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The 4 Rules I Follow to Pack as Efficiently as Possible
Last month, I headed on an extended vacation with only a carry-on bag. I had a backpack as well — which was mostly full of reading material — but the luggage is what piqued people’s attention. “How long are you going to be gone?,” a friend asked on Instagram, sending a line of exclamation marks when I said a little over two weeks. Someone else wrote “How?,” while another joked, “This is what I pack for a weekend.”
There are a few reasons why I like to pack as lightly as possible, but these are the biggest three: My parents met in the travel industry, and so efficiency through airports was as important a lesson to learn as, say, chewing with my mouth closed and sending thank you cards. The other reason is that if there’s ever a situation where I am absolutely left to my own devices, I want to be able to carry my stuff. But the last reason is perhaps more universal. When I have less to look after, I enjoy myself more.
I took off on what I called a “rectangle ‘round America,” where I went up to Portland and the Columbia River Gorge, then over to Minneapolis and a small city in Wisconsin, and finally down to Kansas City. That route is enough to consider, and I didn’t want to worry about lugging too much with me in the process. I also like the challenge of packing light and seeing how many outfits I can piece together from a…
