Bikepacking - a viable alternative to racks & panniers

That looks great, and loads of room to expand onto the forks and bars.

Thanks! I do have a pair of Gorilla cages for the forks (you can probably see the mounts) and a top tube bag too just in case, but this is enough for overnighters.

Can I do better than a restrap seat pack? I want something where the holder stays on and I can quickly pull the dry bag out for riding to and from work
https://restrap.com/collections/saddle-bags/products/saddle-bag-holster-dry-bag-8-litres-black-black
8 litres should be enough for over night trips with all my other bags too

I had the Blackburn Outpost. Pretty good, I moved to Revelate (cos they’re the best right?)
https://www.wiggle.co.uk/blackburn-outpost-seat-pack-1/

The alternative would be a carradice or porcelain rocket

https://porcelainrocket.com/collections/store/products/mr-fusion

I've really liked my wildcat tiger which is just a harness for a dry bag. Once you get used to it and how to pack and attach properly etc it takes seconds and works really well on the bike...

what bars?

@skinny @owl can you say any of those options are clearly better? If not I reckon I’ll go restrap since they’re based in gods country and do a forum discount.
The Blackburn on wiggle is a good price at the moment for anyone wanting one right now

Carradice bikepacking bag (as opposed to normal saddle bag) seems interesting. Has a little rack that it slides onto so I imagine it would be rock solid.

https://www.carradice.co.uk/bags/saddle-packs-sqr-bags/bikepacking-seatpack

Not used personally, but seems cool.

Absolutely not, just throwing another option your way! If I was buying again (which looking at the wear on some of my Tiger's straps I will be before my next proper trip) I think I'd go for the restrap 14l.

Jones Loop in the 660mm flavour. I have them in 710mm on my Pugsley, fantastic bars.

Not bikepacking but I went for a hike today and dug out the MSR pocket rocket and ti pan set I’ve never used. I burned the crap out of my food in about 10 seconds. Is there any way to avoid that other than turning the heat right down? Wondered if I missed some sort of pan prep stage as I’ve never cooked with this set before and the metal pan I used before was nowhere near as bad (but was a lot thicker).

https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/334469/#comment15201615 cooking thread might have some answers. Ti doesn't have much thermal conductivity so that could be a culprit

turn the heat down
ti is lightweight in part because it's not thick
with practice and olive oil I have learned to fry a burford brown on the most ultralight of pans

Alright... thanks for that. Lower heat it is then. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't like I'd gone gourmet or anything; it was tinned ravioli but tasting like canned ravioli eaten out of a used ashtray wasn't ideal.

Next, any recommendations for water filtering? I've been looking at a Grayl Ultralight and pairing that with a normal bottle so I can fill from streams as I walk/ride.

don't worry about most streams, unless you see a load of livestock or if it's obviously bad
tablets are easiest, water tastes fine, I've used these for years, don't see any point in £££ filters

I've been really impressed by this filtration system. By impressed I mean you can get a litre relatively easily/quickly, tastes fine and I wasn't ill.

It's not wilderness around here really... LOTS of forest, lots of country but to give you an example, I hiked through forest today but I know that above the forest on the plateau there's livestock and there's fields with manure being sprayed all over them so I'm hesitant to drink from them without sterilisation or filtration. After a childhood of drinking water flavoured with steritabs hiking with my old man I'm not enthusiastic about starting the habit up again.

I'm on the look out for a compact saddle bag for bare essentials (co2 multi tool and tyre plug). Something like the skingrowsback one or even smaller.
https://skingrowsback.com/collections/plan-b-saddle-bag/products/plan-b-saddle-bag-rattlesnake

Needs to be attached to just the seat rails so I can use it with the dropper equipped bike too.
Any suggestions?

Ortlieb do a couple:

Saddle bag 2: https://www.ortlieb.com/uk/saddle-bag-two+F9411

Or Micro 2: https://www.ortlieb.com/uk/micro-two+F9662

Depending how much you need to carry. Micro 2 is 0.8l and only attaches to saddle rails so works well as a traditional saddle bag for ride essentials.

Cheers. Micro2 looks ok but ideally even smaller would work

Smaller won't gain you anything, you might want enough room to stuff a light jacket or food in there.

I’ve used a Scicon Elan. Just big enough for a road tube and not much else. Very secure right up in the rails.
https://eu.sciconbags.com/products/saddle-frame-bags/elan-210

The is primarily going to be used on the mountain bike for short local rides. I could probably walk home if I had no repair supplies

I'll look into the Scion, cheers