We were heavy packers for our world bicycle tour, managing to cram 8 panniers full of gear, plus an extra bag on the back of each bike for carrying things like our tent, sleeping mats and extra food.
This heavy load adds up to about 30kg of luggage each.
On more recent shorter trips around Europe, however, we’ve been actively working to lighten our bags. We’ve been inspired by tips on lightweight bike touring from Stijn, and by watching bike tourists like Keith and Steve go through the same process.
The result? On our last two 3-week trips, we travelled without front panniers. Now we’ve put together a packing list so you can see exactly what we took along, and what we left out.
Keep reading to see our full lightweight packing list for bike touring.