Day Zero: 8-9-10. At Airport Checking-in

Finally the day of travelling! Where exactly am I heading ? Taiwan ! Had planned out an 11-day itinerary of backpacking around the island nation.

Left my house at around noon as although the flight was in mid afternoon, was worried of any raya rush at the airport. I had wanted to check in on-line the day before as well, but wasnt able to do so as an error message kept appearing. Finally I called up the airline office and found out that as my flight is a long-haul flight to Los Angeles, hence web check-in is not allowed due to tight security reasons.

When I arrived at the check-in counter, was surprised to find it all empty. Was I too eager and had arrived too early? anyway, as the counter staff was checking me in, I waited with abated breath on the weight of my check-in backpack. How much would it weigh??

As in my previous post, the weight of my pack had been of upmost preoccupation of mine for the past few weeks prior to the trip. Hence I was particularly anxious to see if all my meticulous `mathematical calculations" and "economised-packing" has paid off?

And...the counter reading says == 8.7 kg !!

Woohoo ! I had expected 11-12 kg. So it s 8.7kg for 11 days of travelling. First time in my life, I am travelling with an unbelievably light luggage (well, by my own standards-lah).

Suddenly, my shoulders felt very light. it is as if the burdens had been lifted. :) psychologically that is!

Ilha Formosa - here I come ! :)

8 - 9 - 10

All my bags are packed, am ready to go....

Yes ! it is just a few more days before the start of a long-awaited holidays! will be backpacking in a trip that will be a combination of mountains-lake-historical small towns-goodfood !

8-9-10 is the magic number! never knew the date of departure is actually a consenquential series of three numbers, but come to think of it, hey, it will make the trip even more memorable, right? at least, its a date that is very easy to remember in the future years to come. :)

Just to share how my bag looks like.. :) It looks leaner cos I've compressed it ... (notice the luggage tag? its a Fit-to-Fly luggage tag, check out www.fit2fly.com.my. And Thanks to Row for giving me extras :) )


Will be using a 35+10L Deuter bag. The last time I ever used a backpack, it was 55L, and I nearly fell over as after stashing in all my clothes and whatnots, it became simply too heavy to carry! good thing at that time, the group of friends I was with decided to rent a car instead of taking public transport. This time around, have decided to be smarter and opted for a smaller bag and made of more hi-tec lighter material (note : bag is still expandable! so, can still do some shopping if the opportunity arises)


Ah...a smaller bag also means I have to `economise' on my packing and be very efficient with what I bring. This, itself, has been a series of careful planning, thinking and surprisingly, to a certain extent, has become a somewhat mathematical equation/solution. For e.g. taking a bottle of 150ml shampoo will last for how many days? or, should i pour out into smaller containers instead? as every little morsel and milligram will add to the weight to carry around, this has suddenly become very significant. Even the type of material for my clothings, have to be carefully taken into calculation.

Anyway, the bag is all packed now. and the only thing to do now is...

Counting down to take off ! :)