Expedition Kit and Equipment:

A major part of all expeditions is getting your kit right. The right kit for where you are going can make the difference between a cold miserable night and a toasty warm one. It can also make the difference being able to cope with an emergency or first aid situation or not. In this section we hope to build some useful tips and hints of what kit works for us. We'd love to hear from you with your suggestions and reviews.

We work closely with Nomad Travel store in supplying much of the specialist kit for our trips. If you are looking to buy expedition equipment or get travel vaccines we now have a dedicated kit page on their site:

If you are shopping on a bigger scale and want to get expedition kit or just want some advice it is always worth getting in touch as we may be able to get you some bigger discounts from our suppliers.

Worldwide Expedition 40+5 day bag

I have to start by saying that when I received the pack in the post I was a little confused by it. Perhaps the age old confusion of what an expedition actually is contributed to this - but I had envisaged either something more technical, or larger for an 'Expedition' sack. All rucksacks are quite a personal thing - and their usefulness, rather obviously - depends entirely on what you use it for! Problem was I couldn't immediately pick what that would be for me with this bag. It has lots of features which hint at a more technical use but the size for me personally seemed a bit betwixt and between - I tend to use a 60-80 litre pack for trekking and probably something smaller as a day sack.

The clever design which allows you to zip away the back system is a neat idea - and works well - but the main use I could see for that would be when storing the bag as check in luggage on a plane - or perhaps on mules when trekking or bus journeys - but then to be my main hold luggage - for most trips it would need to be bigger.

The one time I do often use a bag of this size is out climbing - when I need a bit more than a small day sack - but not a complete expedition sack - so I decided to take the sack on a short climbing trip I was doing to El Chorro in Spain. The first test passed was that it was small enough to sneak on as hand luggage - even past the ever present Ryan Air police who are normally adept at extracting additional fees out of you for any number of reasons.

Out on the crag - as a basic, mid sized rucsac it worked well - it was comfortable to carry, the cool back system was basic but successful, there are a variety of useful pockets, bungees, a hydration section for your camelback and an effective rain cover. In terms of its shape and carrying capacity I was not so keen - it feels rather bottom heavy with a very, 'pear shaped' design. The consequence of this is also that the long zip opening can be difficult to close when the bag is packed full and things tend to burst out when you open it.

So overall a mixed result I would say - as a mid-range, mid-size option it may well serve a useful purpose for many people. For me personally I couldn't work out exactly what that purpose would be - for a bag of this size I would be tempted to go for something slightly more technical - which for my purposes would cover more uses. Otherwise I would want something bigger and more robust as a full expedition pack, or smaller, basic and cheaper for a day to day day sac.

If you'd like to know more about safety and skills in the mountains see our mountain safety course or or get involved in climbing in Borneo.