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This is more of a show-and-tell than anything else. While I prepare to move up to Toronto I've been staying over at my partners' houses most of the time. I'm essentially living out of a 40-litre Osprey Fairview backpack when I'm not at home packing or whatever.
So far I've actually found this to be very fun. I'm into the adventure aspect of city backpacking for sure, but I've also been getting a lot more fit from it. The backpack weighs anywhere from ten to twenty pounds depending on what I've got in there, and the Osprey system lets me distribute the weight onto my core, not my shoulders. I've gained a lot of leg and core strength, done a lot of cardio via walking around, and lowered my heart rate a ton.
So what's in there?
Oops, it's an EDC post. Here, have an itemized breakdown.
- Top pocket: quick-access small items
- Cold weather: tissues, lip balm, and small ziploc waste bag
- All else: compact flashlight, sunglasses, hand sanitizer, small notepad and pencil
- 🧷 Clipped onto the outside: using strong carabiner clips with the backpack's robust mount points
- Cold weather: subzero? Gloves.
- Rainfly: this one, for rainy or snowy weather. Keeps backpack dry
- Luggage locks: for when I gotta leave this thing alone
- sharge Flow Mini 2 power bank for portable power
Now for main pocket stuff.
- 🪥 Toiletry bag: actually a repurposed Tomtoc electronics bag. Weighs not too much.
- Medicine: this one with common medicines and a few medications to last a week
- Bare minimum: Toothbrush, toothpaste, floss, mouthwash, razor handle + blade refills, deodorant (alcohol spray stored outside the bag for space)
- Grooming: Hairbrush, hair ties, clippers, tweezers
- Sanitary: Small bottle of laundry detergent, Tide pen, wet wipes, some first aid stuff
- 👕 Clothes: a Peak Design ultralight terra shell packing cube which holds 3 rolled-up t-shirts, socks and underwear. Extra pair of jeans goes in the main bag
- Merino wool: I have some clothes made out of Merino. I'm considering switching to it full-time. Great material, but pointless to use merino underwear (please do not re-wear underwear...). Good for t-shirts and socks. Good odour control. In a pinch, can be washed in a sink and hung out to dry; it dries fast.
- T-shirt packing strat: You gotta roll 'em up. I refuse to believe there is any other way.
- Dirty laundry: I have a separate washable bag to hold these
- 💤 Sleep bag: small waterproof pouch that holds stuff for when bedtime comes around.
- Portable alarm clock: this one which gets loud and vibrates. Sometimes I wanna be sure I wake up on time.
- Sleep mask to block light and earplugs to block noise
- 🔌 Tech bag: another waterproof pouch that holds small tech-related things.
- 100w charging brick for laptop and phone, a flat Thunderbolt 4 USB C cable, and Ventoy boot drive
- 💻 Thinkpad x13 gen 3 Ryzen laptop: for a blend of portability and performance! This is the computer I use the most.
- 🚰 s'well water bottle: 25 oz and really really good insulation. Clean with denture tablets and occasionally a deep scrub
- 🌶️ Melinda's Ghost Pepper hot sauce: because American restaurants are really out here labeling onions and black pepper "spicy." Fine, I'll do it myself
But yeah that's about it.
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