Whenever I have traveled anywhere it has almost always been with either my large hiking backpack or a big duffel bag. This year after lugging around at least one of those bags to Guadeloupe, Montreal and several other locations throughout the Northeast I finally broke down and bought a true traveling bag for my upcoming trip to New Orléans.
The bag I decided upon is made by High Sierra. The High Sierra 22″ Wheeled Backpack possesses the versatile functionality that I was hoping to find in a bag. Having a bag which fit most airlines carry-on requirements was a must have as I don’t want to have the experience of lost luggage. The bag can be wheeled around, act as a backpack, and be broken up into a smaller day pack for a tour around the city or a hike through the woods.
Another reason for purchasing this traveling companion is that I have a tendency to bring along too much stuff which leads to me cluttering up my space. For instance when I went on my recent 2 month travel to Montreal, Canada and Plymouth MA I not only had a duffel bag full of clothes but a backpack and small drawstring bag. What I realized is that even spending two months on the road I only wore half of the clothes. Having this size bag forces me to downsize my collection of items down only to what is completely necessary for traveling.
There are also two other things which I am going to attempt to do when I travel is to apply Pareto’s Principle better known as the 80/20 Principle. The idea behind Pareto’s Principle for traveling is that 20% of the items I bring with me I will use 80% of the time. Looking back at my earlier travel this principle holds true as there is always a large amount of things I bring which I rarely, if at all, use. 
To help me with Pareto’s Principle I will also use the 100 items challenge when I pack for travel. This challenge limits the items that a person can bring with them to just 100 items. Normally when I pack I try to think of every possible situation that I may face and attempt to have some item for that one situation. With the 100 items challenge though I must only pack what is absolutely necessary.
So here is to my new traveling companion and to more sustainable traveling habits. I will post an update soon about how I am progressing with my traveling habits and how many items I bring on my upcoming trips.
Hey man, thanks for the pingback :) and good luck with the challenge.
(could you do me a huge favour? change the url from “.wordpress.com” to “.net”. You’re linking to my old and unupdated blog, the new one is of course better, shinier and around nicer.)
Links are fixed and so far I have been having a fun time with the challenge. Normally I fluctuate between +/- 5 items. What really has helped me is buying this travel bag and limiting the things I bring with me to just what I can fit inside it
Now all you need is a smaller bag *evil grin*, preferably something that will be allowed as carry-on luggage. As soon as you no longer have to wait for your bags, travel becomes a whole new experience.
(Thanks for the fix)