fluff_astrid
Contributor
I do a mix of dive travel by air but also quite a bit of dive group meets with my local dive shop. I have been trying to find a mythical dive bag that meets my needs, but struggling. What I need:
To date I've been using a standard TravelPro carryon soft-sided luggage, it's fine but too small and doesn't fit my fins. But at the very least it's survived 4 years of beatings and the zippers, surprisingly, haven't failed yet.
I tried out a Subea 90L rolling dry bag, but it's clearly built for air travel, it was 80CM long, very wide and with an extremely rigid backing. It was far too big to take on public transit, or in dive van transport when there's multiple people going from the shop to a dive site. Need something lower profile and more flexible.
Note, I'm located in Australia, where it's a bit tough to access Osprey or Eagle Creek brands -- I do have a trip to the US coming up in Jan though and have Amazon Prime.
- A bag that can be rolled *and* carried. I often take public transport to shore dive locations due to an absence of parking nearby, and this includes a ~20 min level walk between the bus stop and the shore entry location. Some days I don't mind carrying, but as I've gotten older I'd like to give my back a break and have something that rolls.
- Lightweight and not too big (under 70cm/28in length ideal) -- I am 5'3", so those super tall backpacks don't work for me.
- A bag that is suitable to take on small public transport (our local bus is quite small and often bags may need to sit in front of me or in my lap)
- Stores small as I live in a 1 bedroom apartment -- so collapsible or not too big in the first place.
- It needs to be shaped such that I can stick my fins in it. The fins can stick out, that's fine.
- Needs to have opaque zip compartments so that everyone can't see what I'm carrying. The mesh bags always snag on something.
- Ideally it would be under $300 AUD; I can't justify some of the crazy $800 AUD pricing I'm seeing on e.g. a basic mesh TUSA roller
To date I've been using a standard TravelPro carryon soft-sided luggage, it's fine but too small and doesn't fit my fins. But at the very least it's survived 4 years of beatings and the zippers, surprisingly, haven't failed yet.
I tried out a Subea 90L rolling dry bag, but it's clearly built for air travel, it was 80CM long, very wide and with an extremely rigid backing. It was far too big to take on public transit, or in dive van transport when there's multiple people going from the shop to a dive site. Need something lower profile and more flexible.
Note, I'm located in Australia, where it's a bit tough to access Osprey or Eagle Creek brands -- I do have a trip to the US coming up in Jan though and have Amazon Prime.