Alternatively, put the stuff you can’t afford to lose (passports, cash, card, electronics) in a daypack and use it as a head-rest. Let’s face it. It’s unlikely anyone’s going to want your clothes.

2: Mosquito Net
Newsflash! It’s not just you who knows there’s mosquitoes where you’re going. The guesthouse owners do too. No net in the room? Ask at the desk. Trekking? Most trek organizers will rent or include equipment, including mosquito protection.

Essentially, don’t buy a net unless and until you KNOW you will need one, and what kind you’ll need. (No point carrying a double-bed net if you really need a single-hammock net. Or an all-in-one hammock-net combo…)

3: Rollbags
You need to compress stuff down to fit it in your pack? You’re carrying too much stuff. Oh, yeah, and the rollbag will suck (or rather, cease to suck) inside a month. Guaranteed.

4: Antibacterial Wipes/Cleaners/Whatever
The single easiest way to kill your immune system. Which works, of course, by meeting small doses of local bacteria and getting used to them. It’s too much hygiene, not too little, which makes travelers get sick the second they hit a wet lettuce leaf or a chunk of Thai street meat.

5: Antibiotic Creams
Another great way to screw up your immune system. To avoid infection, clean cuts thoroughly, disinfect with alcohol and/or iodine, cover during the day and allow to breathe at night. This should kill any bug going without – and here’s the clever part – compromising your immune system.

6: Water Filtration Systems
A great idea in principle. In practice? You end up buying water anyway, because you want the cold stuff, you didn’t get the system set up in time or, basically, you just ran out. In most major cities and resort areas around the world, tap water is chemically treated. In places where it’s not, you can generally fill up with boiled in restaurants and guesthouses. If, for whatever reason, you’re drinking unboiled water from a questionable source, iodine’s a last ditch solution.

7: Travel Towels
Sarongs are larger, dry quicker, fold up smaller and are infinitely easier to wash. Plus they double as topsheets, cover-ups, turf markers… Need the cold-climate comfort of a towel? Pack a fluffy one.

8: Travel Underwear
This stuff exists. Seriously, WTF?

9: Hiking Poles, or Anything Hiking-Branded
Where to begin?! Get a stick if you need one. It’s free, organic, biodegradable, and you don’t have to take it with you. This advice, incidentally, applies to almost anything with “hiking” in the title, with the debatable exception of hiking boots — bring only if you’re a serious hiker, already own a pair and intend to do weeks of serious trekking.

Legal Blah: This does not, blah, constitute, blah, advice and is no, blah, substitute for your own, blah, common sense.

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