Pack sizes for parents

Has anyone got any recommendations on the minimum pack sizes that are practical for parents travelling with kids on long backpacking trips? 10 years ago I went RTW w/ a 35-L pack and it was fine, but I'm imagining that 50L will be the minimum now, since I'll be carrying extra stuff. If I carry 50L and my husband 60 or 70, does that seem about right, to those who have done it? Or do I need at least 60L myself? I know it's a somewhat individual thing and depends on what we're going to bring along, but just looking for basic guidelines. Actually what I'm looking for is justification to buy a new backpack. I have a 50L that's 10 years old and all beaten up, and I could use it if need be...but I'd love an excuse to go choose a new one! We'll only be in the tropics -- SEA and India. We will need to carry some books & school supplies too, though.

We got new backpacks for our trip, our old ones are just too beat up and wouldn't survive another trip.

We got the Eagle Creek Maiden Voyage for me (it's a 50L backpack with a 20L daypack) and my husband got the Eagle Creek Grand Voyage (it's a 70L backpack with a 20L daypack). We bought them online from a company in NZ called Bivouac Outdoors (http://www.bivouac.co.nz/) and got them on sale (they were about 45% cheaper than the same bags we'd found here in Australia, plus the exchange rate was in our favour and Bivouac offered free shipping on orders over $100).

The bags are probably bigger that what we originally wanted, but hey... The price was right at the time and it means that our kids won't have to carry anything.

We tend to use packs quite often as we usually travel by train or plane when visiting our many relatives around the UK and Europe. At the moment I use a 45l pack and my husband uses a 70l one. The children carry their own toys fleeces and teddies. I'm hoping that this will be ok for our rtw trip in 2010, with the children carrying a little more stuff as I'm quite small (5ft 1), so can't comfortably carry a huge pack and help the children on and off buses etc. My last rtw trip (almost 20 years ago) I used a 70l pack which was a big mistake as it was just too heavy. I've learned to pack lighter as I get older!

It looks like we're all roughly in agreement - we bought 50l Osprey Waypoint Travelpacks with a 10l daypack for the adults and our girls have Deuter Junior 16l packs (they are 6 & 8 years old and they'll carry all their own clothes + a few toys). I could only get a 70l Osprey men's pack in UK shops but I decided this was too cumbersome so I ordered the smaller version from the US (a bigger pack would only encourage us to take more...). The Osprey packs were much more comfortable than the Berghaus equivalents we tried.

We'll cut down on books by taking an eee901 sub-notebook for school work + pdf versions of guide books; the main bulk of our packing will be cold-weather clothing for the Andes portion of our trip...

We often go off for a month or two at a time ( we are into our 3rd year of a RTW trip) with just a very small day pack each & that includes laptop/s & homeschool supplies ( and even when it is 3 season weather like our last trip).

The lighter the better, you need less than you think. I have worn one pair of smart wool socks for 3 years & they are doing just fine!

We use the LLBean small roll backpack ( can be rolled or has pack away straps for carrying, usually used for school books) for kidlet & she has carried her own since we started the trip when she was 5. She is quite a pro on planes, trains, ferries, freight ships,buses, subways, trolleys , cobble stones etc.

She often also carries her violin, but sometimes we carry it ( has a strap that she can put it on her back).

We find we really do not need much.

Hey Asparagus,

Looking at your previous pack size I would say a 50/55l would be fine, I'm guessing since your old pack is about 10 years old it's a toploader? One thing I have found invaluable is having a front loader, with the kids it's sooo much easier to get to stuff you need without having to pull out the whole pack, you can guarantee the thing you need is always at the bottom no matter where you packed it!!

My son has his own pack, hand luggage size, which he carries a few basics in books/pens and any toys etc he wants.

I would go and have fun getting a new pack, I did the same, didn't want to take my old pack (13 yrs old!!) and there are some fab new ones on the market with great features. I've got a women's fit berghaus with detachable day pack - 55l and 15l, feels weird having soo much stuff this time but definitely like having the extra room and being the women's fit it's soooo comfortable!

Buena Viaja!

How feasible is it for one parent to carry the goods for two kids? My kids will be 8 and 5, so is it unreasonable to think they can carry some of their own stuff? And I don't just mean coloring pencils and paper! I've been looking online and, size-wise, our older would fit a youth pack. I thought maybe a smaller one.

Has anyone else had their kids haul stuff, or do the parents do all the load?

Thanks everyone! I think I'll go for about 55L. I do also want to avoid toploaders...I'm all too familiar with that problem of the one thing you want being down on the bottom!

GlobalPrices - funny, I was just trying on the Osprey Waypoint today at a shop. How are you liking it? When are you travelling? I'd love a review!

Midway2Go: I've read that a guideline for how much stuff kids can carry is 10% of their body weight. Apparently more than that on a regular basis can affect their posture or spine or something. I'm eyeing the Osprey Imp (23L) for both of my kids, ages 6 and 9, but I don't think there's any way we'll fill them. I'm thinking clothes, a few stuffies, favorite toys & personal items, and that's about it. My 9-y.o. could wear the youth-sized pack (the Osprey Jib, which I think is 35L or so), height-wise, but it will be years before she can carry 35L of weight.

My son and I are doing a RTW right now. He's nine, and I'm carrying all his clothes. He's got a school backpack at the moment, with a capacity of about 30l, which we are about to upgrade to a Dexter 30, because the padding &c is better. I'd say he's carrying about 8kg in books, toys and laptop. (I keep asking him to trade in books, but he doesn't want to.)

We've probably got more duplicate clothes than we need but I don't want to do constant rounds of handwashing, and it's not necessarily practical when you're covering distance and staying in places with no hot water / no running water to handwash every couple of days. I would say how much you need to take depends very much on what kind of places you'll be staying in.

I had a 60l with a 20l daypack from Mountain Warehouse, toploading (which is key): the zip on the base went about three weeks in. I've just bought a Thai "North Face" 75 pack with a 15l day pack (we're in Bangkok right now), so we'll see how long that one lasts. The spare capacity is for when we hit LatAm and the Andes.

I'm carrying his clothes firstly because it seems a little unfair to ask him to carry everything. Secondly because it is a hell of a lot easier to pack and repack when leaving places, or pack small packs for taking on night trains etc., when I have all the practical stuff. There's a list of what clothes we have in <a href="http://travelswithanineyearold.com/2010/03/06/on-laundry/">this post</a>. That also means that you can keep all the dirty laundry in one place, rather than having them keep their dirty and their clean stuff separate.

If you take hiking boots, or for that matter trainers, get them to wear them when you travel, which takes down both weight and bulk. Perhaps you could get them to carry their cold weather gear -- coats, etc? -- at the bottom of their packs, so you don't have to deal with the bulk, but they're not constantly getting taken out and/or left behind.

If you're disciplined -- I'm not -- vacuum rollpacks are a good way of compressing things like warm coats/fleeces etc. while they are not needed.

I think the other thing to bear in mind is that, unless you're a masochist, you don't normally walk more than a mile or so tops with a full pack. You can always stash stuff at guesthouses if you're trekking, or have it sent on to your arrival point...

I think a good way to do things is to decide what capacity each of you is going to carry, based on your personal handwashing threshold and the places you'll be staying/type of travelling you'll be doing, and buy packs that work for that. You can then eliminate by throwing things out of the packs until everything fits and you're happy with the weight.

Good luck...

http://travelswithanineyearold.com

I had an arcteryx bora 80 litre pack. I found it quite comfortable. However, the bag we got the most use out of was a duffle bag on wheels like this one.
http://www.mec.ca/Products/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCT%3C%3Eprd_id=845524442506335&FOLDER%3C%3Efolder_id=2534374302861417&bmUID=1269815341112

It was never a problem with airlines (like packs sometimes are with all their straps), was easy to carry around. It carried a lot of stuff, and even the kids could pull it in a pinch.

The kids each had a 10 or 15 litre daypack for their special things (books, stuffed animals, hat, snack, water). All their clothes went into the main duffle bag.

We have been looking at different types of bags for our RTW trip that we are planning. We think the most practical are the rolling duffles, such as this one: http://www.rei.com/product/778756 and a personal smaller backpack for each of us. For our daughter we are thinking a rolling duffle with backpack straps in case we need to carry her bag.

We have traveled with large backpacks and it is a pain. We much prefer things with wheels.