blowboat

As a long time cyclist new to the touring scene I have a simple question.

I had been planning my first self-supported trip...a little three day/two night shake down ride. I made my packing list and began gathering things. Well, as is often the case in my life things and plans change. Now I'll be doing short overnight trip.

So here is my question...it sees that other than a couple of clothing items and food, there is not much difference in packing for a one night trip and two or three. Am I missing something or is that generally true? At what point...a week, two weeks, etc...do you notice a significant difference in your packing?

- PJ

mev

I have developed packing lists for my longest trips and typically look at these for a subset for local trips. I've found the largest differences in the range of one-night to one-week and fewer in the longer than one week. Typically it is other constraints that make a bigger difference, e.g. predictable climate/weather or no-camping? than duration.

For example, from my equipment list for an 18-month trip: Equipment - A bicycle ride across the Americas

I might bring half of these things for a Memorial Day weekend in Central Texas. Some larger areas of change:
- Weather in Austin over Memorial Day is much more predictable, ditch all the mittens/gloves/coats from Prudhoe Bay, much lighter sleeping bag
- No need to carry seven days of food starting out; even for a seven day ride in Central Texas there are a lot more stores available than the North Slope
- No bears
- No ability to carry large amounts of water
- If my tires look fine, I'll not bother with a spare for just a weekend, also no spare chain, spare brake pads
- Fewer changes of clothes, though once I go over a week, that doesn't change as much as I wash/rewash
- No passport, yellow fever card, vaccination records or as many maps
- Lighter on electronic choices, perhaps only a tablet

However, it is easier to have an extended list and then delete some things as obviously not necessary. On almost every extended trip one gets an opportunity to pick up something you missed or to shuffle some clothing items due to season (e.g. on my Alaska to Argentina trip, I mailed myself a package to Fairbanks. This let me carry more food/clothes the first week - and wait to pick up some things like electronics and others until I was on paved roads). I also picked up spares along the way for things like tubes/tires/brake pads.

indyfabz

One night and conditions are such that I was confident I could wash my "kit" and dry it before the next morning, I wouldn't take a second kit. Always take two when I am out for 3 days. I also don't take chargers for my Kindle, camera battery and headlamp batteries.

Other than that, and the cooking or not question aside, I pack for potential weather and other conditions, not length of trip. E.g., New England/Atlantic Coast in June? I am likely not going to take my long undies. Mountains of Montana in June? They are coming with me.

If I am coking on a 2-3 day trip, I won't fill the fuel bottle all the way and, obviously, won't need to pack as much coffee as I would for a longer trip. Smaller volume of olive oil and soap. No shaving equipment for a few day trip. Buggy? If not likely, no insect repellant.

It's funny because I was actually thinking the other day that, back in the day, when I spent 4 months on the road, I had less in the way of clothing and miscellaneous "stuff" (It was 13 person group trip, so we divided the cooking gear amongst ourselves.) than I tend to carry on a two-week western trip today.

But if you goal is to get an idea of what it's like to ride with what you envision taking on a longer trip, load it up. I took one, 62 mile day ride fully loaded before my 4 month trip so I carried everything I planned to take with me, including a bunch of film camera equipment. I wanted to know what I was getting myself into.

cyccommute 

You aren't missing anything. Packing for 2 days is simple. Packing for 3 days is pretty much the same. Packing for anything longer than a week is pretty easy as well. The problem spot is 4 to 5 or even 6 days. I hate doing laundry. I especially hate doing laundry every night so I carry multiple days of clothes...usually 2 to 3 sets plus what I'm wearing. That's what makes 4 to 6 days problematic. Do you carry enough to cover the whole trip or do you stop and do laundry? Do you waste time doing laundry that when you could be doing something else? It's almost not worth doing laundry but carrying enough for 6 days takes up a lot of room and adds weight.

Machka 

I tend to bring slightly more on short tours because I don't have to haul the extra weight for very long. So I'll add luxury items like an extra pillow or a heavy duty pair of wool socks.

Whereas on longer tours I tend to try to go lighter if possible.
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Happy Feet

One thing I take for longer tours is a journal so I can record my experiences in the evening while sitting around camp.
For a couple of days I can remember when I get home but more than that the days tend to blur.

blowboat

Thanks for the input. I suppose I should have at least included some basic information. I will be camping, so tent, sleeping bag, etc. will be going. Planning to cook, so there are the related items. I am somewhat limited on space which can be a good thing)...all four of my panniers are small...probably typically used for front panniers.

Tourist in MSN

I have never done a bike trip shorter than five days, so can't comment on the really short ones. But generally, I trust weather forecasts out for about six or seven days. I always bring rain gear, even if the forecast says I will not need it. But otherwise on a short trip I would rely on the forecast for temperatures. But I will carry more clothing for a wider range of temperatures on a trip longer than a week.

I usually start out with three or four days of food if I know that there will be lots of opportunities to buy food. But otherwise, I might carry more. One trip I started out with over two weeks of food, on that trip I did go past a grocery store on day eight, that store was not on my map so I did learn that I carried a bit too much weight for the first week.

A trip longer than about a week and a half, I might plan to buy camp stove fuel somewhere on the trip, but a shorter trip I will bring what I need from home.

I do not like to run out of expendable supplies, for a longer trip I will bring more shampoo, a bigger bar of soap, a fuller tube of toothpaste, more camp soap, etc.

I usually do sink laundry every day or two, so I do not bring much clothing. But if I did a trip for less than five days, I would skip the sink laundry and just bring what I need.

***

If you are new to touring, it might be a good plan to try to figure out a system for what is where in your panniers. For example, on my bike I can remove the front right pannier and the bike will stay balanced on the kickstand. So, the front right pannier is the first one to come off of the bike, thus it has my tent, that is the first thing I want in a new campsite. My tent is often damp in the morning when I pack it, so everything else in that pannier is stuff that can get damp, like flip flops, etc. My front left pannier, some trips it has had all my clothing, some trips it has had all my cooking supplies (pots, stove, fuel, etc.). If I carry a spare tire it goes in the very bottom of a rear pannier as I probably will never need to get it out. Same with my tools and spares, they are heavy and I do not expect to use them so they are in the bottom of a rear pannier. That said, I do keep a small multi-tool handy along with a easy to get at inner tube. Otherwise, for my rear panniers I have no consistent plan but at times I wished I did.

Machka 

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