Packing

When I started prepping for my trip, I ran across Eagle Creek's packing system. I've seen their displays in map and travel stores before, but never actually bought anything until my vacation this year.

I already had luggage, which I bought on sale from Luggage Online - I bought three bags from Samsonite's Ultra XLT 3000 series, which is now discontinued. FYI, I purchased the 22", 26", and 29" expandable suitcases. What's great is that they nest inside each other for storage. If I had to do things over again, I probably would not have purchased the 29" suitcase, as it's enormous and there's no way I'd want to lug that anywhere. The only time I've used it is when I moved to L.A. and needed something large enough to live out of for a couple of weeks while my household goods caught up to me. I now believe that I need to buy a carry-on sized bag that could be carried-onto most if not all flights (something that's close to 7"x14"x21"), as the 22" bag tends to be slightly too-big, even when I don't stuff it. I brought the 22" and the 26" bags with me on my trip, and flying over I nested the 22" bag inside the 26" bag, and had enough room for all my clothes, toiletries and presents. The friend who dropped me off at the airport was impressed I packed so light, even though my bag was pretty heavy. Do I really pack all that lightly for a girl? I think extreme adventurers and travelers pack lighter than I do.

Onto Eagle Creek's Pack-it System. I was really impressed with the ingeniousness of their ideas. Their system comprises of three items, their folders, cubes, and sacs.

Eagle Creek's folders are really nifty, you fold your slacks, jeans, skirts and shirts (using their plastic card for the shirts) and place them at the bottom of the folder, top it with the plastic card and then fold the folders' flaps over, keeping everything neat and even compressing the clothes a bit to take up less space. There's a video showing how it's done here. I bought 2 of their 18" folders which was just about right for my trip (although I did bring more clothes home than I brought with me, and I didn't use one of the folders when I packed for my flight over at all), and I think I'll eventually get a 15" folder for shorter trips (and smaller bags!).

Eagle Creek's cubes are a really cool idea to separate underwear, sports wear, t-shirts, etc from the rest of your clothes. Basically, if you don't pack it in a folder, you can pack it in a cube. My dad mentioned that Cabela's has similar packing cubes for cheaper. I would also point out that they only come in black, which offends my girly sensibilities. I bought way too many of the cubes. I used a quarter-sized cube for underwear, which fit over a week's worth perfectly, a half-sized cube for bras and sleepwear, and another half-sized cube for sports wear (I erroneously thought I would be doing a lot of running while I was over there.). The full-sized cube was way too big, I thought, but would probably fit a week's worth of men's undershirts and extra souvenir t-shirts nicely.

I bought an extra-small sac for my camera accessories - extra batteries for my 35 mm, extra memory cards and the charger for my digital camera. If I was really smart I would have bought an extra battery for my digital camera. I think when I finish unpacking I'll use the extra small sac to keep a spare toothbrush and toothpaste in the car, maybe even a travel comb. I also bought a shoe sac for my running shoes, and thought it was a cool idea. Their shoe sac would probably fit ankle-high hiking boots if you were traveling somewhere for outdoors activities.

I bought an Eagle Creek toiletry bag, which I was fairly impressed with and definitely will use on future trips. It has room for everything, provided that it's travel-sized.

I also bought a large Eagle Creek compression sac, which came in handy for storing dirty laundry during my trip and packing extra clothes for the flight back.

Other major items I brought with me were Columbia Sportswear Sierra Madre shell (it's packable and water resistant, along with having a security pocket so I didn't need to wear a money belt to hide my passport) and my trusty Timbuk 2 messenger bag. However, because of the inclement weather that I didn't plan for, the jacket wasn't quite heavy enough for me and I feel a traditional backpack would have worked better than the messenger bag. Live and learn, I guess.

I also feel that if I'm going to be doing any other major traveling I should invest in quick-dry traveling clothes as well as more suitable luggage. Eagle Creek does make a cool adventurer's backpack (even in a women's model!) with an auxiliary backpack that can be removed for day trips, but I'm not sure if I want to be completely locked into one company's products, as fond as I am of their packing system.