Backpacking: the Right Luggage
- on 05.19.09
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Finding the right travel luggage before you depart on your trip will greatly depend on where and how you will be traveling. If your journey is a weekend getaway to Paris, and you will have all the amenities provided, then you may need little in the way of travel luggage; the same applies if you are a backpacker who will be constantly on the move. Your bags must be easy to pack, transport and carry. However, if you are heading to Southeast Asia and are planning to put your roots down in Bangkok for a long time, then you can buy the biggest suitcase allowed, along with some added trunks and boxes.
There are a couple of important considerations when choosing travel luggage. First, one of the greatest mistakes that people make when buying travel luggage, is worrying more about weight than size. Weight is less of a problem than bulk, though it is important to be conscious of both. If you can travel light, all the better, but if you cannot, then try to travel small. Secondly, bring what is the most important to you. Some people have the incredible ability to travel with merely a tent, a toothbrush, a change of clothes and a guidebook. I am not one of them, but have found that if you can bring a balance of basic necessities and things for enriching your experience (such as a camera or journal), this can help you pack more quickly.
Your choice of travel luggage is of paramount importance, and will most likely involve you making a purchase at one point or another. After a certain point in your life, it will no longer suffice to borrow your brother’s ripped backpack from fifteen years back or your father’s first roll travel suitcase. You will have to hazard a purchase on your own.
Backpacks can be an obvious choice for people who will be hiking over hills and doing a fair amount of camping. It is the kind of travel luggage that distributes weight evenly on your shoulders and hips and takes the main weight off your lower back. However, if you are considering using public transport and walking in busy, crowded areas, it may be wiser to buy a combination bag and backpack. Both pieces come apart and zip together depending on where you are going, and can be very helpful if you do not wish to look too conspicuous with your backpack.
If you are going on a tour, and will be with a group who has their travel luggage carried for them, it may be wise to look into purchasing a duffel bag. These are easily stored in compartments where suitcases do not fit, and can be easily hoisted on to a pack animal or stowed away on a boat.
Traveling by air may merely require that you purchase a conventional suitcase, and if you are a frequent traveler, it may be wise to get a good quality one. The typical way that travel luggage is handled in airports could easily seeing you replacing that cheap suitcase after each trip.
However and wherever you go, remember to consider the importance of what you will be carrying, and how the travel luggage that you eventually choose can either make or break a trip.
John Pawlett
http://www.articlesbase.com/travel-articles/backpacking-the-right-luggage-100087.html
what to do with luggage when backpacking europe?
I plan to study abroad in the spring at AIU London for a semester of four months but after that I wanted to travel the rest of Europe since I'll already be over there. What to do with my luggage though for 2 weeks? I'd probably be bogged down with 2 big suitcases…What options do I have, lug them around to each country or see if i can store them in London and pick them up on the way home? My biggest concern was about storing them in Hostels which probably do not have a storage space for that amount of luggage.
From a backpacker's website:
The best option to store your bags somewhere in London is a professional storage company. This isn't as expensive as you might believe. The best solution I have found, is ABC storage, who have 3 good locations in London.
Particularly their Southwark location is good for backpackers, who don't have too much to store. They have lockers that are one metre square for £35 per 4 weeks, or 1.5m for £45. This works out to as £8.75-£11.25 per week.
Here's ABC's website:
http://www.abcselfstore.co.uk/
References :
http://www.londonbackpackers.net/storage.html
How about packing them up and shipping them home? Then you can carry your carryon around and not have to worry about your two suitcases. Then when you get back it won't be as long before they arrive.
Have a great trip!
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