We’ve been back from Egypt since December 9th, and are leaving on January 5th not to return again until June 5th. That’s 5 months of travel for which to pack.

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Even though we’re pretty proficient at packing, I always look back at packing lists from prior trips before putting together a new one.

In this case, I looked back at Episode 278, our 3 months in Germany, Austria, Italy, and England, where we travelled with just carry-on size suitcases, a small duffel bag, and Ted’s camera/tech bag. The latter two are small enough that they qualify as our “personal item” that fits under the airplane seat in front of us.

Packing for 5 months is really no different than packing for 3, providing the weather is similar. On that 2022 trip, it was hot summer weather on the European continent (July/August) and rainy early fall in England.

Honestly, the hardest part about carry-on travel is that I get bored with my clothes (Ted does not, thankfully; he’d happily wear the same jeans and interchangeable merino tee shirts every day). I remember that on our 2022 trip, I ended up buying a couple of new pieces and leaving a few things behind with our landlord in Trieste, not out of necessity but out of boredom. This time we’re staying in apart-hotels, hotels, and resorts, so there won’t be a “person” to leave things with.

Our upcoming itinerary is New Zealand, Australia, and Malaysia with southern hemisphere and equatorial summer weather; and Crete, Poland, and England in the northern hemisphere’s spring. That means that the mix of clothing should be roughly the same as in 2022, and we’ve planned to take the same pieces of luggage.

As a confirmation, I used Microsoft Copilot’s AI tool to VERY quickly give me 2025’s actual weather in our destinations, and compare that to historical averages. Once it had done that, I asked it to use the weather data to help me create a 5 month carry-on wardrobe. The results:

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As with our 2022 trip, we’re staying mostly in places that have a self-contained laundry, and those that don’t will have either laundry service or be in proximity to a laundromat.

All of our international flights are Business Class where we don’t have to think about our luggage allowance, but our short hops inside New Zealand, Australia, and Malaysia are on commuter planes where even our carry-on suitcases will need to be checked, and (in the case of Malaysia Air) we’ll have to be very careful that our personal items don’t exceed a measly 4.5 kg/10lbs each.

I started by laying out exactly what was suggested by Copilot, and fitting it into my carry-on bag, along with “assumed” items like underthings. Interestingly, Copilot’s recommendations are compiled from a number of sources (always cited), including TravelFashionGirl and Rick Steves’ travel site, so all the AI tool is doing for me is saving me hours of scouring those sites myself, which is something I always did before every trip.

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But, my inherent “boredom issue” combined with a little bit of extra suitcase room means that I’m actually packing more than just the suggested lists. One of our two carry-ons will be marginally over the carryon-on limit (still far below the checked bag limit) , but still the correct dimensions, so not a problem in Business Class even if I don’t choose to check it.

The plan is to use one suitcase for our hot weather destinations, and the other for the cooler places. Although some items obviously cross over, it’s nice not to have to paw through long pants and cardigans to get to the shorts and tee shirts. I suppose packing cubes could also solve that issue, but having tried them a couple of times in the past, I quickly realized that each packing cube’s fabric and zipper takes up as much room as two long-sleeved shirts or sleeveless dresses; I’ll always opt for the extra clothes!

Besides, if our suitcase is already at the weight limit, what’s the point in compressing items smaller?

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Ted’s suitcase will contain much closer to the suggested quantities.

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Filling in the gaps in our suitcases will be TruEarth laundry detergent sheets, clothespins, a compact sewing kit, mesh laundry bags, foldable fabric carry bags, and a few colour-coordinated costume jewellery items.

We’ll also each have a raincoat, lightweight jacket, and of course shoes: extra running shoes for Ted, runners and sandals for me. Those things will go into our small duffel bag along with our toiletry bag.

My compact crossbody purse will have our Passports, photo I.D., travel documents, emergency numbers for health insurance, my prescription meds, and the 5×7 notebook that has all our travel plans, reservation numbers, and sightseeing ideas in it. Each of our phones and iPads will also have photographs of all of our documents – and each other’s, so that if one gets lost or stolen, we’re not without what we need.

Our flight to Auckland leaves the day after tomorrow, on the first leg of our 13-leg Round-The-World airline ticket.

An excellent adventure awaits!