How I pack for a bikepacking + camping trip || A week on the road in France

Cycle touring, bikepacking, whatever – getting your packing right is half the battle because all those ‘little extra bits’ you throw in ‘just in case’ are going to make you weep quietly into your handlebars when you’re slogging up a gravel hill 50km into your longest day.

Here’s what works for me after three years of cycle touring. Bear in mind that the surface you’ll be riding on, the bike you’re taking, your own preferences and your own needs and accommodation choices will effect what and how you pack. There is no one right way.

(P.s in this video I say I use the Jetboil with an Aeropress – I’d totally forgotten that I don’t take the Aeropress (although it is great for other travels) and I have the Jetboil french press add-on and just use it as a cafetière)

Related videos you might find useful for cycle touring:
How I find cycle touring campsites in France: https://youtu.be/84K8Z-vAQsg
10 tips for first-time cycle tourers: https://youtu.be/5UxB7L6tGHs
How I plan cycle touring adventures: https://youtu.be/nFTZ631rW5s

Stuff I use for cycle touring:
Panniers: https://www.cyclestore.co.uk/ortlieb_back_roller_classic_waterproof_panniers_40_litres-ID_66199
Jetboil Flash: https://amzn.to/3RwhXH1
Jetboil French Press: https://amzn.to/3z9Ubdr
Topeak Top Tube Bag: https://amzn.to/3xl2wur
Sea-to-Summit TR2 Alto: https://www.ellis-brigham.com/sea-to-summit-alto-tr2-tent-253604

//FIND ME AT:
Website: https://kitiarapascoe.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kitiarapascoe/

//BOOKS:
In Bed with the Atlantic: https://amzn.to/33406kq
A Bear in November: https://amzn.to/3f3Dx1P
Little Book of Zen: https://bit.ly/3n2WWoa

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Welcome to this extremely haphazard video which is going to involve me talking about how I’m packing for my upcoming cycle [Music] tour. Now, I was brought up cycle touring, when I was a child we would go on two week trips cycling through France, Spain, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark – those kinds of places but then I didn’t go for a really really really long time and then I’ve been several times in France in the last few years. I am getting to grips with it a bit more but I still overpack every single time and no, I do not make a list which I can consult the following year and learn from previous mistakes but this time I’m determined to not overpack, I’m going to get it right, it’s going to be perfect. It also helps that this year we’re going to Normandy rather than Brittany and the Normandy route that I have created is a linear route from St Male to Ouistreham (Caen) and it is significantly less hilly than the past two cycle tours I have, the past three cycle tours, I’ve planned actually, two in Brittany, one here in Devon, so that’s going to help with packing because obviously the bike isn’t going to be being dragged up so many hills as before. So I’ve got that on my side as well. Super excitingly I’ve just bought new panniers, tadaa! Thanks for everyone who got involved in my poll a little while ago and suggested Ortlieb, I have used Ortlieb before, in fact I’ve almost exclusively used them as an adult, as a child we had, I don’t even know what they were Karrimor maybe, I can’t remember but they were ancient even then. These ones are the same as I’ve used in my past two French cycle tours, they’re just mine. I always borrowed my sister’s before because she is a very generous woman but I’ve decided to bite the bullet because I’ve got a bit more cycle luggage requirements this year so I thought I’d buy my own and they literally arrived this morning and I’m leaving tomorrow so I’m quite last minute. This cycle tour was planned so far in advance, like months ago I planned this, booked to the campsites, planned the route, inspected the route, everything was glorious if you want to know more about how I plan cycle tours there are a couple of videos that I will put in the description about that but when it comes to what I’m actually taking I’m a very last minute person when it comes to that, so these are the main form of baggage I am taking but I’m also going with my partner and he has a Bob trailer and that is a trailer that you pull behind the bike, obviously. So he obviously carries his share of our joint goods such as the tent which actually doesn’t weigh very much but also bigger things that are much would be much harder for me to carry so larger things like the washing up bowl, plates, things like that they go in the trailer. Okay so we’re going to pack one pannier right now together and we’re not going to pack the other one because that’s going to be my clothes and I haven’t sorted that lot out yet but I’m going to pack really lightly. First things first is my trusty Mountain Equipment sleeping bag, man I love this thing let’s can’t take a look this so let’s get it out this is the what is this this is the helium 250 women’s small oh no it’s regular got it on sale a while ago can’t remember how much it cost but I love it, it’s in this fetching aubergine color, also got a silk liner that someone gave to me many years ago. Let’s get stuffing… tadaa! That is my sleeping bag, you can obviously get lighter ones this is I think it’s three seasons but it suits me fine I do get quite cold in the night sometimes and also in June it’s not always the warmest temperatures. This is amazing I’m really not a new stuff kind of person when it comes to equipment um all the panniers that I used as a child obviously my parents and they were really really old and battered and I think they still use them I’m pretty sure my dad still used the same panniers we used in the ’90s and then obviously I’ve been borrowing my sisters so it’s very exciting to have new panniers, they smell of new plastic yum. Then I have this which is a very large bulky sleeping mat it’s the AlpKit, I can’t remember what model it is and I don’t want to undo it to have a look it is I’ll put it around here somewhere it weighs quite a lot and it’s also quite large it’s actually probably a little bit bigger than my sleeping bag itself I was looking at the Thermorest Uber light great name but also the Sea to Summit one, um I can’t that’s called either but you can get them that they pack a lot smaller than this but you know that’s just more money when I have one already pretty sure if I remember from last year my sleeping bag and my sleeping mat oh yeah oh yeah they fit side by side at the bottom of the pannier which is ideal because these panniers are slightly tapered so this really makes the most of the room and they are lovely and squished in there, tadaa, now again I seem to remember from last year that I had one pannier that I never opened during the day and another pannier that I could easily open so my sleeping stuff went in here and anything else I definitely wouldn’t need during the day of cycling and that always goes on the side of the bike that I don’t get off of so that when I get off my bike and lean it against a wall the paner that I can access during the day is always the one closest to me this sounds a little like I’m overthinking but that’s just what experience has led me to um do so in this pannier I’m also going to put my down jacket I can’t remember in fact I’m 99% sure I didn’t take my down jacket with me last time do I want to take it do I want to take it I don’t know I’m going to put it in so another thing I can put in here are my flip-flops which are useful but not during the day of cycling then other things I can put in here are things like plugs towel head torch some clothes but not very many in this one but clothes I’m definitely not going to need during the day like no extra layers or anything like that and then that one can just be closed and then I will just ride and not open it until we get to the campsite the other one then I normally only pack half to 2/3 full because that is the one that I’ll access easily so I need to be able to get stuff in and out of there quite easily but also that is the one that I’ll be putting supermarket food in which is very important because while I take gas and the Jet boil for said gas this will only heat water theoretically I could make pasta or something like that but I don’t um this this the only purpose of this is to make coffee which I know you agree with me come on this is very important this whole thing is just for coffee I don’t have a pan to go with it or anything like that like you can obviously get pans and um fittings for this but I don’t have any I just used the jet boil for making coffee with an Aeropress coffee maker which is just plastic so it’s really resilient if you drop it it’s not going to break all that kind of stuff I’m not cycling with glass the only hot thing I ever make is coffee everything else is cold food that’s all I eat on cycle tours in France so anything that takes place in the Summer where it’s really easy just to sit outside and eat I’ll literally just go to the supermarket buy salad baguette all of that kind of stuff because then you don’t have to think about cooking you don’t have to take pots some pans and all of this Jazz with you like I’m sure you might want to do that if you go for a longer tour but I just can’t be bothered with all of that stuff for a week this is only a week French supermarkets are everywhere they have abundant delicious food in them and I just don’t really think it’s necessary to cook in this kind of short time span as a result though we do go to the supermarket pretty much every day I guess um and so that stuff goes in this the top of that pannier so it doesn’t get crushed and everything else so the tent which is this amazing creature which is this tent review here is a Sea to Summit what are you called Alto tr2 I love this tent this tent was actually given to me by seed summer in exchange for the review that I just put up there so um I didn’t pay for this but it’s absolutely amazing and I have used it now for several adventures and it’s just been brilliant it also just hardly weighs anything and it comes in these modules so you’ve got inner tent outer tent poles so you can split them up or keep them together we normally don’t split them up we normally put them in the trailer because they don’t weigh that much but at the same time they do have weight and so it’s better to keep that weight low and give it to someone else that’s not me so it goes in the trailer um although it’s really easy to split up if I want to take one of these for instance and put it in the top of one of these panniers that’s super fine other things that I’m taking but not carrying personally are things [Music] like this fun plastic supermarket plates which had for years I hate them oh my God I don’t know if you can see you probably can’t see but can I illustrate this so this is a plate for I don’t know how much it cost kids large plate four pack Sainsbury’s if you put stuff here it goes into this groove here it’s it’s convex it is convex it’s a plate that’s convex in the middle it rises who designed that like tell me who please just did you design who designed that it’s absolutely absurd I hate them but I still haven’t replaced them if you’ve got any tips for like really lightweight camping plates then let me know because I have been these been next to my bin for like 2 months because I want to throw them out but I can’t bring myself to throw out something that’s perfectly serviceable so I’m going to take to the charity shop but I haven’t yet and I haven’t bought any replacement ones so I have to take them on this cycle tour and I am sad about that but bowls are also terrible they’re from the same package situation they’re terrible because I can’t really illustrate this but if you put this is such a weird tangent I’m so sorry if you put stuff in this it will literally just topple over and this isn’t a very good example but it will honestly just fall over like that and it will lie down like that in which case ants and your friendly neighborhood snails can get into it it’s a nightmare but that’s what I’m taking so there you go these don’t really wear anything these are amazing actually these are Alp kits titanium Cutlery I don’t like the noise they make but they are really brilliant and they don’t um they don’t wear very much so they’re really good we also have whoops sitting pads these were I don’t know 50p or something from go outdoors I think and they don’t wear anything at all um and they fold up like this and they’re just for sitting on or kneeling on or whatever when you’re on Sandy Dusty dirty ground they are great love them um they’re very retro but they can go in the trailer they can get in one of these they can be strapped to the top of my rack they’re so easy to carry aside from that I’ll be taking things like tools inner tube head torches have I already said head torches some snacks which I’ll mainly buy along the way but I do have some to start with toilet paper never ever ever go C touring without toilet paper you never know it could be a perfectly serviceable campsite and yet they don’t have toilet paper I don’t know what is going on with that but always take toilet paper just is great um clo bags for Supermarket trips plastic bags cuz you never know when you’re going to need a plastic bag wet clothes things you’ve washed all that stuff can go in there boilet trees obviously I wash my clothes and shampoo because I truly believe that all soap is soap um I’m yet to be proved wrong about this and and washing clothes and shampoo seems to work really well so that’s what I do and then it also doubles up as shampoo another thing that I have is a battery pack and I find this really really useful it weighs a ton which is really annoying but it’s incredibly useful so camping obviously we don’t have electricity we only have electricity for one night during the actual tour which is the second night I think where we’re staying in a hiking cabin which I’m very excited for but broadly speaking don’t have electricity and I’m navigating by my phone and or my watch depending on how I’m feeling on that day in which case I’m going to need to charge those things not my watch so much but I’ll definitely need to charge my phone cuz my phone’s battery isn’t very good so I use this this for that and that’s pretty much it it’s heavy and annoying but it is really useful I normally carry it in my handlebar bag and I highly recommend that everyone has one because you just never know in France I charge this overnight in the campsite toilets so I never I don’t have to leave my phone or my watch or my GoPro or anything like that in the toilets overnight which I wouldn’t feel comfortable doing but I would feel comfortable leaving this overnight normally you can plug it into a socket they’re often near the ceiling but they are sometimes over mirrors or over lights and you can just rest it on top there no one can really see it it’s not getting any in anyone’s way if they want to charge something briefly they can obviously unplug yours and plug theirs in you know whatever I’ve never had a problem with it I can almost always find somewhere that I can leave this to charge a lot of campsites in France and other countries also have common rooms or reading rooms or places where cycle tours or hikers or just like kids and stuff can go and hang out or eat their dinner like wear the book swap is things like that you can often find plugs and there will always be someone charging a power bank there so again that’s a really good place to look out for so I know what you truly want to look at is my handle bag it is so old it’s the same kind of one that I always used to have when I was a child and I just love them you can get some really like funky ones these days and I just like I would like a new one and one that doesn’t weigh 18 kg that’s an exaggeration but still but I’ve yet to find the perfect handle wellar bag so I’ve just stuck with this one it’s from Alura 1,000 years ago it’s still got a lovely matte panel in there that I don’t use because I navigate with Kut um who I do work for so that’s a disclaimer there and then inside I have this strap that I I don’t know where I got it from it’s like a camera strap or something it’s got a a waterproof cover that is absolutely in no way waterproof anymore at all in fact it’s probably like a sponge these days but it’s just like a box inside like a an actual hard box it’s great I love it I once lost my phone in between the lining and spent about 3 hours absolutely panicking it’s great it just Clips straight onto my handlebars with the click fix thing and then it’s got these like side pockets as well I mean it’s old and heavy but at the end of the day it’s what I got it’s what I got so in here I put my cameras phone wallet passport battery pack and maybe a snack or two or three or five that’s what I normally put in here because that means that anything valuable basically I can just uncp this from my bike and take it with me into a shop and I don’t have to worry about leaving valuable stuff on the bike because we travel as a pair um normally one person is always with the bikes anyway because that’s just a lot easier than both of us locking our bikes going to the supermarket we normally just send one person in and it just means that I can really easily take everything with me and not have to worry about anything so this is my quadlock which I haven’t actually used with this handlebar bag before but I’m going to try and see how that works out and I can have my phone here and be navigating there then also I’ve got my trusty top Che bag which has always got a couple of alons in it um that is really useful I always take that with me the last time I went cycle touring I had two bottle cages on because the time before that I didn’t I only had one uh so I had two bottle cages on and then took two fulls sizee bottles parked the car near the fery port was loading up the bike to go cycle to the ferry and discovered that oh literally cannot get that in that’s what happens when you are 5′ full uh you have a small bike frame so that is annoying but and then I have this lovely little one here and that goes in there as you can see there’s absolutely no room for a frame bag here so all those bike Packers I guess they’re riding larger bikes than I am so broadly speaking that’s what I’m taking I’m traveling pretty light as I said we don’t have any cooking stuff just coffee making goods and then I’ll just have clothes on top of that and toiletries stuff like that which does always seem to add up because toilet trees are always a liquid but I’m hoping this year I can travel pretty light I think it all hinges on how many jumpers I take and how many bib shots I take things like that I’m just going to take two pairs of bib shots this year one pair of trousers for the evenings and wash stuff I’m just going to wash and dry stuff and that will be fine I’ve probably forgotten something extremely key that I just can’t think of right now but I’m kind of of rushing this because I have loads to do cuz as I said I’ve left this to the last minute I’d love to know how you pack your bags what kind of bags you use are you like an inline bike pack a bag person are you a paa person like what do you use I know some of you before have given me interesting tips about like modular packing and stuff like that which is really cool I pack my stuff in plastic bags not to protect it from the weather so much cuz oie panes are by waterproof more so I can access things really easily and one of you amazing people gave the tip a while ago to go for a ride with your fully laden bike before you actually finish packing so pack it all go for a ride and then be like do I need to alter this a bit so I’m going to go do that tomorrow morning to make sure that I haven’t overburdened myself or that I can just get to grips with handling the bike after a year of not having such heavy stuff on it I hope this was interesting and stay tuned for the actual tour video because I’m so excited about that I have made another two I’ll put those into the description this one’s going to be even better even cooler I’m really excited about it so stay tuned for that that will be coming very soon thanks for sticking around with this one see you later [Music]