Packing List

While I was scrounging the net, hoping to glean from others who have gone before me in extended travel, I became keen to learn about the items they took along with them. I was especially interested in reading through their packing lists and a couple of bright sparks even went as far as posting photos and videos. I'm not so savvy with video but I've spent my afternoon taking photos of everything I'm taking. In fact, this is great for itemised insurance purposes as much as it is informative for anyone interested in what to pack for world travel.

I was really none the wiser about luggage and how best to travel. I've heard snippets of instructions, such as: go light, roll everything, decide what you wish to take and half it etc... When my daughter went to Fiji last year for a school service trip for ten days, we went and brought a large duffel trolly bag at The Warehouse (cheap and poorly made). It was enormous! at least 100 liters! and she packed it - more like shoved it -  full of stuff. Heavy, cumbersome, but did the job.

So when it was time to think about what I was going to take, I researched some and settled on a similar but better quality duffel trolley bag. The first one was 100liters and I played with it for a week before returning it for my current one - at 47Lts.

I found plenty of advice online, in blogs and YouTube. I began to get interested in the concept of 'one bag' travel. Once I got used in eliminating my things the idea appealed to me to consider traveling with only with a carry-on. But I had to remind myself about the nature of my first trip. In all accounts and purposes I'm going to be spending 11 months in one place and making short trips from there.

So - as I said in my last post - I downsized from a 3 bedroom home, to fit all my worldly possessions into two bags. Each item is listed below with added photos. With every item out on my bed, I saw I could cull it still, but I won't at this stage, being my first trip, I wanted to get a feel for it and eliminate items from there. But my ultimate plan is travel with one bag.

I'm thrilled that the check-in luggage comes to about 15kg, well under the 20kg limit on Jeststar. Room for gifts? hmmm.

My carry on luggage

So let's begin with what I've decided to take along with me: My cabin bag has a total of 30 items but a few of these will be housed in my check-in bag due to weight.

Cabin Bag High Sierra trolly with backpack straps. I've been caught wheeling two bags before and it's beyond frustrating. This holds all I need for work, from my laptop, working files and as you can see everything else I find useful. I must say I'm liking having everything at my finger tips so far and it's interesting to note how little I can get away with for work.
Plastic bag with a copy of my personal ID: drivers license, passport, criminal record (um, it officially says i don't have one - because you were wondering weren't you?), extra photo, important numbers etc. I have one in my check in luggage also as well as with family members. 
HP laptop 15.6" (work bench) with a new battery, which sticks out a mile - not so great for travel, but will be leaving well enough alone at this stage.
Red Monster Space Saver lunch box holding all my power cables - first 'play' with a space saver
External Hard Drive 1TB (carried in check-in luggage, as it's a brick!)
Mesh case holding wireless mouse, flash sticks and multi-card reader.

Camera with Case and Tripod Canon Photoshot A450

Sony Walkman with sound reducing earplugs

Water Bottle

Bible NKJ

Day shoulder bag

Purse

Journal with 2 note books

Pencil case yellow with selection of writing implements

Drawing pen set of 4

Sharpener

Sleep mask/ear plugs

Detol hand sanitiser with moisturiser

Hand made Grad-bear lovingly made by Cassandra (Sofia's flatemate) - just because

Power Adapter plugs

Business cards with containers

Mobile Phone - Vodafone 845 on 2 degrees network in NZ, Optus in OZ
Sunglasses
Travel wallet with tickets, passport, insurance details etc
Mirror, tweezers, nail clippers with case (carried in check-in luggage)
CD holder with related work files and programs (carried in check-in luggage)
3 work files  coloured plastic files
Cuddle Buddy a gift from my daughter for the flight
Hanger convenience for organizing things (carried in check-in luggage)
Coming is my new Kindle Touch

Left: the monster lunch box space saver with all my power cables & connections inside.
Right: everything in my bag ready to go. Note: Cuddle Buddy does fit in the top

OK lets take a peek at my check-in luggage: Total of 62 items

Even this is too much I feel, but have stopped myself from culling

I've 14 tops. Have noticed that since I've been living out of this selection,
I'm only wearing about 4 tops constantly, so I've got room to cull should the need arise.

5 pairs of 3/4 length pants, 1 pair of shorts and 2 skirts

PJ's with 1 top (yellow one was thrown), 2 piece swimming costume with board shorts

1 sarong, 1 light scarf (for Muslim temples), 1 washing bag and sunlight washing soap,
hair brush, Sheewee (have a funny story with that item),
1 belt, 7 pairs of socks, 2 bras & 14 (!) pairs of knickers.
No idea why I have so many, but there you go.

Small space savers: sm: holds sanitary items,
med: medications - garlic pills, 12 mths supply malaria pills, Tea tree oil and cream
white flower balm etc, lg: fan, overflow of sanitary items, hair tidies, cutlery set
Backpack in a bag, quick dry towel

4 pairs of shoes: 1 black jandles, 1 black low strap heal,
1 white slip on sandle and a pair of white sneakers
1x 47Liter trolly bag - Antler

4x medium Space Savers - Kathmandu sale!!

Toilet bag with deodorant, face cleaners and moisturizer,
toothpaste & brush, perfume, body cream, shampoo/conditioner in solid/soap form,
body soap and puff (not in pic), & razors - no makeup, I don't wear any or jewellery

Now for the packing - everything is neatly rolled, as there seems to be more room. 

Underwear, sarong, hanger, power plugs. Inserted external hard drive and CDs - for protection

Pants, skirts, shorts and pj's

14 tops and bathing suit

3 pairs of shoes and warm vest. Sneakers left out to wear on flight

Toilet bag and smaller space savers

now ready to pack

I placed the heaviest space saver, containing the pants and skirts at the bottom of the bag for weight balance. 

The external hard drive was placed in the 2nd saver. I love the organization

with 4 space savers in the bag, there is room for more. So in goes the toilet bag

and the 3 smaller space savers, the towel and backpack in a bag

and it's all done, ready to close up with ease

once I have the bag standing on it's end I see that I can still put more inside. The Cuddle Buddy would be inside the computer backpack

Space savers - I'd heard about 'space savers' thought the process of researching travel. So when I saw them for sale for $5 and $10 (normally $39.99 each for medium bags) at Kathmandu I grabbed a handful to see if they'd work. Before using them by bag bulged with the same amount of things inside and without hope of ever finding what I needed in a hurry. I'm totally won over in using space savers from now on. I love that only a bag at a time can be opened without it bothering the rest of the contents.... ahhh space saver heaven.

Luggage - I read on One Bag that in choosing a suitable bag, I needed to consider 3 things "Good, Durability, Cheap - pick any two". I had another issue also, that fact of my hometown of Christchurch, NZ was/is still experiencing major earthquakes since September 4 2010 - just hit 10,000! as of writing. This meant that the bag shop (along with other businesses) missed out on 2 seasonal stock buying, which hadn't even crossed my mind would be an issue, so my choice wasn't as prolific as I'd hoped for. Still I'm happy with what I did purchase and got both bags on special. I think I chose 'durable and cheap', my Antler 47 Lt bag was reduced from $349 to $178 - I was a happy camper. While my High Sierra was reduced but not as much, I picked it up for $170 after asking for a discount, they gave me 10% - bless them (I was out of sale season).

Kathmandu - became my most favourite place when they had their annual 60% off sale. I purchased a few hundred dollars of gear there - they even had luggage, which hadn't occurred to me to investigate, but such is life. I found that what I was really after needed to save me space and weight and I got everything from there for 50%-95% off. I realised for me, economy is really important, I want as best as I can get for as least as I can get it for - don't we all?!

So that's it, I'm ready to leave - although I'm about to leave NZ in a week, I've been living out of these bags for more than a month, and it's been really easy and convenient.