Packing for an 11-Day Business Trip to Vietnam in a Small Carry On Bag

My most popular post is about how my wife and I traveled through Italy for a month while packing carry-on-only. I carried one (max-sized) carry on bag for that trip.

Now, let's talk about traveling for over a week with an even smaller bag.

I'm just back from an 11-day product development trip to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. I was there to finish up development on a new product that we're launching on Kickstarter this summer: the Superlite Backpack.

At Tortuga, we believe in dogfooding, so I packed for the trip in the Superlite, a 34L (mid-sized) carry on.

Here's what I packed and how I made it work. For reference, HCMC was 95° F (35° C) with 95% humidity.

Tricks to Make it Work

1. Start with a carry on. Then force yourself to cut things until they fit in the bag. Constraints are good.
2. Read The 7 Secrets of Packing Light to learn the principles of packing less. Then you can figure out how to apply them to your needs.
3. Divide your trip by two. For an 11-day trip, I pack for six days and plan to do laundry once. I could pack just as light for a 15-day trip by dividing it into three, packing for five days, and doing laundry twice. Travel is easier when you're carrying half as much (or less) stuff.

What I Packed

Luggage

• Carry on: Superlite Backpack
• Personal item: Plastic bag of gifts for our factory team

Tops

• 8 t-shirts, including one for the gym and one for sleeping in
  • Mostly Uniqlo and Taylor Stitch
• 1 shirt jacket (worn as a jacket on the plane)
• 2 polos

Bottoms

• 1 chino pants
  • Outlier Futureslimworks
• 2 chino shorts
  • Outlier New Way Longs
  • Flint and Tinder 365 Chino Shorts
• 2 gym shorts
  • Ten Thousand Interval Short
  • Ten Thousand Set Short (doubles as a bathing suit)
• 6 pairs of underwear
  • Nike Dri-FIT Stretch Cotton Boxer Briefs ($10/pair at Nordstrom Rack)

Other Clothes

• 2 pairs of shoes
  • 1 pair of sneakers
    • On Cloud X 3
  • 1 pair of leather slip ons
    • Sperry Men's Gold Cup Harpswell Nubuck Driver
• 4 pairs of socks
  • 2 Darn Tough crew
  • 2 no show socks
• Sunglasses with case
• Packable hat
• Leather belt

Everything Else

• 2 toiletry bags
  • 1 quart-sized bag for liquids: Nite Ize RunOff® Waterproof 3-1-1 Pouch
  • 1 smaller bag for everything else (toothbrush, razor, floss, etc.)
• Laptop
• Kindle
• Pouch with charger and cables
• EarPods
• Notebook and pen
• Wallet
• Passport
• Phone
• Water bottle
• 2 pill bottles: melatonin and acetaminophen

In Conclusion

If you're willing to do laundry, you can pack everything you need for more than a week in just a carry on.

Small bag, light load, total freedom.

If you still need help going carry-on-only, email me.