Following up on one of my previous posts, 4 Principles to Packing Smart, I'm including a summary of my pack and other tidbits. Altogether, everything so far weighs less than 20 pounds.  There were a couple moments when I considered adding a sleeping bag to the mix so I don't have to rent / buy one down in LatAm for the various treks.  But, desire to carry a lighter load won over.  Anyway, heads up that this post is a little disjointed so bear with me here...

First, the backpack.  It's a Deuter pack with a 70 liter capacity.  It features adjustable aluminium stays, a breathable hollow chamber foam in the back, contoured shoulder and sternum straps, a pivoting VariFlex hip belt that helps to make sure the weight of the pack is distributed optimally across the hips, stabilizer straps to adjust ventilation and control, and compression straps that reduce the size of the pack if the load gets reduced.