I always travelled with a backpack. I had a few of them – of different construction, size, and weight. On the skin of my back and shoulders I painfully experienced all that you need to know about backpacks. I divide them into two major categories: comfortable and uncomfortable. Among them, we can also distinguish backpacks that are cheap and expensive. The main difference between them is related not only to their price, but also to the degree of their friendliness towards the user.

Cheap and Expensive Backpacks

The cheapest backpacks are simple constructions made from tough material. I recommend them only to occasional carrying of light loads in the city. They are not suitable for travelling farther, since they do not have a fastening in the waist, so the whole weight of such a backpack rests on the shoulders of the person carrying it, which quickly becomes unbearable.
Good backpacks have two extra fastenings: in the waist and on the chest, which enable distribution of the weight of the carried luggage both on the shoulders and hips. Often they are also better adapted anatomically; they have special cladding, possibility of back height and strap length adjustment, and so on.
A traveller’s backpack (trekking, transport) should have a volume of at least 60 litres and in the case of a person of medium height no more than ninety litres. The most popular volume is seventy litres. I do not recommend buying the most expensive backpack, but if it is supposed to be an aid during travelling and not an obstacle, it should meet a few conditions.

Buying a Backpack

Before buying a backpack, think in what conditions you will use it the most: in Europe, or in the mountains in the wintertime, or in the tropics in the summer. Imagine you are already on the road, put on similar clothing and then start trying on the backpacks. If you are planning a journey to the tropics, don’t put a backpack on a winter coat and vice versa.
While buying:

 Try on a backpack which is at least partially filled in with luggage, so that you can feel how it fits your back, shoulders, and hips with a load.
 Adjust the height of the backpack to your own height by adjusting the straps and possibly the additional equipment which serves this purpose.
 Fasten both carrying straps: on the hips and chest.
 Pay attention to whether the hip strap is not too rigid and tough and if it won’t constrict with a heavier load.
 Don’t be shy to ask the shop-assistant to put an extra load into the backpack putting inside a fistful of snap-hooks, heavy boots, and other things from the store. After all, you have to check how the luggage fits your back and where you are feeling any discomfort.
 Don’t take off the backpack for at least half an hour, walking in the store with it on. A good backpack is the one which you easily forget that you are wearing. A bad backpack is the one which chafes, stabs, becomes a burden and within a few minutes you feel like taking it off your back and never putting back on again.
A good backpack is an investment. Even if it’s not the cheapest one you will appreciate its value while marching without pain and suffering with a comfortably distributed load and not a ghastly luggage carried as punishment.

Comfortable and Uncomfortable Backpacks

Only once I was persuaded to travel with a “chimney” style backpack constructed as a long sack. In order to reach something placed in the middle of the backpack’s height – not to mention something lying down the bottom – first you have to take out everything which is located above. This is what I call an “uncomfortable” backpack.

A comfortable backpack is such a backpack which you can place on the ground in a horizontal position, open using a zipper, then raise the flap and instantly see its whole contents. I also do prefer backpacks which are not covered by dozens of pockets, loops, fastenings, and other gadgets that make moving in narrow rooms, crowded buses or trains more difficult. My experience shows that a backpack should be as flat as possible. If stuffed pockets, loose straps, or boots or pots stick out from it, then sooner or later they will get tangled in something and will not let you go on further. Some backpacks are equipped with an extra flap, closed with a zipper, which covers the carrying straps. Such backpack resembles a bag and what’s most important it doesn’t have any loosely hanging straps, loops, buckles, or any other elements which make its transportation more difficult. Apart from that, a traveller carrying a bag is usually treated in a better way that a traveller with a backpack.

Backpack, Bag, or Suitcase

I have two backpacks, two bags, and one travel sack, which I use depending on the type of journey.

 Into the jungle, where there are no roads or pavements, there’s only a river and a barely visible path in the wilderness and also there are no pack animals, on which you can load your luggage, I take two backpacks: a small-sized backpack and a big one. In such places you have to carry the whole luggage on your own back.
 For expeditions to the Himalayas, Andes, or other mountains I take a small-sized backpack and a travel sack, which during trekking is carried by a yak or mule. The sack is made of black, tough tarpaulin and it’s just a simple sack – such as used by sailors. Its disadvantage is that when it’s not packed wisely it’s difficult to find anything in it. Its main advantage is that it’s easy to fasten to a yak’s back and it’s comfortable for it to carry (among other things it’s because it doesn’t have any sticking out, hanging, or constricting elements).
 For an expedition in off-road vehicles or other means of transportation (balloon, ship, boat) – through the desert, jungle, savannah, river, or ocean – I take a small-sized backpack and a big backpack.
 For an expedition to cities or the country or a safari I take a small-sized backpack and a travel bag meaning a large, rectangular, black bag equipped with wheels. It is made of tarpaulin, which is as strong as the one used in a backpack and it’s adapted to difficult conditions since it’s a model made for US marines.
 For smaller journeys through Poland, lasting a few days, I take a small-sized backpack and a small travel bag on wheels.

Small-sized Backpack
The invention of a genius, which cannot be replaced even by the best of bags. I write more about the small-sized backpack on page 48.

Small-sized Backpacks for Photographers

I do not recommend camera bags, particularly those specially designed for cameras, which due to their appearance tell from a distance that they carry valuable equipment inside. They have company logos, gaudy labels, and most often their shape is similar to that of a camera. Every thief, even a beginner, is able to recognise and track down such a bag. I once went travelling with a really neat camera bag. Everything fit in it really well – lenses, a professional camera, spare film rolls, and batteries, even a ball pen and a notebook. My arm grew weary and the bag, in the most unexpected moments, for example while crossing a fallen tree, started to dangle dangerously and it bumped against my hip when I had to run to catch the bus. It also attracted attention. I got rid of it as soon as possible, cutting off the straps and the flap, which was closed using a zipper, and placing it on the bottom of a small-sized backpack.

Special backpacks were invented for photographers. For photographers-travellers only one model is practical and worth recommending. It is a backpack which looks quite plain – its first advantage as it doesn’t attract the attention of thieves. However, inside, it has two parts. The bottom one is clad with special sponge and it has extra stiffening. That’s where we carry the camera, lenses, and other requisites. The upper, narrower part is intended for normal use – you can fit in there everything which is needed during a short journey – a bottle of water, backpack protective cover, notebook, and a ball pen.

The advantage of this backpack is that you don’t have to take it off to take the camera out. You simply move it from your back to your belly, reach inside and take out whatever you need. We place the backpack protective cover, bottle, or an apple for lunch in the lower part of the backpack for the time of shooting pictures and we put the camera on top. Then you simply unzip and in a matter of a few seconds the camera is ready to use. I advise against walking with the camera dangling from the neck.

And One More Bag

There are places in the world where you feel like buying everything the sellers have to offer in thousands of stores, small shops, and marketplaces. Unfortunately, these things are not only beautiful, cheap, and exotic, but very often they are big and heavy. This is surely true in case of such countries as: Peru, India, Nepal, and Kenya, and less distant ones such as Egypt or Greece. I saw when Poles couldn’t take their eyes and hands off a beautifully coloured fabric, a few more necklaces, wooden fiddles, a vase, or another heavy statue of a rhino. The consequences are easy to predict: the newly purchased objects will not fit inside a suitcase and the whole luggage will surely weigh more than twenty kilograms.

There is a well-tried way to handle this and even more than one. First of all – you always have to take with you an extra, light, empty, and capacious bag. This can be for instance a Chinese bag, which has a volume of a few dozen litres, but fits easily in a backpack or briefcase pocket. I have in mind these most characteristic Chinese bags, which are rectangular and in which sellers of Chinese or Vietnamese clothes transport their goods. Having packed such a bag with extra shopping, being aware of the fact that we have more than the allowed two pieces of luggage and that they surely exceed the weight limit, we make an agreement with a few passengers that we will check in together.

At the airports groups of passengers are treated in a preferential way. It’s enough to say that “we’re together”, collect the passports, and tickets, and go together to the check-in counter. The luggage is weighed and its total weight is calculated and divided by the number of passengers. If everyone has excess baggage, then of course the problem remains unsolved, but usually you can find a few people that resisted the frenzy of shopping.

Checking-in as a group has only one disadvantage: the group gets those seats on the plane, which is given by the airline employee, with no chance to choose a favourite place. Well, that’s the price you pay in return for something else.

Luggage in a Margarine Bucket
When I sailed in dugout canoes on Amazonian rivers I experienced all kinds of flooding, getting wet, unexpected fountains of water drops, and damping, which my luggage was subject to. I quickly realised that during a tropical downpour, capsizing, or when a leaking canoe is making water, you cannot protect standard luggage using a protective cover, plastic sheet, or even covering it with your own body. Water has this amazing capability that it can assume all kinds of shapes and it imperceptibly squeezes in the smallest crevices, infesting with its wetness everything that stands on its way and wants to accept this dampness. Standard luggage made from canvas and tarpaulin, even if it’s covered with a water-resistant layer, sooner or later gives in to it.

I found a solution after a few years. Before setting out on a journey, involving sailing on a river, I buy a margarine bucket. In America and Africa in order to pack wholesale quantities of certain foodstuffs (among other margarine and soup bouillon cubes) they commonly use characteristic white or yellow buckets with a very tight lid. These buckets are sold on the secondary market without their original contents. One bucket has a volume of around twenty litres, so you can easily fit inside it a camera, lenses, and the rest of your equipment, for which extended exposure to humidity could be deadly.

I take the bucket into the boat with me, where it accompanies me until the end of my river voyage. Usually, it stays right next to me with a slightly closed lid, so that I can take out the camera with one quick move or close it in the same speed in case of oncoming danger. It is absolutely watertight, but not comfortable to carry, so when I return from the river back to normal roads, I give the bucket to local people. I buy another one before a new journey.

Money Bags

This is one of the worst ideas that manufactures of tourist equipment ever came up with, unless they acted strictly in agreement with pickpockets. If I wanted to steal from someone, I would look for a tourist with a bag for documents and money. Some carry them dangling from their necks (these people are easiest to rob), others in their waist. The most characteristic feature of each type of such bag is that it attracts attention from a distance – and this is its biggest disadvantage. It announces to the whole world that its owner is on vacation, ready to spend big money, which he or she always carries along. I advise against carrying all kinds of such tourist gadgets. It’s not only the pickpockets or robbers, but also that their owner will always look and feel like a stranger “in town”.

Documents underneath the Clothes

One day I was standing in a line to the cash desk in a bank in Bogotá. I was waiting and waiting, so I watched the people around me. Suddenly, I realised that almost all the clients and guards were looking in the same direction, clearly fascinated by something. I looked in the same direction. I saw a couple of young tourists standing in the line to the foreign currency cash desk. For some time they had been trying to get out some green banknotes, which they were taking out from their underwear with visible difficulty. Everyone in the room was looking at them with great interest. I understood that those tourists used an extra means of protection in the form of a flat canvass bag, fastened in the waist underneath the clothes. You can hide documents and money in this way, hoping that the thief, after taking our luggage, will not come up with an idea of a strip-search. The idea is generally correct – on condition that it is kept secret. Using this hiding place in public means disclosing the secrets of all travellers.

Translated by Michał Nowakowski

Backpacks, Bags, Suitcases - excerpt from the book "THE GLOBETROTTER'S GUIDE, or The Travelling Blonde", published by National Geographic Poland 2008

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