Revisiting a Long-Term Travel Packing List

Hooray!  We've sold all our furniture, moved out of our apartment, and have begun packing our final few bags for our upcoming long-term trip.  As this is Living the Dream's second long-term adventure, we have the opportunity to revisit a packing list from a previous RTW trip.  Since your packing list is probably the most important list you can generate for a trip, we put several dissection posts together after my last trip to look at the original list (above) and make comments on them for traveler's future adventures (below).

• Things We Needed - We're not making the same mistake twice.  These items are coming.
• Things We Didn't Use - Unfortunately, we're still making the same mistake.
• Things We Couldn't Live Without - Always an advocate for extra socks.
• Things We Want - Not surprisingly, we didn't get any of them for this trip.  Although we had the opportunity for Google Glass, and the funds to buy them, the window to pick them up was too small for us to make it happen.  That is, unless Google can ship them to us in the next 10 days.

Now that we've looked at the last packing list, lets find out what we're including in our next one!  For this go around, we're trying to include the theme "multi-purpose" in as many ways as possible.  But what does that really mean?

The Multi-Purpose Packing List

On this trip we will be on a "chasing summer" itinerary like most other long-term travelers.  After exploring the world in previous adventures, both short and long-term, we have found that we are what you would call over packers.  While our bags are light, our packing list is extensive.  As this trip will have us not only going to summer destinations throughout the trip, we are hitting a few places that could get quite chilly or down right cold.  To accommodate, we tried to develop a packing list that would be multi-purpose to cover us in all environments without requiring any extra gear.
How can a packing list be multipurpose?  Most of our gear is rated for all weather conditions: extreme heat to bitter cold, hiking grade and waterproof at the same time. 
A great example of this is our KEEN shoes and sandals which are not only built for hikes, but also waterproof and fast drying.  The rest of our packing list follows this same logic.  We may not be taking thick winter gear, but our jacket is thick enough that will protect us from most cold days but thin enough that we can pack it easily.  Angie's long pants tie up to double as a pair of shorts for use on the many summer days we see, without the need for another pair of long pants.

We tried to apply this type of logic in the selection of all of our gear to make our packing list ideal for any weather environment we may face - short of the extreme cold weather during our hike in Nepal and potential Antarctica excursion.  In those destinations we may buy more heavy duty gear and resell as soon as our cold days are over with.
So, what goes into a 14 to 18 month packing list for a couple? Lets find out!
Angie's Bag - Guerrilla Packs Voltij (55L)
Angie's bag is a respectable 55L backpack by Guerrilla Packs.

• 7 Tank Tops
• 3 T-Shirts
• 1 Long Sleeve Shirt
• 2 Pants
• 3 Shorts
• UnderArmour Muroc Jacket
• KEEN H2 sandals
• 1 Bathing Suits
• Pajama Set
• 10 Pairs of Socks
• 3 Bras
• 10 Pairs of Underwear
• 3 Packing Cubes
• Travel Towel

The Guerrilla Pack comes with a nice detachable day pack that will double as Angie's carry-on bag when traveling.  The following items are featured in her daypack:

• Documents
• Sony HX20V Digital Camera
• Acer AOD250 Netbook
• Allergy Medicine
• Cables and other equipment for above gear
• Sunglasses
• Glasses 
• Business Cards
• Tripod (Small)
• Power Adapters
• Travel Pillow
• Passport Photos
• Journal and Pens

Jeremy's Bag - High Sierra AT Gear Access (95L)
Jeremy's bag is a beast and, at 95L, is the largest bag that you can check in an airplane without paying oversize fees.  While we already know that this bag is large, our packing list that goes inside it is not. This bag was bought entirely with souvenir acquisition in mind and has tons of room to load up with great purchases before we ship a box home.

• 10 T-Shirts
• 1 Long Sleeve Shirt
• 1 Button Up Shirt
• 4 Shorts
• 1 Pants
• 1 Swim Trunks
• 5 Pair Boxers
• 10 Socks
• UnderArmour Muroc Jacket
• KEEN H2 Sandals
• Travel Towel
• Alarm Clock
• Rain Coat
• 2 Packing Cubes
• Chain Lock / Luggage Locks
• Swiss Army Knife
• Corkscrew
• Digital Scale for Bags
• Toiletries (outlined below)

Jeremy is also the lucky one to get to carry all the toiletries due to having the obscenely large bag (yay?).

• Toothbrushes and Toothpaste
• Deodorants 
• Face and Body Soap (one of each)
• Razors
• Shampoo
• Cotton Swabs
• Nail Clippers
• Tweezers
• Floss
• Mouth Wash
• Medicine (Allergy, Motion Sickness, Immodium, Advil, Anti-Bacterial/Itch Ointment)
• Sunscreen
• Lip Balm
• Bandaids
• Hand Sanitizer
• Bug Spray (with 15% DEET)
• Contact Cases, Solutions, Extra Contacts

The High Sierra bag that Jeremy carries does not have a detachable day pack and he uses an old school backpack that is large enough to fit in his favorite Tripod.  The following items are featured in his daypack:

• Documents
• Dive Log and ID
• Nikon D80 SLR with Lenses
• Canon D20 Dive Camera
• Acer 722 Netbook
• External Hard Drive
• iPod Touch
• Cables and other equipment for above gear
• Sunglasses
• Glasses
• International Driver's Permit
• Business Cards
• Power Adapters
• Tripod (Large)
• Oscar the Roaming Gnome
• Umbrella
• Travel Pillow
• Playing Cards
• Passport Photos
• Journal and Pens

As we are still tinkering with our packing list before we depart, we may update this list in the next few weeks.  Before we leave we'll do a weight check and update this post to reflect what our final values are!
Have you been on a long-term trip before? What do you think of our packing list?  Join the conversation by commenting below!