Travelling With Carry-Ons

There is more than one reason to travel without checking bags- it costs less, you don’t have to worry about lost baggage, and it is faster to check in. For many of my travels I like to do carry-ons only. My most recent trip involved 12 different flights with 5 different airlines in all, some of which had incredibly short connections, so the carry-ons only rule was pretty much a must. However, travelling with all carry-ons can prove to be somewhat difficult, especially when travelling for long periods of time and need to bring gear for cold weather in addition to research materials such as hard drives and a computer. I think I am starting to get a method down though.

Backpacks are usually too large to fit into the overhead compartment, but if you put many of your belongings under the seat in front if you, you can shrink the backpack small enough to fit into the overhead. There are some pretty impressive fold-up bags out there that can be stowed under the seat. Recently I’ve been a fan of the Packable Tote by Eagle Creek. It is big enough to fit a laptop, a book, and several other items. I love the fact that it has a zipper pocket in the front and a zipper on top so your stuff doesn’t fall out. The only downside is that the bag is kind of big compared to me. I tried to use it for carrying around a camera and bottle of water while going out for a day and leaving my stuff at the hotel. I looked pretty ridiculous given that the bag is probably the size of my upper body. Then again, the size is why I bought it, and I have no problem fitting all my extras in it.

As far as backpacks go, I have been using the Deuter FuturaPro 34 for women. I have to say that pack is incredibly comfortable to wear. Also, when the pack was mostly full, I never had any issues fitting it into a normal sized overhead compartment. I was even able to fit my winter gear for going up north to do research. Fitting in fleece pants, yaktrax, gaiters, and the works in addition to all of my other things was not a problem. I think it is a pretty decent travel pack overall.

One thing that I might try in the future is to use a slightly larger pack. When I had some time to kill in a town before checking into my hotel, I tried to squeeze everything extra I had in the tote into the pack, and everything didn’t quite fit (I think I had my camera, a book, a pair of pants and a hard drive that were left in the tote that I was carrying around). So, I may try this with a slightly larger pack in the future. Otherwise, the times that I have done this on overseas flights, I have been pretty happy.