BootsnAll Travel Community

Ok, thanks for all the feedback. We never did find an Osprey Porter 46, and this includes visiting the Seattle Flagship REI, another REI and the Denver Flagship REI, who called their other locations, found on that theoretically had *one* of them, but said store couldn't put their hands on it. Either its selling like hotcakes and they can't keep them in stock, or I think this model is on the way out.

We looked at all the other packs mentioned here, including the Alpine Explorer and Lookout. I can't remember what the downside to the lookout was (I think it was fit) and the alpine explorer looked nice but the pouch was too small. All the packs with side access hydration pouches proved to be too small for the laptops, often by quite a bit.

We ended up buying Kelty Redwing 3100s. The hydration pouch just barely fits my laptop in a sleeve, so it should be a good fit with a better sleeve. The main thing that sold it was the large main compartment, good fit.

I think it was someone on here that recommended the Redwing initiall- so thanks! We probably should have gotten the 2650 due to carryon size restrictions, but the 3100 is the one we ended up with. Will be testing it out on a side trip next week...

Now to find all the right sizes of packing cubes and get everything organized.

Thanks for the feedback!

hopefully you like the kelty better than I do. I loved it when I bought it but now after lugging it around for a year and a half I'm starting to really hate it. the pockets on the outside never stay zippered/velcroed so don't put anything you actually want to keep in those. plus, its really uncomfortable no matter how I adjust it.

We can return the keltys if we need. I'm really not sure what the point is of those external pockets- they are oddly shaped and seem kinda pointless, but I guess they are good if you want to cary 4 water bottles (plus a hydration pack?)

But you've used yours for a year and a half, its time to get a new one! I imagine our needs and strategy will be pretty different in 6 months, let alone 18... already I'm hoping for a next generation MacBook Air so I can cut out 3-4 pounds.

Thanks for the feedback though!

My husband and I both bought the 3100 Redwing (kelty). We leave for our RTW in Nov 08 and have spent the last three weeks walking with our packs packed with everything we would take on the trip. We have been walking for about 3 miles each time and neither of us has had any issues with the pack. My husband is 5'9" and I am 5'5". The pack is a little long on me but it distributes the weight just fine. He and I are both at about 15lbs each with everything, including a Nalgene bottle full of water in one of those side pockets (still haven't had the issue everyone else has had of the pocket splitting open with the zipper...maybe b/c ours are newer?). I love the pack. I originally had bought hte Kelty Women's Coyote 4500 but found that it was too big (also started a thread on BNA and got some great advice). Hope you all enjoy the pack as much as we do!

Interesting, our packs are about 25 lbs, but much of that is electronics. We have officially left on our trip, but we haven't yet left the US... so I can't say we've given them a real test yet.

We found that the Vertical Tom Bihn Brain Bag fits in the hydration compartment nice and snuggly and turns it into an excellent laptop compartment.

I randomly found the Osprey Porter 46 at my local REI. Snapped it up. It's quite big, and I was able to take it home for a week's visit. But like most people have said, the hip straps leaves something to be desired. If you are going to be toting it around for a couple hours, I would buy a padded hipstrap and fit it through the hip strap slots. I tried this at REI and it worked nicely! To pack it away you could put it in the front zipper pouch or something.