Bags

I've been doing a lot of thinking today about what kind of baggage that I'll be bringing. We're not checking any luggage, so we can have two bags: one is our actual luggage, but must fit in the overhead compartment, the second is our travelpack, the bag we'll carry around with us all day during our time in Cameroon.

Monsieur Arachide, a friend on a message board, introduced me to OneBag and I have to give a serious shout-out. What a great resource! I feel pretty confident that I can pare myself down to the bare necessities as far as clothing and toiletries, but I can't decide what to put them in.

That same friend also sang the praises of eBags' Weekender pack and now I really want one. Now, it isn't that I don't have a backpack. I do. I have a nice L.L. Bean bag, but I can't ever find anything in it! It's deep and padded and I always feel like I'm shoulder deep, rummaging for my water bottle or wallet or whatever I was trying to get to. I really like that these unzip like a suitcase so that the contents of my bag stand a chance of seeing the light of day.

Then there are these things called "Packing Cubes." The way that travel bloggers and travellers go on about these, I feel like they need a religion or infomercial of both. Apparently if I buy a few, my life will be changed. Now, I'm not entirely convinced of their transformative powers, but I may see if I can find a few somewhere. They appear pretty cheap on eBay and if I can avoid the dreaded packing slide, maybe I will see the light.

So now the question arises. If I get a Weekender bag, do I use that as my real luggage or do I use that as my backpack? Ideally, I'd like this to be my main bag and to have a smaller daypack, but that might really be pushing it on the small scale and I'm not sure what I'd do with my laptop. Maybe my father will let me borrow his netbook. :)