In search of a Light weight bag pack for a safari

drmarkf wrote:

Just returned from 3 weeks in South Africa & Botswana with a total of 8 flights, both scheduled on jets and light planes. Based on this and various earlier similar trips I have a few observations:

Total luggage allowances on light planes are either 15 or 20kg, and it has to be in soft bags. Although you can have a small-ish cabin bag with you either on your lap, under your feet or in a separate luggage space at the rear of the cabin, I don’t think you can guarantee to be able to take both typical safari camera gear plus all your clothes in a single bag in the cabin. This time I had a soft 65L Osprey bag in the hold for clothes (half full at most), and a Mindshift panorama 180 with my m4/3 camera gear/batteries etc with me in the cabin. The planes were mostly under half full, but nobody else was carrying anything bigger than the Mindshift in the cabin.

Hand luggage limits on the scheduled jet flights were unlimited as long as you can lift it (BA), 7kg (Comair) and 8kg (SA Airlink). The latter 2 are pretty limiting/impossible for anyone wanting to take more than, say, just safari camera gear unless you’re using m4/3.

I am but still, it weighs about 6 kg and is somewhat bulky.

Apart for the BA flights, nobody seemed to be taking the slightest notice of what weight people were actually carrying in the cabin. On both the Comair and Airlink legs, locals were in some cases carrying several cases and bags that collectively must at least have doubled the allowances.

So, draw from that what you will: the question is, however, on a scheduled flight in Africa would you be happy for your single hand baggage to be sent in the hold if they did actually decide to enforce the limits? And what would you do on a full light plane flight if they said your single bag had to go in the ‘hold’? (At least in the later situation you watch the bags being loaded and unloaded from the aircraft as you stand by.)

Personally id always go for 2 bags on a light plane flight.

Thank you so much drmarkf for your comment. It is VERY helpful because I am more and more aware (and afraid) that I might not even be able to have my camera bag with me in the cabin. My tour operator said I could have a purse, an iPad and/or some reading material and a jacket. So I have to be prepared to have my camera bag put in the cargo area. I would definitely go for 2 bags because I do want a bag for day use.

I will look at the Mindshift bag and see what it looks like.

Thanks again for your post. If you want to drop me a personal email with more tips, that would be great.