Upon my return from Costa Rica last week, I discovered that my web hosting service was under a DDOS attack, so all web services like email and this site’s management were affected by the situation. Still can’t upload images to my server. All the more reason for me to extend my vacation mindset – for now I’m still on ‘Tico time.’

I really shouldn’t neglect my site. After all, the discipline to post regularly is a key factor in what makes a website successful. SEO and Google-payola help, but if you don’t post, you lose your audience, so it doesn’t matter how many people click-through.

So I will make the first step and outline the first project of this site and first piece that inherently exemplifies the core purpose of this site. I will be intimately dissecting the single carry-on backpack I carried with me through Costa Rica with a full complement of backcountry camping gear, and a digital SLR with three lenses – one of them being a 300mm f2.8. I am tentatively calling it a lesson in “Pack-natomy.” Be forewarned, this will be far too complex and thorough an article, but it should give a well-illustrated starting point for conceiving your own long-term “one-bagger.”

As with every trip, there are things that you regret having lugged along and others that you were struggling to do without. For me, the stove and cookware proved to be completely useless since I had to change my trekking plans due to the previously-scheduled Holy Week, where most of the country shut down.

On the flipside, there was a real rock-star on this latest campaign. Today’s cham-peen is the previously mentioned North Face Flyweight Rucksack. This pack held everything I could throw at it – typically my full camera kit and a liter of water in a Kleen Kanteen. No rips, tears or tatters that I was fully expecting from:

• Flimsy, yet very packable nylon
• Road/trail wear in rough country
• Mass-produced Asian sweatshop-fare

The trip also proved to be useful in fostering some new ideas and giving me time to develop them in my head. One of them (for now, we will call Project X,) will be the production of an item that is inherently aimed at those who practice what I preach as far as balancing portability, survival and serious photography goes. So rest assured there is plenty more to come…