Aer Travel Pack 3 X-Pac
For when you need to take everything you own with you - and keep it organized.
Aer is a brand I was first turned onto when I was on the hunt for a one-stop-shop, carry all backpack for a trip to Europe. It’s an absolutely fantastic backpack, just under TSA guidelines for carry-on luggage, and can easily carry everything one would need for a long weekend excursion or three day business trip. Depending on the need to bring make-up bags or hair dryers, etc, available capacity will be reduced. If efficient with space and on a casual trip, a weeks worth of clothing will fit in the bag.
Here’s my been there list for the Aer Travel Pack 3
France
England
Multiple hops all over the continental United States both for work and vacation
Overall, the bag is the perfect package for the professional content creator (think, Jimmy Chin or Chris Burkard, not a Tik-Tok’er), artist, businessman, and explorer. It has dedicated, cushioned pockets for a large laptop, a tablet (my Microsoft Surface fits perfectly in the tablet pocket), more pockets than I care to count, and is well supported and comfortable for hauling heavy loads over longer distances. The bag will not struggle to fit a full frame mirrorless camera and two prime lenses, plus two days change of clothes, however, the bag really comes into its own when you need dedicated, easy access and well organized areas for external drives, CF express cards, battery backups, cables, chargers, your passport; this is the bag.
Materials and Aesthetic
I would be a madman not to disclose this first, when fully loaded, It is not an attractive bag.
You will not win any backpack fashion shows carrying this hulk around. The backpack is purpose built to carry everything you need, and keep it organized while you do; it’s an OCD’ers wet dream.
For the unorganized, the amount of searching you might have to do while looking for a USB-C cable borderline requires a court ordered search warrant. The backplate is rigid, and when filled to the zippers, the bag will stand on its own. Think, carrying a Keurig box around on your back. The bags dimensions are not far off the length and width of a 27” monitor, and the materials on the X-Pac version of the bag are top notch. X-Pac is not appended onto the name of the bag for cool points. X-Pac is a manufacturer of high quality synthetic materials that are designed for use in high wear, stress, and abrasion areas. Numerous, high end outdoor apparel companies use X-Pac, and the material is also used to make sails. The X-Pac series is waterproof. The fabric pattern has a rip-stop style look to it, albeit diamond stitched instead of the standard grid.
There is a standard version of the Travel Pack 3 that retails for $249, while the X-Pac iteration sells for $279.
The bag features YKK waterproof zippers that are unzipped to reveal a bright orange interior. Only the X-Pac versions of Aer’s bags have this feature. I like to think the orange interior is to the bag world what the red bottom shoes are to the high end fashion footwear world. This is the Christian Louboutin of backpacks.
External Components
The bag has some added exterior features that I find myself frequently using while travelling. Namely, three quick access pockets, numerous d-rings and loops for attaching items, and a water bottle sleeve that easily accommodates a 40oz wide mouth Hydro Flask. I have not used the feature yet, but the bag does have hip belt rigging points for when added support is needed. The belt is sold separately on Aer’s website. The quick access pockets are large enough to accommodate items you want immediate access to but don’t necessarily want to carry in your hand or pant pockets, e.g. a wallet, passport, phone, feminine products, or a phone charger. The bag has two robust carry handles. One on the top and another on the side. The handles feel great in hand, and show no signs of being overstressed even when used to heave heavy loads. The handles are unlikely to be a point of failure throughout the bags lifespan. On the reinforced backplate, there is a luggage handle pass-through so you don’t have to tote the bag around on your back, however, unless you have an upright roller bag with four wheels instead of the standard leaning roller with two, it’s not practical to slide the backpack onto a roller. The bag weighs 3.9lbs and has a 35L capacity. It is too easy to load up the bag with 35lbs of gear, and that makes any roller extremely top heavy, but a leaning roller gets really heavy, really fast when a fully loaded Travel Pack is resting on top. It’s a nice touch, and is perfect for waiting at the gate or taking public transit, but the utility of the feature is lost the heavier the pack is loaded.
The most unique and innovate feature of the bag are the magnetically secured cinch straps. At first, I thought the plastic magnet housings would fail, breaking the strap, but I’ve secured them and really torqued on them to help give the bag a smaller foot print. They showed no signs of breaking or being overstressed.
Interior
Okay - I counted the pockets. 20 pockets. This includes all areas, both zippered and open, that can be used to store an item. There are open slots perfect for external batteries, hard drives, documents printed on 11x17 ledger paper, and can accommodate rolled engineering drawings in a protective tube. The orange interior has an added utility in that it’s impossible to lose most items in the backpack, since most tech related peripherals are black.
Final Thoughts and Things to Note
This bag is not a daytrip bag - it was never intended to be. Unless, for this day trip, one would need to carry far more than the average person. For daytrips that don’t require a change of clothes but I want to make sure I have a small camera, a charger, water, maybe some basic toiletries, and room for souvenirs, I take my Aer Pro Pack Slim.
The Travel Pack 3 shines when you have to bring a lot, and you need to keep it organized. There’s a saying I grew up with. “Everything has a place - if it’s not in that place, it’s out of place.”
The Travel Pack 3 is the embodiment of that mantra. I have dedicated open pockets for a 65W Anker charger, a calculator, charging cables, Surface charger, Dude Wipes, Liquid I.V., the list goes on for quite a while.
It is not the first backpack I reach for, but it is my favorite.
Dimensions
Length: 21.5" (54.5 cm)
Width: 13" (33 cm)
Depth: 9" (21.5 cm)
Volume 35 L
Weight 3.9 lbs
