For a while that I’ve been doing reviews of how I pack my luggage when I travel, and recently I wrote an article about my trip to Australia where I used for the first time this amazing thing that are the eBags Slim Packing Cubes.
First impact
When I received the first three cubes, the first thing I thought was that I threw money away for no reason. They are way smaller than I thought they are, and I thought they would be pretty useless considering their size. When I got home I decided to try them, so i folded a few t-shirts to see how many I could fit inside each cube…, I was really surprised that they have way more space than they look like, I managed to pack 5 t-shirts inside a single cube! Really compact, and without reshaping it into a cylinder either, almost perfect parallelepiped.
Packing
What better way to test these cubes other than jumping from hostel to hostel for the period of two months? I think I already traveled a bit, and one of the things that annoyed me the most was really to keep my bag organized so that I wouldn’t have too much wasted space.
During those two months those cubes proved how a great investment they were, I never had to care much about packing or keeping my bag organized, because the cubes would do it for me, all my clothes were folded all the time and always organized. I needed underwear? I just had to take the cube where I had my underwear, and if that cube was under another one? No problem, I just had to move the upper one without messing with the tidiness of my bag.
Simply amazing, sometimes I even threw the cubes to my bed so that I could choose what to wear, and in seconds everything was inside again, compacted and organized!
Different ways to use them
Using these cubes to keep your clothes organized is probably the best way to use them, however I also used them to keep my camera cables, accessories and computer cable together inside the same cube, so to avoid losing any of them. In this case, being compact isn’t the advantage as you can’t compact something that is solid, but it is a great way to keep things organized. Way easier to find that USB cable that you need for the GoPro, and less chances to lose it as well. We just need to make sure we won’t put things in different places and everything will be ok.
I also used another cube for the toiletries, and again, being compact isn’t an advantage here either. Though, it is perfect to take all your shower products with you at once and always having them together. The cubes have a small handle to carry them individually in a more easy way.
Details about the cubes
- These in specific, are longer, which means they aren’t real square cubes but parallelepiped.
- They have two zips so that you can close it from both sides.
- One of the corners has a net, so that you can peak inside without opening the cube and know what’s inside.
- They are washable, but not impermeable (don’t forget about the net).
- They have different colors, perfect keep your bag organized (I have 3 blue and 3 black ones)
- They have a small handle from the side.
Opinion
Basically, the first impact was a bit scary, but it became love at second sight! These cubes are more useful to keep your things organized rather than compacted. No vacuum compaction, nor any other kind of compaction technology. The goal of these cubes is to make your life easier to pack and unpack your bag, faster way to pack everything inside with less chances of leaving things behind, having everything in the same place even if you chance the position of your cubes.
I tried several different ways how to place them inside my bag, some ways worked better than others, but that also depends on your bag’s format. I also noticed that having lose items inside the bag affects greatly the way you should place your cubes inside. But in overall I never had any issue with packing, I don’t think I could have a better opinion about this travel accessory.
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