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Lightest I ever travelled was when I took my motorbike down to the South of France for a week with a mate of mine on the back.
Apart from the clothes we were wearing, we took two bottles of Jack Daniels, toothbrushes, toothpaste and a pocket full of cash.
We slept rough each night, including park benches in Perpignon, a field near Montpellier and on the one night it rained, we got into an old boat that was being renovated in the local marina.
More recently, I went to Kurdistan for two weeks last year with just my camera, wide angle lens, 20 rolls of film, spare pair of light combat trousers, spare t shirt, fleece jacket, desert boots, two pairs underpants, two pairs socks toiletries, notepad.
The whole lot fitted into my LowePro camera bag.
By the time I flew home… I was minging!Re: Light travel.
I take less than the 10kg of stuff the airline lets you take free, usually 2pr jeans, shorts if I am going to a place you can wear them, and 4 each of undies, socks, and t shirt + the usual bug juice, throwaway camera, bottle from duty free, rizlas, a whoopie cushion, bum wad, and toiletres. This leaves me with lots of room for stuff I might pick up along the way.Recently I’ve just been going with a shoulderbag and even that is weighed down by three or four books, my dinky little first aid kid and several pairs of everything.
For the middle-of-nowhere trips I’ll take my 20 kilo backpack, which is still about a third of what your average backpack nut takes – and that’s only for places where I need to bring extra food, extra shoes et cetera.
Follow the two-to-three pair rule, a couple of cameras and books, a bunch of toiletries, and a pair of dress shoes if you need to impress someone along the way.
Or just say to hell with it and buy one of those massive suitcases that everyone seems to fly back to Europe with from Africa, where you can hide several large families in them comfortably. One step down from a shipping container and they wonder why they’re getting dinged for excess baggage…..
Bud Lite?
Seriously, a light load is the way to go with local purchases enroute as they are cheap and let you blend in better. A light ruck at most is all anybody needs and more than that is just a burden.
Of course we usually carry a double basic load of ammunition and a couple weapons for different environments. An AK for all around stuff but have a subgun for in the car at a minimum.
First Aid kit and emergency car repair kits plus comms and alternate comms.
And a cooler……..
Lightest traveling besides backpacking was on bicycle.
Everything stuffed into paniers, tent on a trailer. The wife and I dumped the trailer and tent after two days – too dangerous going downhill and too big a pain in the ass go up hill. After that we’d just log miles, 60-90 a day depending on the terrain. We’d be burnt out at the end of the day but the beer tasted that much better. We stayed at small motels after we dropped of the trailer and went and picked it up by car a week later. We’re leaving for four days on the bicycles again shortly. Haven’t picked a destination yet but somewhere in the midwest.
I went to Afghanistan without most of my usual equipment, promptly got very very ill & regretted it. Nowadays I generally lug around half a pharmacy’s worth of prescriptions + lots & lots of other stuff including such dire necessities as whisky, chocolate and MANY books… screw travelling light – if you really have to walk you can always leave the stuff somewhere and only take a day-pack or get a porter.
PS: I somehow recall being told that SRR tends to lose most of his books as he goes along… might just be a myth though.
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