Introduction of my ‘daypack’
I had been going thru several catalogues for campers, hikers and such, looking
at the back-packs to replace my monstrosity. I started to find that many of
them had removable mini-packs, usually being called ‘daypacks’.
It did not seem to be anything really impressive to me, but then again, I
had not used one...
Within about a week of my actually thinking of progressing to something more
modern, I was cleaning up in our back yard(the local kids think that our acre
is a dump and private kegger hole) and found a back-pack laying under some
trash. I cleaned things up and hauled everything back to the house for various
disposal.
The pack was in awful condition. The main compartment zipper had been torn
out, the straps had all been cut off and it had obviously been sitting in
water for a little too long. Except for the *front pocket area*.
I cut the front pocket off the pack, tossing the rest in the garbage, and
washed it. It had a good water resistant fabric for the smaller compartment,
now the ‘main compartment’, and a mesh pocket on the front. A pencil
was still in the main area in the appropriate loop. Being made for a kid going
to school, there were places for pens or pencils, a hook for keys and other
such nooks and crannies. The mesh was slightly torn, but I fixed that up with
a bit of needle and thread.
I tried to figure out how I was going to attach this newly discovered addition
to my ‘survival pack’, but couldn’t bring myself to sew it
to the green canvas of the main bag. Then, I remembered the day packs and
had a brain storm.
Taking six d-rings and some grosgrain binding, I made straps and attach points
on *the back of the bag*. It now can be used as if it were a small back pack
or I can attach it to the frame of the main pack. I keep the messy stuff in
there like sunscreen lotion, my toiletries and such. They are usually the
things I need the most often from the pack, so why not?