How the hell do you pack for 6 months of travel?

In thinking about the trip I had to decide what my packing methodology was going to be.  I'm travelling for nearly 6 months and I'm moving from Chinese summer (hot, humid) to Scandinavian winter (frozen testicles) so I'm going to need to cater for a bunch of climates.  I did a bit of google searching to see what other people who have done this kind of trip are doing.

I didn't want to be one of those dickheads who carries around a giant pack on their back and another one strapped to the front ... can you imagine carrying all that around?  At the same time I don't think I'm hardcore enough to be one of those ultra-minimalist people who can travel for 2 years with a school backpack.  I do like some level of comfort and given I'm 6 feet tall and a fattie my clothes take up more room than you skinny bastards.

So I decided to set myself an aspirational goal of going carry-on only and buying cold weather gear as I go (after all ... anything I buy in Australia is not going to be suitable to deal with winter in the arctic circle).  That means buying a bag that is small enough to fit in the overhead compartment of international flights and thus stopping me from having to ever check baggage (weight permitting).  There are a number of advantages to this but it does require some planning.  In reality having to check a bag isn't a huge inconvenience but I am a fundamentally lazy person so carrying less is really the kind of thing I'm into.

That decision made I did a bunch of reading on the interweb (see ... it's not just for porn!) and went to a bunch of stores and tried out a few bags.  In general carry-on only means I'm looking for a bag that has a capacity of 40-45 litres.

I had a few requirements which narrowed down the list.

1. Volume / Size - had to be carry-on sized. 
2. I had to be able to get it in a store in Australia.  Having never travelled like this before I wanted to be able to try stuff on.
3. Not a top-loader - inconvenient.  Much prefer the clam-shell style of opening for easy access to the whole bag.
4. Water resistant would be a nice touch.

There were really only 3-4 bags I ended up considering based on those requirements.  The Deuter Transit 40, the Osprey Farpoint 40 and the Osprey Porter 46.  Of those bags the biggest issue was the vertical size of the harness system.  Either the straps were too short or the bag simply wasn't long enough to sit in the right spot on my back so they were going to be uncomfortable to wear.

The Deuter Transit 40 is a good example of this.  It was one of the final 2 I was looking at.  I liked the bag, the material was nice (though not waterproof).  However - despite the product description showing an adjustable harness system it wasn't available on the 40 L version of the bag.  I would have had to upgrade to the 55 L version to get the adjustable harness which would have pushed me out of the carry-on range.

The bag I ended up going with was the Wing-it by One Planet.  I stumbled on this one in Melbourne when I was there for work a few weeks ago.  I nearly didn't walk into the store but I'm glad I did.

There were 3 main reasons I ended up with this bag I think.

1. The harness system is great.  It's really adjustable so the bag sits well on my shoulders and in the small of my back.  It's also really well padded on the shoulders so it should be a breeze to carry.
2. It feels like it has really good quality construction.  The material is great (heavy duty, waterproof) and it just feels really sturdy.  It was pretty expensive but it feels like it's going to last for years.
3. The staff at the store in Melbourne were really helpful.  They spent a lot of time talking with me, let me take the weighted pack for a walk around the block, sent me a new waist strap (fattie remember?) and I like that it's an Australian made product.

The only thing I didn't really like about it was the lack of pockets.  There are 2 internal pockets under the lid which are pretty small (they will hold a bit of paperwork and some cables but that's about it) and a stretchy pocket on the front.  I would have liked to see a water bottle pocket on one side of the bag and the internal pockets expanded a bit.

I think I made a reasonable choice.

It's proving quite enjoyable to type all this out.

Next post will be about what I'm actually packing.