Wednesday, August 20, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #6 Days 21-23 - Weekend get away

Another weekend get away. Same bag, same results. Excellent for the task at hand. Bag starting to gain some character. Just barely.


After 3 weeks of travel days I have been impressed how versatile the Sportsman Bag packs.

Thursday, August 14, 2014

Filson on Screen

From time to time I see a Filson product in a movie or TV show. I'm always happy when I spot one of these.

Spotted this one on The Sopranos -- season two, episode 10 - Bust Out. Looks to be a large duffle bag behind Richie Aprile in Tony's neighbor's sporting goods store. Tony's crew was putting in orders of Igloo coolers to take to resell. They should have been dealing in Filson bags instead.




Friday, August 1, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #5 Days 18-20 - Again, with the camping

Another weekend, another camping trip. Another chance to use the Sportsman Bag. An again, it did the job. Still looks new though. Not a surprise since I haven't run the bag through the ringer yet.

Organizer pockets easily keep things in reach in the tent.

Some of the stuff I keep in the front pocket when camping.

Two headlamps, sun glass case, clip knife, multi-tool.

Thursday, July 24, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #4 Days 16-17 - More Camping!

My previously post-mentioned trip to fly with the Sportsmans did not happen. As I began to pre-pack for the trip I realized I needed a backpack that would carry better for my travels. I didn't mean to neglect the Sportsman for its first chance to take to the air, but just didn't work for this trip.

But a week later we had more camping. Just a single-nighter. Again, no complaints. In fact, all awesome. I need to did a little deeper in how the pockets have been great for camping. Overall this bag, for me, really is perfect for camping. Everything I need fits perfectly in the available pockets and compartments.

The perfect tent bag.

Wednesday, July 9, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #3 Days 13-15 - Camping!

The inaugural trip for the bag into the woods. As expected, this bag naturally looks great in the wilderness. After all, its kin was spawned from the wilderness and the Alaska Gold Rush.

The Sportsman's Bag easily packs a few pairs of needed clothing items for a weekend camping trip. I again use the internal divider to separate pants, shorts, tops from socks and underwear. The two accessory pockets are perfect for organizing your other small items: flashlight, headlamp, clip knife, multi-tool, phone charger, earphones, etc. The outer tuck pockets works great for stashing worn socks and boxers. To me, this is a great built-in dirty laundry pocket for the small clothing items.

Looking at home on Park Service picnic table.


Filson sitting like an obedient friend at foot of sleeping bag.

When I decided to purchase the Sportsman's Bag I envisioned lots of camping use. With the first trip complete, I really like how it organizes everything perfectly. Since most of my camping is 3 days or less the bag can handle anything. Really a fantastic system for how I camp. I find it very helpful to be able to grab an item (knife or flashlight) easily from the side pockets.

Next trip up for the bag will be cross country flight. Looking forward to see how it handles the airport and plane travel.

Saturday, June 14, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #2 Days 3-12

Ah, the first week-long trip with the new Sportsman's Bag. This trip wasn't the best way to break the bag in since it was an Alaska cruise. Hence the bag didn't get much daily use -- it lived in the closet for the most part. Surely not as rustic as being thrown into a float-plan or F150, but it got used none-the-less.

For the trip the Sportsman's Bag was my primary luggage. My other piece being a Timbuk2 Blackbird backpack for my two tablets, camera gear, whiskey and wine, and second pair of shoes. All my clothes fit in the Filson bag.

Vancouver BC view night before sailing.
Arrival to the cabin.

Everything out of the bag.
Overall I stuffed a bunch of stuff in there: 1 pair jeans, 1 pair pants, 4 shorts, 2 t-shirts, shirt and tie, thermal top and bottoms, 3 boxers, 5 socks, 5 polo shirts,1  belt, 2 pill bottles, 1 flashlight, 1 travel first aid kit, 1 Nikon charger, 1 rain jacket, 1 wool hat, and 1 dopp kit. When packing a bag like this I didn't bother with packing cubes -- they just take up extra room. Instead I roll everything. I also used the Sportsman's inside divider to create two sections for organization.

Ready to leave the ship. Filson stuffed with a few souvenirs.

Bag worked great for the trip. Used the external stash pockets to stuff dirty socks in there. End of the cruise I didn't bother rolling and just crammed. That with extra tourist t-shirt from Skagway and the bag was approaching overstuffed. But I am sure I could have fit a little more in there if needed.





Friday, May 30, 2014

The Sportsman's Bag Journal- Trip #1 Days 1-2

I just bought a Sportsman's Bag the other week. 4 bills of Made in Seattle USA goodness. MSRP is $325 so if you use it everyday for a year it is less than $1 a day. You have no reason not to get one. Which I just did.

I already have a nice closet full of 6 other Filson bags. But immediately I can see this bag is a champ. There's lots of reason I leave my other Filson bags home on trips and travel, ie bag organization, heavy, not-slim, etc.. But where there are shortcomings for some of these other bags, Rucksack and Medium Field bag come to mind, the Sportsman shines. I expect it to be my regular goto bag.

People love Filson bags. People love to use Filson bags. People love to read about Filson bags. So I want record every trip and nights use of this gem of a bag.

Without further ado...

Easy overnighter to my sister's weekend house. Packing was easy. Clearly the bag doesn't look broken in. Got a long way, many miles, many nights to reach that acclaim.



Looks too new. Wanted: use and abuse. Lots of use.

Back: Wool hat, USB multi-charger, 10" tablet, paper planner.

Main: clothes, moccasins, book and WSJ. Keeping original tags on.

Front: CRKT knife, LED flashlight, Flux card game, flask of rum.


Yes, the bag worked great for this trip. Why wouldn't it? A paper grocery sack would work for a single overnighter. Next week I'm taking this bag on a one week Alaska cruise. Then we start to get some travel mileage under its belt...

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