Packing Defeated (Pack All The Things!!)

I have defeated packing. Long live the Eagle Creek Packing Cube.

I can't believe no one has mentioned these before! They are perfect! Ever wondered why Hannable couldn't conquer the Roman Empire? He didn't have packing cubes.  If he did, he could have loaded all his elephants in one or two, chucked them over the Alps and picked them up on the other side.  Ever wondered how Lewis and Clark were able to send so much stuff back to President Jefferson? They HAD packing cubes.  Someone has been holding out on me.

Anyone remember the computer game Oregon Trail? You could go hunting for extremely pixilated deer and buffalo, shoot as much as you want, but you could only bring back 50 lbs of meat.  That is like packing for Peace Corps.  Look over every posession in your life and bring only those most needed.

Seriously though, if you are in the PC and are getting ready to go, then you undoubtedly know about the packing limitations and are losing sleep over it. We have very specific size and weight limits and they make a difficult task seem impossible.  To me, packing just about everything you will need for 2 years is tantamount to summoning up a miracle, (i.e.- Mary! Go to the moon and back before supper!) I just can't think under that kind of stress. 

I have been packing, unpacking, and repacking for the past couple of days trying to decide how best to roll, fold, or stuff my clothes so as to allow for as much room as possible for other things.  No matter how I arranged all the clothes they took up a heck of lot of space in both the duffle and backpack.  Then my sister came home for a visit. She has a couple of the cubes and boasted the claim that they would solve all my packing problems, bring about world peace, stop global hunger, and begin instituting harsher punishment for parole violaters (kudos if you understand that reference).  To me it sounded something like this:

"Excuse me little girl!"
"Yes?"
"I understand you need to get to the moon and back before supper."
"Uuuhhhh....."
"Well this tiny little bag of canvas will solve all your problems!"

It did, savor this moment Catie; you were right. We were shoe shopping, and passed a display of Eagle Creek packing cubes, on sale.  I stopped, looked and ended up buying one. After we got home, Catie began shoving all kinds of clothes into this itty bitty thing.  So yeah, that one physics law that says no two things can occupy the same space at the same time, totally broke it.

In that first cube went, 2 skirts, a dress, 4 shirts, one pair of leggings, one pair of bike shorts and three pairs of underwear.  And it all came out to this 9"x13"x5" little package:

It takes up way less space than just throwing clothes in a duffle and hoping you can press them down really tight.  You do all your squashing here and then these fit in the bigger bag and you pack around them.

Anyway, I promptly went back and bought two more cubes of this size and one smaller double sided cube. Then I went from all of this taking up loads of space:

 To this:

Now, I am not saying packing is now 100% worry free.  You still have to find a way to get in the rest of the stuff which, when combined, is about the size and shape of a dead yak, and roughly as cooperative.  However! Having 99% of all your clothes in nice, neat, easy to move around, cubes makes things tons easier.  I still need to rearrange what is in the cubes, I want it all split as evenly as possible.  Once everything is situated all you have to do is pack around the cubes.

I know how it sounds, an entire post devoted to the idea of putting a bag in a bag, but trust me on this one.  They will ease the hurt. I know it is last minute too, we leave in 6 days.  I was blessed enough to find mine on sale at a store.  However, since PCV do get really good discounts through the Eagle Creek website it would probably be worth it to get some and have them rushed.  I promise you will not regret it. 

Packing before the cubes is like riding a tricycle, getting cubes is like being upgraded to a space shuttle.  You still can't get to the moon and back by supper but you will eventually.