I started this backpack hobby as a way to pass time during the COVID-19 quarantine. It was a hoot to collect for five years, but this year, I’ve been shedding like wild. Everyone mostly talks about packs they own or want to own here, so I thought I’d change it up a bit.

Here are the packs I’ve really enjoyed using, but decided to let go and give them a beautiful, long life with someone else.

1. Mystery Ranch Urban Assault 21 in Waxed Wood, 21L - 2020: I was super curious about the trizip design and had seen someone carry a MR pack in downtown Seattle. The zips were beefy and I loved the “brain” dump pocket. It just looked so cool. Had to let it go when it was basically useless when trying to use it for EDC during grad school - couldn’t unzip upright, zips were waaay too tough to open.

2. Recycled Firefighter 24HR pack in 1000D Cordura, 21L - 2020: What I really wanted was a Goruck GR1, but I wasn’t willing to pay $200+. This was a nice …

TLDR: I am keeping the tomtoc because it has the best balance of materials and features for me in a perfectly sized package.  

INTRO 

I have been searching for my perfect personal item + EDC backpack for the last two years.  

My requirements were pretty broad. Not looking for a specific layout or material. Just something that fits under a plane seat and works well for EDC. Wanted it to look and feel sleek on the back. Materials and hand feel are important to me.  

I started with some cheaper china brands (bottom row) and then some more premium brands (top row). I will only discuss the top row.

IMPRESSIONS

From top left to top right 

INCASE TRACKS 18L ($99 to me, $179 retail)

Incredible build quality, and the best looking in my opinion. Love the rounded bullet shape. Cordura 1680d is nice, smooth good hand feel. Not the best quality internal materials.  

Lots of thoughtful organization for a bag this size. Love the huge “sunglasses” pocket. Extremely comfortable and …

Before I really got into the bag community I just had the Nomatic Travel pack (1) and had that bag purely because I travel for work multiple times a month visiting clients and it just looks really professional!

Then last December I was at the bulls game and they handed everyone free cheaply made bulls branded fanny packs.

Started using it and was like wow this is actually great not having stuff in my pockets.

The bulls fanny pack eventually started tearing from use and I decided ya know what, let me start really researching and find me a good fanny pack.

Little did I know the rabbit hole this would lead me down! LOLL

8 months later and now I’ve collected all of these bags! 🤣🤣 but man it was fun learning about all the materials and use cases all of that.

But, I’m good now LOL don’t want to spend anymore moniessss.

But while I’m here, if anyone wants to ask about any of the bags or anything feel free! I’ll list them out below:

1) Nomatic Travel Pack 20L (expandable to 30L) 2) …

The person I made this bag for picked baby blue leather for the exterior and Sherpa for the lining.

Since it’s a helmet bag I used foam for protection, cushioning and support.

I made the pattern myself by looking at pics of this bag online ( apparently the bag is vintage and not for sale anymore)

All machine stitched except for the handles

Pic 1 is from a shop I visited with a friend, showing the backpacks they had. Pics 2 and 3 are ones we customized ourselves, but my friend loves the one in pic 3 more—and even took it to Shanghai, China. I guess black backpacks really do go with everything.

I used recommendations on this sub a fair bit to help putting this packing list together, so I figured I’d post my feedback in case it is helpful to anyone else. I know this sub is dedicated to more urban travel, but in addition to a lot of cities we have some camping and hiking that adds some gear in; hopefully that’s ok.

The packing list needed to be pretty versatile. My wife and I quit our jobs to travel full time for 15 months. We’re hitting 35ish countries across Africa, Asia, Europe, South America, and Antarctica. We’re avoiding full on winter, but will see temperatures ranging from moderately cold to extremely hot. Accommodation and activities are a bit of a mix as well. We lived mostly in tents for a couple months while on our overland truck tour in Africa, have stayed a week in a dive resort, our longest camping trip will be 9 days, and we’re hitting cities of all sizes with some occasional fine dining. We’re a little over halfway now. …

I recently also caved for the O’sprey 26+6 Daylite hype as my one bag, and I remember it being hard to find picture evidence of it actually fitting in the Ryanair sizer.

Therefore, here’s some pictures I just took on my first trip of it fitting in the Ryanair sizer (40x30x20cm).

Obviously the bag is in its compressed state, and even then, it has to be slightly underpacked, and you have to empty out the bottle holders.

However, when you have done that, it indeed “fits” in the sizer. There is a yellow line in the sizer that my bag is poking out above of, and I don’t think I can make my bag shrink much in that dimension because of the semi-solid backplate. However, I think you & I should generally be fine. First of all there’s a good chance you’ll be allowed through without the sizer check, and even if you get picked for the sizer check, I think in most cases they’ll accept this as fitting.

I put my heaviest clothes on and filled the …

Just came back from my first real one-bag trip: a 6-day summer break in Albania.

Everything fit into a Patagonia Terravia 22L, a mix of tech gear, casual wear, and active clothing.
The travel outfit was: shorts, polo, rain jacket, and trekking shoes. Everything else went into two packing cubes.

I flew with Wizzair and the backpack passed the personal item size check with no issues. I didn’t purchase any extra baggage, and on the return flight it fit easily under the seat in front of me. I even left a bit of extra space so the Terravia could compress and pass the fit check without stress.

What I packed

Light trekking gear:

• 2× merino wool t-shirts
• Trekking pants
• 2× trekking socks

Casual wear:

• 3× shorts
• 2× t-shirts
• Polo
• Rain jacket
• Sleepwear (shorts + t-shirt)

Beach gear:

• Swimwear
• Beach towel
• Flip-flops

Tech:

• Olympus OMD-EM10 MkIII + Zuiko 12–45mm f/4 Pro
• DJI Mavic Mini + remote
• Kowa BD25 10×25 binoculars
• Power bank
• Cables + chargers

Other essentials:

• Emergency …

Video proof that it fits in the sizer

Recently, I went to Evo 2025 (a gaming tournament) in Las Vegas and traveled with my Aer TP3 Small through Spirit as my personal item because I wanted to test and see if I’m able to with no problems, and fortunately there mostly weren’t any!

What I Packed:

- Peak Design packing cube w/ 2 sets of shirts, shorts, and socks, 4 pairs of underwear and tank tops, and pajama pants

- Inflatable mattress because 5 people in one hotel room meant one of us (me) had to sleep on the floor

- Plastic bag w/ toiletries

- Phone charger and cable, Anker power bank, Sony XM4s

- Leverless controller (similar to the dimensions of an M4 MacBook Pro 14 in.)

- Other small items (tissues, wipes, chap stick)

Using the TP3 Small during my trip:

- Even though I had a lot of things packed, it was still pretty comfortable

- Load lifters helped a lot

- Used it on all the days I was at the event and even though it was mostly empty, I was okay with carrying …

I’m at the end of a 6 week trip right now, and I’m honestly quite proud of the laundry system I devised for my travels and I reckon this is the place to share it. I was worried about the cost of laundry in hostels and how it would add up if I did it regularly. This was my first trip that’s so long.

I carried a pack of detergent leaves (packed down nice and small), a length of plastic cord about 4m, and a rubber plug for sinks. I took with me 3 proper outfits (T-shirts etc), plus an extra spare pair of underwear, and later in the trip bought a little vest top too. I’m a knitter so by the end of the trip I also had an extra pair of socks.

I usually stay in places for 2+ nights so I would do laundry every night except the night before leaving. Only ever a few things to wash because I’d wash the clothes I wore that day. Then I’d find places to hang my clothesline and get creative about it - I also have sewn loops into most of my clothes and could hang …

https://www.etsy.com/listing/4351051422/

Looks like alpinhound released some evergoods inspired reflective logo patches.

These look…..DOPE. Def grabbing a few. Hope EG is cool with the inspiration :)

Today is the day We say “enough.”

This patch situation is ridiculous.

2x2 patches don’t exist. (Obviously they do, technically, but barely.)

I’ve spent 2+ years looking for patches. I have not found a single 2x2 patch I want to put on my bag. Larger ones get caught on things and fall off. Smaller ones look stupid. Exposed velcro is ugly.

NO LONGER shall we stand idly by whilst you leave us naked and exposed.

NO LONGER shall you taunt us by promising creative freedom while providing an unusable canvas.

ENOUGH.

The People want patches. The People demand patches.

Reflective tape doesn’t count. Put in some effort.

What percentage of this subreddit is either about patches, or includes a picture of a patchless product?

Get your shit together, Evergoods.

Just partner with somebody. Christ almighty. This is insane.

I’m looking at either the CAP 1 or CAP 0.5 to use with my CTB20 (Waxed Canvas – awesome bag!) when I travel, to store an Apple 20W charging cube along with cables for my phone and tablet.

Which one would you recommend for fitting in either the front stash or quick-access yoke? It would be great if it could also hold other small items like a Tide-to-Go pen, chapstick, etc. I’m also open to other suggestions!

Just got a new CTB26 and noticed a hole between the main cavity and laptop zipper. My CPL doesn’t have this so I’m wondering if it’s normal? Thanks!