REVIEW – Planning a trip to Southeast Asia later this year, one of my main means of transport will be the ubiquitous scooter. Now when I lived there for a couple of years, I regularly transported 2 x 20 litre water bottles or even once a four shelf bookcase, but I really don’t want to take a large (60l+) backpack or suitcase this visit as it’ll just be a pain on the scooter as I explore. Enter me researching one-bagging: travelling with a single carry-on bag only. Now, I’m no stranger to packing constraints, having done multi-day bush walks in the wilderness of Tasmania, but that constraint is self-imposed based on what I could carry and up to about 20kgs (including tent and food, etc), not a measly 7kg like limited to on an airline. Hopefully, without any checked-in luggage, I’ll have more flexibility and mobility while travelling and won’t have to worry about the airline losing my luggage nor have to wait around at luggage carousels waiting for my luggage to arrive. Enter the Bellroy Lite Travel Pack 38 litre. Will this be the answer to my problems? Read on……
⬇︎ Jump to summary (pros/cons)
Price: $229.00
Where to buy: Bellroy or Amazon
What is it?
The Bellroy Lite Travel pack is a pack from Melbourne Australia based bag maker Bellroy. It comes in both 30 and 38 litre models and the model I’ve been sent is the 38 litre. Both bags are fundamentally the same with the 38l just being a bigger version.
Tech specs
Dimensions: 520 × 370 × 170 mm
State volume: 38 litres
And now the big kicker here: the bag itself only weighs 1kg, hence the moniker of Lite. It’s actually part of their Lite range which includes slings backs, duffels, daypacks and more. Now I also have a Tomtoc T66 Travel Bag which is another 38 litre bag which I use for EDC (this may seem big for a EDC but then you never know when I might need to bring home a couple of routers or some packs of dog wee mats or pickup some groceries :P) and was my previous main contender for my overseas trip. Now, the Tomtoc weighs in at around 1.3kg. So, by using the Bellroy Lite, I gain an additional 300 grams of nonbag weight for packing. Do you know how many extra T-shirts or pairs of undies this is?
Design and features
There is no fancy packaging here—just a big, recyclable plastic bag. In the side picture above, you can see how slim the bag is when it’s empty.
The bag itself is made of Dura Lite Nylon, which is a ripstop nylon made of 100% recycled materials, which is great to know. Bellroy claims that it’s 1/3rd lighter than any of their other materials. On the front, there’s a top pocket with a vertical PU coated water resistant zipper which covers about 1/3 of the front and a lower vertical PU coated water resistant zipper pocket which covers about 2/3 of the bottom of the bag. There are four lash points laid out around the top pocket if you want to attach something externally via an s-biner or carabiner, like a travel pillow or a coat, but that’s not something I’ve ever done. While they look quite thin, they feel strong enough to be able to carry something like a full water bottle.
The top pocket has a nice light material inside making it easier to see things in there and has a small pocket, a pen pocket and a key lanyard inside. This is perfect for things you need to get to quickly and easily like some paperwork, sunglasses, earbuds, or hand sanitiser. The zipper pull rings for the top pocket and the main opening are these nice shrink wrapped pullers which give great leverage.
The bottom pocket is bigger in size and covers the bottom 2/3rds of the bag again with a light material inside for visibility. This is ideal for a magazine, a light jumper, a set of over-ear headphones, or something similar- something that’s a bit bulkier but you still want quick access to. Nothing special for the zipper pull on this pocket; however, it is worth noting that all zippers are YKK. The nice thing about both these outside pockets is that they have their own volume so that when you pack them, they don’t just push in and take up space in the main backpack itself like many packs. This means they are actually adding additional packing space, not taking it away. On the right side, you can see it has a padded carry handle.
The shoulder straps clip onto two lashing points in the bottom corners. Again, they don’t look that strong but seem to be able to carry a fair bit of weight. I certainly had no issues with them carrying around about 10kg of stuff. If you disconnect the straps you can stow them in the back panel so that you can carry the bag like a briefcase or if you want to pack the straps away to stow under a seat or in an overhead locker. You can see the top padded carry handle here as well.
The back of the pack and the straps are made from a nice breathable mesh, and so far, they seem to allow pretty good ventilation (though I haven’t tried them in the tropics yet). The bag also comes with a small but serviceable and adjustable sternum strap that helps hold the bag’s weight on your chest a bit when fully packed.
If you’re not one-bagging it, there’s also a luggage passthrough to attach to our other luggage.
On the back of the bag is a notebook compartment with a non PU coated zipper but a concealing lip over the top of it. This will fit up to a 16″ laptop according to Bellroy however I don’t have anything bigger than a 13.3″ to confirm this. There’s some minimal padding here and also a bit of a false bottom, so it doesn’t bang on the ground when you drop the bag. Putting a notebook in here gives the backpack a bit more firmness and form.
The main compartment is a suitcase style opening. On the right hand side is a single, cavernous storage area with a mesh to keep things in there. You can use this side either with or without packing cubes and it’s nice to have some flexibility here. On the other side is a smaller mesh pocket and at the top a non-see through pocket. I suspect the top pouch is maybe either for things like your bathroom stuff or maybe it’s not see through so you can store your “delicates” and people can’t see them.
So here’s the bag with a light load out. On the right hand side a couple of packing cubes contain clothes; shirts, paints, sock, undies etc. On the lefty hand side I have socks in the top pocket and in the pocket below is my EDC tech kit (Inateck Tech Pouch) and a pair of shoes. You can see there’s still heaps of room internally and this doesn’t include any load being placed into the front pockets.
So far, I haven’t done a sub 7-kilogram pack yet, but I have overpacked the bag to go away for a couple of weekend trips to test its comfortability. Here, it is fully packed out with about 10kg of stuff in it. Because the material is very flexible you can really shove stuff into it. I’ve used a combination of packing cubes and just straight chucking stuff in. There are clothes, shoes, and electronic pouches all in there. You can see I could probably even still fit some more stuff in there if I really wanted to because of the flexible material.
And again, fully packed from the top. Looks like there might still be some spare space in the top of the pack for those additional 300 grams of undies 😛
And finally, here’s a picture of what it looks like on someone that’s 6′ 1″ and 5’6″ that’s blatantly stolen from the Bellroy website as I couldn’t find a satisfactory “volunteer” for the picture. If it matters, I’m closer to the shorter size 🙂
Final thoughts
Having “over packed” this to 10kg for a weekend trip and a couple of times for work two day trips I must admit I’m surprised how comfortable this bag is given the quite basic and harness is and the fact that the straps are actually detachable. Additionally while the sternum strap looks a bit weak, it does in fact make a difference and assists in taking some of the weight off your back.
The bag easily gobbles up everything I can throw at it, whether I use compression packing cubes or not. That being said, I think where this bag will really shine is where weight really is a concern, such as when an airline gives you had constraints on the weight, as mentioned in my introduction. I haven’t done a full sub 7 kg pack yet; however, I’m pretty sure that I’ll easily be able to do it, especially now that I’ve “gained” 300 g of additional packing compared to the Tomtoc Navigator bag.
This bag will be great for carrying around on my holiday with the additional option of being able to stow away the straps and use it in briefcase mode when required. While the material doesn’t feel as robust as a bag made of Cordura or similar, I don’t have any worries about this bag being able to withstand the rigours of travel, especially since it won’t ever be in the hands of any airline baggage handlers. That being said, I’ll be taking a waterproof elasticised cover with me in case I get caught in a tropical rainstorm, but that being said, most backpacks will only be water resistant, and a fully waterproof bag will definitely be heavier because of a heavier fabric and coating.
It’s worth noting that because of the “thin” material unlike a heavy material the bag will take on the shape of whatever you pack in it, so if the front pockets have lots of angular and spikey type things in it, that’s how the bag will present itself. Not a big deal but may be something to note for those who are bit more OCDish about things like that.
All in all, I this bag is fantastic especially for what I need it for. If you’re looking for a great light weight bag that’s well thought out with useful packing options both externally and internally the Bellroy Lite travel pack (either in the 30l or the 38l) is well worth a look.
If you want a follow-up on how it goes on my 3 week South East Asian holiday (definitely Vietnam and probably Lao) then leave me a comment below 🙂
What I like about the Bellroy Lite Travel Pack
- Lightweight
- Flexible packing options
- Pockets have independent volume
- Comfortable
What I’d change
- Side compression straps for when it’s not fully packed
Price: $229.00
Where to buy: Bellroy or Amazon
Source: The sample of this product was provided by Bellroy. They did not have a final say on the review and did not preview the review before it was published.
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