How To Fly with Camp Gear
Have you ever realized how much camping gear you actually own? If you are avid outdoors enthusiasts like us, sometimes you can forget how many different types of bags and gear and tools you have to make outdoor life more fun and, well, survivable.
This is our tale of “one bag, all the adventures”.
Recently, we were able to take a trip that neither Ashley or I thought we would ever take. It all started with Ashley telling me, “Babe, we need to pack for a backcountry trip, but we can only check the one bag.”
Needless to say I was a little taken aback and obviously had questions. She steadfastly held me off saying I didn’t get to know anything because it was my birthday trip and all I could do is make sure we didn’t die in the wilderness and it HAD to fit in one duffel.
That is, shelter, sleeping gear, fire tools, wood cutting tools, medical, cook sets, and more. If this was only me and not both of us, no problem. Most of my gear fits in a day bag. But packing for two, especially one who gets cold very easily (not naming names, AG) it came as quite the challenge. Especially with the added constraint of multiple days and water resistant.
To add extra spice on this, I was also having to trust an airline with my one condensed duffel bag of my primary backcountry gear. I know stuff can be replaced, but I have worked hard over the years to collect the pieces I have.
If you’ve been with us for a minute or two, you know our luck with airlines and checked bags. So there was a fair chance my kit could end up in Nova Scotia or even Australia and we’re S.O.L
That being said, I tackled this task with extreme enthusiasm because if there is something I really love, it is traveling to places I’ve never been, with no idea of what I’m doing, with only the things i have with me to make it work. It’s my favorite type of trip, so Ash really nailed this birthday trip.
I started with my Oakley large duffle bag with backpack straps. It’s a soft sided piece of luggage that is made with heavy duty fabric, rips top stitching, and a waterproof/ heavy duty exterior liner on the underside. My first hurdle was figuring out two sleeping sets in this bag. Our down bags are big enough to take up most of the room in the duffel on their own, so I got creative and compressed both down bags into one stuff sack and cinched it down into the smallest cube I could. Shout out to @thenorthface for their multi temp down bag and how easily it packs.
Our REI Half Dome tent and sleeping pads were pretty straightforward as they just took up one side of the bag and laid horizontally on top of each other like stacked wood. Then I tucked the sleeping bag cube into the bag and realized how much space I still had to work with.
Our cooking gear went next as I wanted to place the heavier/ sturdier items toward the bottom to balance the bag and add some protection for the other things. Airlines can be very careless but if they toss a duffle by the handles it normally lands on its bottom. So I was banking on that a little bit you could say.
After the cooking gear, I started tucking the water filter, lights, and medical into the bag. Then came my miscellaneous items like camp saws, playing card games, toilet paper, stuff sack bag, beanie, a stasher bag, walkie talkies, solar and BUG SPRAY!
When it was all said and done, I closed the bag and realized that I had just packed enough equipment into this one duffel for both Ashley and I to not only go camping, but go camping for multiple days and be comfortable too.
***PLEASE NOTE*** When traveling with camping gear, it is easy to forget what can and cannot be checked with airlines. Please check with your airlines regulations when you’re planning. For instance, I always travel with a small can of white gas for my stove, but had to leave it at home and pick one up when we got there instead. Small things like this can help save you a lot of time if you do your reading. Otherwise your fuel bottle becomes someone else’s free item while you still have to buy another.
The day came and once again we were driving down the hill at 3AM to catch a flight with me none the wiser of where we were going. Until we checked in and I had to hand my bag of backcountry toys to the airline attendant and they said it was going to Milwaukee.
4:30 in the morning is a great time to turn to your wife and ask her “What is in Milwaukee?” As she is walking away from you smiling.
Turns out, we were flying to Milwaukee to see my best friend Mike and his family (for the first time in two years) to join them for a boat camping trip on Lake Superior in the Apostle Islands!!! When I mentioned earlier we went on a trip that neither of us had ever thought of or planned to go on, I meant it. The Great Lakes is something you always know about, but you don’t necessarily intentionally go there. At least for us. But here we were at 5 am jumping on a plane to fly to someplace we’d never been, to camp someplace we’d never heard of, trusting only in our friends and the bag I had packed. This truly was a “adventure without an itinerary” from my side at least.
Please subscribe for more adventures, as I will be writing up an article on our trip to the Aposltes and why it needs to move up your list of places to see.
