Why a Backpack?

The Art of Choosing a Backpack: A Five Part Series
By Don Miller

Part Two: Why a Backpack?

Since the last issue of the newsletter, several people have commented on the backpack article. The only question was "Why do I need a backpack when I have a perfectly good suitcase?" The answer depends entirely on the type of traveling you do. Let me explain, a backpack is not just a means of transporting your clothes and essentials, it is a way of traveling.

This eliminates any discussion of business travel. The scope of our newsletter revolves around vacations, holidays and fun where better clothes may not be required. Backpacking also implies a trip longer than a weekend getaway to the local Holiday Inn. In fact, most people would assume international travel, a two week jaunt through Western Europe, a great explore of Southeast Asia, a safari through the jungles of Central America.

Generally, there are three kinds of international trips. The first involves an escorted trip, moving from city to city by bus with people to handle your luggage every step of the way. This type of travel does not require a backpack. If someone else is carrying your luggage for you, a suitcase will probably be more convenient. The second is renting a car and driving. Depending on the size of your car trunk and the number of suitcases and passengers, backpacks may be a good choice if space is a premium.

The third type, the type that Live Life highly recommends, entails truly independent travel by rail, bus, ferry, goats or whatever is necessary. You make your own schedule, find where you are going (frequently getting lost) and there is a real sense of discovery. This is the type of trip where a backpack not only makes sense, but is necessary. Carrying a backpack frees up your hands so you can make purchases, study maps, take pictures or gesture wildly. Wandering the streets of an unfamiliar city becomes much easier when you do not have to drag your bag through crowds, over curbs and up narrow steps to the third floor of your lodging. Lugging a heavy suitcase up and down the stairs at train stations will make you a convert within ten minutes. The ability to store your backpack easily is important as well. A great way to economize on your valuable vacation time is to utilize sleeper cars on a train so you do not waste your daylight hours on transportation. Sleeper cars resemble sardine cans for people and storage of a suitcase would be difficult at best. Finally, it is not unusual to find yourself in a city for a few hours. Too short of a time to justify getting a hotel room, yet too long to justify sitting around the station waiting for your next train. Luckily, most stations offer convenient storage lockers, where you can leave your luggage for a small fee. A large suitcase would never fit, but a backpack can be crammed into the most unlikely of places.

Somehow, this may sound like an ordeal rather than a vacation. Lugging, walking and storing with no pampering. Quite the opposite is true. Your trip is no longer just a vacation. It becomes an adventure. With a backpack, you get an automatic membership into the “true-traveler” club. The community of backpackers opens up to you and virtually everyone you see with a backpack becomes your new friend offering suggestions and assistance as needed. Suddenly, you are not just a spectator watching the pretty scenes flash by the picture windows of your bus, you are a participant, a player, you meld with the culture. You gain a new involvement with travel that you may not have experienced if you simply rolled you suitcase from bus to bellhop and back again.

Part One: Types of Packs

Part Three: Fitting a Backpack

Part Four: Packing a Backpack

Part Five: Personal Recommendation