http://www.onebag.com/

Actually, most travelers are still big time pack mules...

But considering that hikers out in the wild carry just 10 lbs base weight or less -- travelers should be able to carry even less -- since shelter and bedding (i.e. hotels) are conveniently available and need not be carried!

Some travelers overload their packs because they feel better when they have everything at hand. While this might be important when out in the wilds, it's nonsensical when stores are everywhere!

To me, the flexibility of having everything at hand is dubious compared to the flexibility of traveling light and being able to just "get up and go" -- and making all kinds of unplanned stops just because you see something interesting. If you carry just a small bookbag, that's easy to do. But if you have a 90L pack on you, you can't go anywhere or do anything until you find a hotel and unload the darn thing!

Yeah, just like with hiking, turning yourself into a pack mule is no fun when traveling either -- and so unnecessary too!

Edited by ben2world on 05/10/2008 03:08:18 MDT.

Actually the One Bag site is older than BPL. It's been advocating going light weight travelling for quite a long time now.

Yeah, I first encountered that site in 2001 or something like that. The author tried to get his thing published but no pubisher would do it -- so he put it on the web. By then, many of the packs he recommended were already obsolete -- and many of the links were dead ones.

In the last three years or so, the author has gotten much more exposure, and the site got a major overhaul, with updated links. He was on NPR just yesterday!

Some travelers will never travel light. I like to see someone try to convince Imelda to travel with just one pack! :)

Wow! Discussing such a subject in Chaff! ;)

Yeah, when some of us get too light we start getting woozy in the head! ;-P

onebag older than 2001. It was originally http://www.oratory.com/travel/ I am sure it was around in the late 1990s. I think I based my travel list I wrote up for some friends on Doug's... which means his pages were most likely around in the mid 90s.

--mark