Personally, I don’t trade traditional panniers for bikepacking unless I have to. If you are riding on the road or even mild dirt roads, panniers are just hands down better. If you want to go someplace remote and rugged, bikepacking gear is better than panniers but only because it has a smaller profile and rides out of the way of rocks. Don’t do it just because bikepacking happens to be popular now.
You are going to have problems with bikepacking from the get-go. Small frames make life harder. A frame bag won’t have too much room and a large size saddle bag may not be able to fit between the saddle and the rear wheel. My current saddle bag has a hole in it because it rubbed on smaller bike when I loaned it out.
So don’t dig for bottles. Use a Camelbak. Honestly, bikepacking gear came from mountain biking which is far more comfortable with Camelbaks than road riders are. Carrying the water on your back is what frees up the space for a frame bag. You don’t have to dig around in a bag to get a drink...you just grab the hose and suck away.
It’s possible just different.
You’ve discovered one of the problems with bikepacking gear over traditional panniers. The load is carried higher and further forward. This
does make the bike less stable. But, in an off-road situation, the higher load provides more clearance.
The following are suggestions for bikepacking
as it was originally intended, i.e. off-road. Bikepacking is more spartan than road touring.
Not sure what all this is but in a remote setting, it’s mostly useless. Lose it.
Get a lighter tent. A 2 lb or 1 lb freestanding tent works better both because it is lighter but because it packs smaller.
You won’t need these for bikepacking.
Ditto.
Do you need a bag for that cold a temperature? I tour and camp in the Rockies and have the need for those kinds of temperatures. When I tour elsewhere, I go with a 40° bag which is a lot lighter.
Not a huge problem here. But, for me, that includes rain gear and cold weather gear.
Too much (even for road). I have a pair of zip-off pants and a light shirt. My rain coat/cold weather bike gear does double duty for off-bike use.
No real problem but try to cut it down some. I use
these for both on- and off-road tours. Lighter than a bar of soap. 3 to 4 of them are good for a shower or sponge bath.
About average.
About average.
About average. I use butane stoves and canisters.
Yup.
Lose ‘em.
A Camelbak will do the same thing.
Carry a plastic shopping bag. Not the reusable ones.
My system is constantly evolving but here’s what it has looked like the last couple of times I’ve toured.
Summer 2018
DSCN1146 by
Stuart Black, on Flickr
I found this set up to have some limitations on carrying food. The water bottle is just a reserve bottle. I use a Camelbak.
Summer 2019
Untitled by
Stuart Black, on Flickr
I added carriers to the legs of the fork and micro panniers to the rack. Neither added much to the weight.
One other note: For bikepacking, I carry freeze-dried food. Not because I want to but because there’s just no where along the way to pick up anything else and anything else I would carry would weigh a lot more.