Travel Purchases #1 : The Travel Pack

When it came time to buy my pack, beauty bag, locks, power plugs and special magic soap, I'm the first to admit I went a little crazy with my internet purchases.

For a whole week, there was a steady line of couriers at my door, each bringing some type of magical travel accessory for me to posess. I'm not gonna lie, it was an exciting week.

While I'm not going to do an itemised list of all the crazy crap I bought- for Show & Tell over the next few days I'd like to talk about the favourite travel items I've bought in the last month.

Today, I'm going to talk about buying my pack - which any traveller knows is quite an arduous task and that hurt my brain.

1. My Pack

I spent several days trawling the net for information on backpacks. There are an almost unlimited array of brands, designs, colours and functions and the headache-inducing confusion of reading pack review after pack review drained me to the core. Pretty much the only thing that was clear to me was that, as much as I'm a fan of not spending too much, I'm of the opinion (which I stole from several travel blogs) that it's worth spending money on your pack.

From my web searching, I also developed the following criteria for purchasing a pack -

• Front Opening for easy access and not having to go through all your crap constantly (as I ALWAYS seem to pack something I need in transit right at the bottom of my bag)
• Multiple internal storage compartments - to keep my crap organised and necessitate the purchase of fewer travel cubes
• Detachable day pack - not so much for actually carrying around (way to look like a tourist backpacker and become a target for theives and tricksters.. and also just look retarded) but for extra storage when necessary
• Harness design custom for women. Many brands offer a custom harness for the female form (we're built a little differently, I hear) and apparently it significantly reduces strain from traipsing around with a pack on
• 60-70L in volume. It took me a long time to come to that figure, but after talking to people in adventure shops, they really recommended sticking with one of the smaller packs. I'm a big offender in the "taking too much crap with you" category, so setting my carrying capacity low will most likely reduce the size of this offence. 
• Needs to be available for purchase IN BRISBANE, as an important part of buying a pack that is right for you is getting it fitted by a trained professional - also the guys down at Paddy Pallin and K2 Base Camp are so helpful with planning other areas of your trip and travel advice. So, no internet purchae on this one (the price of postage is just too much on a pack).
• Cool Aesthetic. Yeah, I want my pack to look cool.. is that a crime? I'm going to be living out of it for 4 months once I get off the boat, and you're not happy living in an ugly house, right? In terms of colour, as usual, I have a strong preference for green.. but that's just a preference.
• Price Range $250-$350. While I would love an arc'teryx pack (the ultimate), I couldn't really justify spending $500-$750 for a pack. However, after going and looking at the $100-$200 price range packs, I realised that you do what you get what you pay for in terms of quality- and I want a pack that can last.. I want to find "the one".. of packs. THis pricerange includes the lesser packs offered by truly large pack brands (lowe alpine/mont/macpac) and the best packs from Osprey and Eagle Creek- all of which are great packs.

For this reason -I looked at the travel pack option from the following brands.

• Osprey
• Mont
• Lowe Alpine
• Eagle Creek
• OnePlanet
• MacPac

I looked at the following brands (Caribee, Black Wolf and a few other cheaper brands) but when I saw them, I realised that quality is relfected in price and while these packs would last one trip.

After much deliberation and internet-time-wasting, I decided on the Osperey Waypoint 65.

The pack matches all my criteria and I got it for $350 at Paddy Pallin. When I spoke to the guy at Paddy Pallin, he told me that they are the main importers of Osprey into Australia, so can get stock quickest and at the best price. This pack is the brand new 2010 model, the previous model is only $300, but the look and feel of this pack are second to none (including the  Lowe Alpine travel trekker II, which I think looks a bit weird).

As a travel pack, the harness zips away for easy transportation. It has a huge number of spots to attach gear (especially important as I'm taking a sleeping bag for couch surfing) and it has an excellent harness suspension system. Although fairly tall, I fit the women's size perfectly as I have a "short back" (apparently).

Anyway, I simply love this pack. Ive packed and unpacked it a few times now, working out how much stuff I can take (most of which will be sent home when I disembark the cruise ship). It's currently filled with all the other random travel crap I've bought - which will be the subject of tomorrow's Show and Tell.