Is that all you're taking?

We purchased our backpacks today....well, one of them, the other will be in in a few days....and they're surprisingly smaller than I had imagined. I guess I had envisioned these gargantuan packs that would tower over our *seemingly* pea sized heads! (See below) Boy am I glad I was wrong!

By the way...check out that old lady's face! I think her pack was too heavy!

However, I now know that when people refer to their gargantuan packs they are actually referring to the price tags. Man....I can't believe the price of these things. I mean, one pack cost more than an entire set of luggage we bought back in December. Oh well, let's hope the old adage, "You get what you pay for," rings true for our situation. And, Dave Ramsey would be proud, of course we purchased them with cash!

We got a crash course in backpacks 101 from the lovely salesperson at Quest Outdoors this afternoon; we left there backpack connoisseurs. Our packs are made by Osprey and we went with the 60 L variety which seems like plenty of space for all of our necessities. The most important feature that we were looking for was a pack that was front loading instead of top loading. This allows us to access our pack contents as we would luggage instead of a duffel bag. That means we won't have to dig to the bottom of the pack just to find a pair of socks. Yay!


And, the coolest part??? The backpack has this little "day pack" that detaches for use when the big pack isn't necessary. Isn't it adorable?


The backpacks will carry, comfortably, 40 lbs and no more than 50 lbs. I've been thinking and I really hope that all of my stuff doesn't weigh in at more than 40 lbs. Perhaps knowing that I will be toting all this stuff around will convince me to pack lightly. Let's hope, cause I don't think my sweet husband can possibly carry two for very long!

On the way home Mickey commented that purchasing our backpacks made the trip feel all the more real to him. 88 days and counting!

Mr. T modeling his new pack....sans contents, of course.

Next step - learning Italian!