Home Again – and some packing advice

We are back from Ireland.  I can’t say I am happy about that, but coming home is usually a good thing.

Ireland is a beautiful country and has about the friendliest people I have ever met.  Everyone is very accommodating and they all just seem to want to make you happy.  That place can really grow on you.  And they have damn good oysters.

For those of you who are photographers, you will appreciate the problem of how much gear can you carry and how the hell do you pack it all so it fits in a carry-on legal bag?  I have been using a Lowepro Vertex 300 bag, which can carry my gear (minus the tripod and tool bag) and a laptop as well.  The problem is that you have to carry it.  It doesn’t have wheels.  As I have gotten older, the weight has become an issue, not to mention the fact that I have gotten more lazy as time has gone on.

Prior to the Ireland trip, I went searching for a carry-on legal camera case that was on wheels.  Everything I found was just too small.  In a fit of panic, I ordered a Tenba backpack on wheels that looked like it was of legal size.  Unfortunately, I only checked one dimension, which, in retrospect, was not a smart thing to do.  The bag showed up two days before we left and was obviously too big.  However, the camera storage part was a padded insert.  I pulled it out and wonders of wonders, it fit in my Eagle Creek 22″ ORV trunk carry-on.  Perfection.  I put the insert in there and it became an instant carry-on camera case.  It worked like a charm.  I don’t know if you can just purchase the insert, or one from Lowepro, but if you can, and if you travel by air a lot, this is a perfect solution.  Even better, it doesn’t look like a camera case.  Less chance of theft.  And it rolled.  That, my friends, is my holy grail of camera bags.

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