when I need to check the bag. I say unusual because I carry so little that I don't need to give up my bag often, even on crowded buses. I can carry it on my lap if I want to.

I've seen boiling temps in Vietnam and freezing temps in Nepal, all with 7 kg of gear, including the pack and a rediculous 20 oz REI duffel. And I'm carrying too much! It's possible to get down to 5 or 6 kg in a pack the size most people use for day trips. Trust me, I thought it was crazy too before I left.

P.S.- I splurged on the Eagle Creek sil packing cubes. Expensive but they keep me organized and give the pack some structure.

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