Baggage Breakdown

Yay! We've bought our tickets! Plans are to head to Europe for three weeks in May, leaving the day after my graduation. The "we" in this case is as follows: Kris, Sharon, Sara (Lord willing and if she gets a job that will let her go), Martin, Jolene, and Louisa. We shall be flying in to Berlin and flying out of Paris three weeks later. The venue we have chosen for this trip is to travel by backpacking. "Backpacking" defined means literally carrying all your traveling gear on your back—no suitcases. You live out of your backpack for three weeks, travel by train, sleep in hostels, eat food from supermarkets (if necessary), wash your clothes in sinks, and dry your clothes on fishing line strung across your dorm room. Well, ok… we are going to find a Laundromat if at all possible, but we aren't necessarily planning on that.

As you can imagine, this type of travel is an art form and requires quite a bit of planning. Not only do you have to plan where to go, but you have to also plan how to get there and how to get there as lightly as possible. Fortunately for us, we have some experience on which to draw. Take, for example, our trip to Washington by train back in 1998. Five of us girls caught the train in Chicago, stopped for several days in Montana, and then ended up in Seattle, Washington. We spent several days in Washington and then flew back home. A marvelous trip indeed had it not been for the scads of luggage we had with us. We had to rent a car in Seattle, and we literally could not fit all our luggage into the trunk. I think we were all horrified at one point or another at the amount of baggage we had brought with us. We had made sure to leave NOTHING behind. It was so much, in fact, that some of the girls could not even carry it as we were rushing through the airport trying to catch our flight. Poor Sharon had to not only carry her own luggage but also some of the luggage of the other girl. The icing on the cake was when Sharon ended up snagging a man during our loping run through the airport—the hangers of her garment bag snagged the hangers of an unidentified man's garment bag. After that horrifying experience with too much luggage (which we fondly referred to as our "8 tons of luggage"), we agreed, NEVER AGAIN.

Next major trip: Europe 2000, one month, by bus. Thank goodness the tour bus limited us to one 28" suitcase and one carry-on bag (and we moaned and groaned at that because we didn't think it was enough room), or we would've sure enough brought the kitchen sink with us. The way it was, we were still WAY overpacked. We had bellhops to deliver our bags to our rooms and to pack them inside the bus every day, and so we really didn't realize the full burden until the days when we were on our own, before and after the trip. I bumped my flight at the end of that trip, spent a night at an English Inn, and had the opportunity to bump again the next day, but because I just couldn't bear the thought of lugging around my big, fat suitcase for another whole day, I declined. I turned down $200 because of that suitcase. Again, I said, NEVER AGAIN.

Then came Berlin 2006. Sharon and I went to Berlin on a two-week study abroad opportunity. And we remembered (yes, we certainly did) the troubles we had had with luggage on each of the aforementioned journeys. We again downsized our suitcases—this time to a 25". We knew we were in trouble when our petite little professor came trotting out from the luggage carousel with a little 18" suitcase. And as she flew around Berlin at record speeds with us in tow (into buses, up and down those metro station stairs, onto trains, across roads, and up three flights of stairs to our hostel room), we knew that despite our efforts to downsize, we again had TOO MUCH BAGGAGE. We went to Dresden for a three day trip, and so Sharon and I made it our mission to find SOMEWHERE—anywhere, please God—to park our big suitcases for the duration. Thank goodness for those lockers at the train station. It was worth every penny to be free from big luggage. We packed what we needed for three days into a little duffel bag, and GLADLY paid the fee for luggage storage. But poor George. On this trip, he had made the blunder we had made on our Europe 2000 trip. He had a big 28" suitcase that he was lugging all over the place. Wherever he went, it was like having to find space for himself and another whole person. Yes, it was that big.

But this time, with our luggage on our backs, there is simply no room for error. None. Whatsoever. We have purchased a kitchen scale, and everything being taken is being weighed and then entered into an Excel spreadsheet for a grand total. Twenty pounds is my goal, but I am afraid it will be more like 25. But no more!! Everything is being scrutinized times two for fear that I shall have a baggage breakdown.