Editor’s Dozen: Evan’s Favorite Gear and More of 2024

Stuff. This world is full of it. Americans live to consume it, and now, in the holiday season, we express our love with how much we buy for someone else. We strive for more and more stuff and drown in advertisements by corporations trying to convince us to buy even more. Because shiny new stuff gives us that short-term kick of excitement, and here in the States, our culture glorifies excitement and mocks contentment. It tells me not to chase contentment but rather to drive to Top Golf and watch ESPN and gamble my life away and buy a new Mercedes on the way home. When have you ever seen an ad glorifying contentment? And how many ads do we see per day lately?

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Bikepacking, as an act to me, has and always will be the ultimate rebellion from modern consumerist culture and mass tourism and suburban brain rot. My whole bikepacking kit cost about one month of rent here in San Diego. And my five months of riding the backroads and high mountains of Morocco, living with locals and learning the language and customs, traveling with intention, finding contentment and moments to be present in, some of the most blissful of my life, cost me something like $3,000 in food and travel. My 2024 income is below what the US government defines as poverty, and yet I truly lived. 

I bought nothing new for that trip. Or for East Africa. Or to ride across the desert. Once you can build a bikepacking kit that works, it becomes all you need. And yes, there is a lot of stuff in it, but I try to see these as things I use to serve my ultimate goal of bikepacking: real travel, democratic access to nature, immersion into the world, and therapy with every slow rotation of my legs. Bikepacking has helped me build community and understand the world around me. My early 20s existential angst, when figuring out who I was and what we all were, hurt my head and spun me around, and that’s now fading as I step into 27. And maybe that’s just growing up. But I think riding through my thoughts and seeing my home from a distance, through a foreign lens and then through one close up, and riding by myself and with curious strangers, has helped quiet those perennial storms. 

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I sold my truck yesterday, partly because I have become so anti-car in my thinking and because I want to expose myself more to the world. Now, I’m forced to take the long way and talk to the neighbors and camp in the rain and huddle in the cold. And I want to live like this, at the mercy of the world, with my head on a swivel and a notebook in my pocket. I want to be alive. I want to fill my days with things both little and big, ugly and beautiful. I ride to feel the cracks in the road and see the wildflowers that bloom through them. This is why I bikepack. Because you are open, and you are naked, and you are free. 

If you’re new to bikepacking, I urge you not to stress too much about the stuff. I worry we spend too much time talking about what stuff is best rather than the act itself. Ultimately, more stuff is hindering, but bikepacking is freeing. It took me a long time of tinkering and learning and making mistakes and breaking things to figure out what I like best. Embrace that journey, but understand that journey might also begin with a backyard overnighter with a shitty secondhand tent and a foam pad and a frozen burrito on the fire. Maybe you have tarps and bungee cords lying around. Make bags from that. Borrow a machine and learn to sew. Ask a friend to borrow a saddle bag and duct tape it when it falls apart. Look up at the trees and lie down in the dirt. Experiment. Exist. Move forward. I have talked to several people who want to try bikepacking but are too caught up trying to figure out what gear they need to go on their first overnighter. To those folks, if you are reading this, I urge you to just go. There is no perfect setup. No perfect tent and no perfect bike. But there is a world out there aching to be seen. So go see it. 

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I’ve never written an Editor’s Dozen. I try not to write product-focused pieces. I want to focus on the act rather than the stuff. But it’s naive and idealistic to say that the stuff does not matter. I’ve spent two years out of the last five traveling on my bicycle, and I couldn’t have done it without my stuff. My beloved Alibaba tent or my handy little stove. The bags made it easier, and the camera made it more interesting. But I won’t look back to the Caldera 500 and think about my bag setup and how I wish I had more weight on the rear or a lighter sleeping pad. I’ll think about those mornings at the hot springs, talking with the PCT thru-hikers, drinking coffee, and soaking my aching feet under the poignant rim of the pinnacle range in the morning light. I’ll think of camping on the top of White mountain with the ancient bristlecones. I’ll think of the two-day hoof up Mt. Patterson and the flying descent through the burning yellow aspens while racing the red-tailed hawks. I’ll think back to how that ride was so intense. And how grateful I was to do it. So, here it is. Just some stuff. Buy it if you want. Or don’t, and go ride a bit more. 

Merit Popcorn bags

Made in The Netherlands / $75 at Merit Gear

I’ve long had two of these on my handlebars to carry my camera and gear. They’re rock solid, super easy to open and close while riding, hold a modern mirrorless camera with a prime lens easily, and are really water resistant. When it rains, I put my camera in a ziploc bag that I keep under the camera. But with these, I can access the camera on the fly within a second and keep it off my body, which I find super important. And I really like the people behind the company. 

iPad Pro

$999+ at Apple

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I’ve moved all my workflow over to an iPad years ago and carried it on the bike for all my longest trips. Because it’s solid state, rattling it doesn’t matter. And it’s so small and light that I don’t really notice it on my bike. I edit and write everything you’ve ever seen on this thing, and can download offline movies on Netflix and watch them in the tent some nights (which is really nice). My iPad Pro is now four years old and has traveled something like 10,000 miles on my bicycle. 

Esbit Alcohol Stove

Made in Germany / $70 at REI

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Pry this one from my cold, dead hands. I love this stove so much. It’s refreshingly simple and very easy to use. I carry it with a small butane burner inside as well as the alcohol stove itself, so that I have multiple options while traveling. I also use it to cook on the fire often and by just shoveling coals under the stand. And it has that nice pouring spout for making coffee, which you have to love.

Nikon Z6 II

Made in Thailand / $1,495 at B&H

I’ve rattled a few cameras apart by now, and I’m hoping that by moving from Fuji to Sony and now to Nikon that this one will last longer. I’ve ridden with it now for over a year, having it bouncing around in my popcorn bags, and it’s still going strong. I love the image quality, and it’s an incredibly intuitive camera to use.

SPAM

$2 at Your Local Grocery Store

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Recently, on a long desert ride, we all decided we wanted to try SPAM. I’d never tried it before, and I must admit, fried up on the pan in its own fat, and then diced, mixed into macaroni and cheese with a can of green beans, with some black pepper and tabasco on top, this has to be the best meal I’ve ever had while bikepacking. And I love the nostalgic packaging. And it’s everywhere. 10/10.

Topeak Cargo Net on my Jumbo Jammer

$6 at REI

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I love my Jumbo Jammer. After my piece on Roadrunner a few years back, they hooked me up with one, and it’s been so nice to have a durable, secure, and expandable place to put all my clothes and sleeping gear. When I’m in the desert, though, I like to throw a Topeak cargo net over it and use it to store all my day clothes (sun shirt, thermal, helmet, and hat) and my dirty clothes so they can air out. 

Kindle

$135 at Amazon

This was a gift to my sister a few years back, and she didn’t want it, so she passed it along to me. It took me a while to start enjoying it, but now I’ll never go back. I love the fact that I can carry hundreds of good books while riding. It’s also backlit, so I don’t need to use my headlamp at night, and it’s tiny, light, and easy to pack. It’s the perfect long tour companion. My favorite books this past year have been Desert Solitaire, East of Eden, and Things Fall Apart. 

Prestacycle Ratchet Tool

$35 at Prestacycle

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I was given this little thing at Sea Otter two years ago, and at the time, I thought it was kinda silly. I’ve always been fine with a normal multi-tool and didn’t see how this would be any nicer. But now I never go anywhere on my bike without it. With an insert on the bottom, it works as a three-way tool, and the extender and ratchet make getting into weird places so much easier. It also came with a full-size chain breaker and plug kit, so all my tools are now in this one little thing, and it’s super convenient and easy to pack. That ratchet sound is so satisfying, too.

Route-free Riding

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When I began bikepacking, I always followed routes found here on BIKEPACKING.com. I still think it’s an amazing resource, but now that I’m traveling a bit more and more confident in riding, lately I’ve been just looking at the maps and going to new places. I haven’t actually followed an entire route for two years now. Instead, I load up enough water and food to have a safe margin and just figure it out as the road unfolds. It makes for annoying turnarounds and sometimes we miss the best stuff, but I love the excitement of seeing if a road goes through and finding out what’s on the other side. 

Hudski Doggler

Made in Taiwan / $1,350+ at Hudski

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Hudski helped me out a ton this year by licensing some of my photos and putting me on a bike for my travels. I first rode the Doggler a few years back and fell in love instantly with its upright geometry and aggressive tires. This year, it carried all my stuff easily, never skipped a single beat, and always put a smile on my face when going downhill. Plus, I think it looks great. This yellow bike with all the scratches has become a good friend of mine by now, and I’ll never forget holding it in the air next to the iconic sign on top of Kilimanjaro. 

Cheap international SIMS

While traveling, a cheap international SIM card is such a game-changer. In Armenia, we got unlimited data for $5 a month, and the entire country was covered in service. Most of the developing world is the same way nowadays. Cell phones are such a mixed bag of good things and bad, but they are undeniably powerful tools to help navigate and connect. My new phone is eSIM only, but that’s actually not been an issue, conveniently enough. 

Instax Minilink 2

Made in China / $99 at Amazon

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I adore this little box of fun. I used it to give out even more photos when doing my second ride through the High Atlas, delivering portraits earlier this year. And in Kenya and Tanzania, it was so much fun giving out family portraits and little photos. Sometimes, I would even give away photos as thank-you gifts for letting me stay with people. My camera will send the photos to my phone, and then from my phone, I send them to this thing, which makes it super fast and convenient. Sadly, it broke after six months of bikepacking and started printing patchy blobs everywhere, making the photos unusable. I’m still undecided if I’ll try another one. 

Bikingis.fun

Free on Instagram

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Coming back to San Diego for the summer, I found this Instagram page run by a local cyclist. Every week, he lists all the group rides that are going on in the area, and on a similar account, he runs all the underground races and alley cats and rollouts. Whenever I come back from a long trip, I hit a rebound of sadness and post travel blues. But with Bikingis.fun, I went to every single group ride I could make for the first two weeks, and it really helped me re-enter life here and not feel so sad and lonely. The group ride scene introduced me to some great people, too. Thank you so much, Chris, for putting this thing together! 

Favorite Photo of 2024

I shot something like 15,000 photos this year, and it’s funny how easy it is to pick a favorite. I wrote an entire story about this photo from Morocco, and it’s what started my portrait project. And somehow, taking this photo changed the way I look at photography as a whole. In that moment it manifested into taking, printing, and delivering these portraits. Now, I’m unsure how that change will manifest in the future. Photography, for me, has evolved from a curiosity to an obsession and now to something else. But I’m just not sure what that something else really is yet. 

If you’re interested in purchasing any of these products, please support your local bike shop and buy from them when possible. If you can’t, or they’re only obtainable online, we’ve provided links to manufacturers and stores where they are currently available; some of these retailers offer a modest referral fee, which helps support this platform. This has no bearing on the review or selection.

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