What To Pack

Using A Packing List

Arguably the single most important aspect of intelligent travelling is the issue of what to pack. This, more than anything else, will determine the size of your luggage, the weight of your load, and the state of your happiness. Your top priority, then, should be the acquisition, personalization, and use of a good packing list. "What to pack" is far too important to make up as you go along!

Most people think of a packing list as a list of suggestions for — or "reminders" of &mdash what to take on a particular trip. If you're such a person, you'll likely find the material on this page to be quite revelatory.

Do I Really Need a Packing List?

It's not possible to overstate the importance of actually creating a personal packing list, and using it regularly. Such a list serves two principal purposes. First (and foremost), it's a sort of contract you make with yourself, an agreement (and ongoing reminder) that if it's not on your list, it shouldn't be in your bag (because all the necessary items are on your list); this defends against last-minute attacks of "I might need this." The worst possible time to be considering what to take on a trip is while you are packing for it!

It's important to understand that the goal is a single packing list, not a different one for every trip. The primary purpose of the list is not to specify (or record) what you are taking with you on any particular journey, but rather to develop a model for your own travels, a constraint on your packing exuberance, a personal blueprint that you can refine over time (not change every time).

The world is awash with "packing lists". Dozens can be found on the Internet, and almost any travel store will happily supply you with what usually amounts to a list of the many things you might buy from them. And therein lies the fault of most such lists: they enumerate the possibilities, rather than eliminate the liabilities. A list of stuff you might want to take is very different from a list of things that you can't travel (comfortably) without. Even the Internet's venerable Universal Packing List is intended to be exhaustive, thus not at all the type of list that I am writing about here (in the real world, author Mats Henricson uses a much different — and shorter! — list for his own actual travels).

The secondary function of a packing list is to help ensure that nothing important will be forgotten. The go-light traveller in particular is only carrying items that are essential to the journey, so forgetting one of them can be especially inconvenient.

I've used my own list (which is reproduced on this site) for more than a quarter century of travel around the world. I could probably reproduce it from memory. Still, I never fail to take the few seconds necessary to check it on every single trip. And, on more occasions than I like to admit, I've been reminded of items like a belt that I was forgetting to pack for the pair of trousers in my bag. It's no coincidence that aircraft pilots are required to complete a mandatory checklist — on each and every trip — before being allowed to fly the plane.

Don't pack list items that are unnecessary for a specific trip: parkas aren't needed in North Africa, nor are shorts in the Andes (for that matter, shorts are culturally inappropriate in many countries); malaria tablets & a mosquito net are unlikely to be helpful on a trip to San Francisco; dressy shoes might be dispensed with during an Amazon river trek; and you shouldn't need luggage locks when visiting your grandmother in Manchester (unless she has proclivities that might dictate otherwise). The list described in such detail on this site is intended to encompass items that are sometimes part of a one-bag traveller's needs, not always. It would be an unusual trip indeed that demanded everything on this list!

Add items if you must, to address your business needs, hobbies, personal requirements, etc., but resist the temptation to add non-essentials. If you're thinking "I might need this", you're likely mistaken; if it's "I can't survive without this", you may be right. But consider it carefully and dispassionately. Will the joys of listening to Radio America really warrant lugging that short-wave radio? Do you truly need that 200mm lens? Perhaps, though I have yet to hear of someone returning from an extended trip who vows to take more stuff the next time!