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Five Small Things is a new series that pauses to highlight the little objects and concepts that have had an outsized impact on our lives lately, whether on or off the bike. Explore the debut collection of handpicked finds below…
Welcome to the first installment of Five Small Things, a new occasional series that invites our editorial team and folks from across the broader community to share bits of kit and more abstract notions that add to our lives, intrigue us at the moment, or otherwise bring us joy. Each post will feature an array of picks, including bikepacking gear, activities, concepts, albums, hobbies, gadgets, books, and more. Anything goes.
Five Small Things aims to bridge the gap (and the long wait) between our annual Editor’s Dozen roundups, bringing attention to little stuff that might not otherwise find a home on the site. It also seeks to highlight the value in the everyday, since it can’t always be new bike day, and we can’t always afford the latest and greatest. Find our inaugural five below.
Sunrises and Sunsets
Cass Gilbert link
In 2026, I’m aspiring to see as many sunrises and sunsets as I can. Yes, I’m fortunate enough to live in Oaxaca right now, where beautiful sunrises and sunsets abound. But still, this notion is applicable anywhere, even if it’s harder to realise in some parts of the world than others, or at least at certain times of the year. I say this because the idea is inspired by my friend Andy Dodd, who set himself the task of waking up for sunrise every day of the year in the often cold and grim UK. So if he can do it, I can too!
I consider these transitions perfect bookends to the day, and a wonderful way to recalibrate that circadian rhythm, especially if life revolves around screen time. Plus, if I’m planning to get up early for a sunrise light show, I’m more likely to get to bed at a reasonable time. Sometimes I’ll arrange to tie it in with a group social ride, or as a way to introduce visiting bikepackers to Oaxaca. Often, I’ll have canine company—although we had to rehome sweet Huesos, the neighbour’s dog Lula roams free and loves to trot along too. My buddy Adam invariably packs little Laurita the Chihuahua in his BXB handlebar bag and if Carlos makes it, there’ll be a couple more dogs in our misfit pack as well. Similarly, I find it deeply satisfying to finish the day with a sunset sighting. Otherwise, nighttime has a habit of sneaking up on me and suddenly, I don’t know where all those hours went.
Sunrise and sunsets, whether spotted from a kitchen window or celebrated from the cocoon of a tent, help put it all in perspective, a reminder of the passing of time and the beauty of this world, despite its many complications.
Enchanted Sacks Ditty Bag
Lucas Winzenburg link
I wrote a little about my love of small bags for organization in my 2024 Editor’s Dozen, and the joy they bring me hasn’t diminished since. Whether I’m loading up my backpack to go work at a coffee shop or packing my bike for some time away on two wheels, I appreciate everything being in its right place. Where my desk and home workshop tend to be quite chaotic, using ditty bags to organize my stuff when I’m out and about helps bring a sense of calm and order and keeps me from misplacing things, as I tend to do. Camera batteries, passport, multi-tool? Check, check, and check.
Several months back, my friend Kevin Chow in Berlin surprised me with a little ditty bag he’d made from fabric scraps cut while building prototypes for his recently launched custom bikepacking bag brand, Enchanted Sacks. At about nine inches wide by five inches tall, it’s the ideal size for my usual needs, and I’ve used it daily since it arrived, whether hauling my chargers around town or using it as a makeshift dopp kit on a weekend camping trip.
Wristwatches
Joe Cruz link
Precise time—keeping it, minding it, worrying over losing it—can break the meaning of travel for me. Mostly I want no part of the ticks that drag me into the abstract thermodynamic fiction of the passage of time. Nor am I racing to break a time or establish a fastest known one. When human beings began to regulate themselves according to the needs of railroad schedules and punch clocks, they left their bodies and space. They stopped inhabiting a where and instead thought first of the next or the must. I want instead on the bicycle the elasticity of consciousness, a compression or an obscure horizon, stasis at once and never.
So, why a watch? Precise time, for all the ways it might bend us, can also enable us to tunnel through distance to people and places that we care about far away. It’s looking at my wrist and knowing that someone I love is just waking up or taking an afternoon walk just then. It’s a keeper of a birthday or a promised check-in. It’s a signpost of which day this is that connects me to a vision I had months ago when I was making a plan. The watch is a spaces crossing machine that folds another place with all its voices into one with the flood of images both here and there. It does this job singularly, not like a phone or a wrist-top computer, and it quietly gives me back my attention.
Why this watch, this one that has been with me on every trip of the last ten years? The Casio F-91W, attainable for under $20, is an icon of design, the most ubiquitous watch in human history, credible when worn with a suit because of its place in watch lore, but with a resin strap and body ready for adventure. Worn by Barack Obama. Also worn by Osama Bin Laden. It’s a reminder of politics but doesn’t itself take a stand, it leaves that to the wearer. It came out the year of my first bikepacking trip—I had one back then—so it’s nostalgia, a different kind of time machine. It leaves a very precisely shaped watch tan that at night back home reminds me to dream of riding again.
Sketching
Josh Meissner link
Logan’s recent piece about what he’d do differently if we weren’t in the bike industry got me thinking. If I didn’t write in this space, which practically requires photos, I’d probably take fewer. The camera can get in the way, and not everything needs to be represented.
Give me a pen and I’ll scribble away, but I’ve shied away from sketching due to the pressure of perfectionism. On tour in the French Alps and the Vosges last year, something lifted. I scribbled what I saw in front of me: a lone peak, a Mont Blanc vista, a stunning cloud inversion. I scribbled with what I had: a Muji ballpoint, a lined Moleskin notebook, a child-like hand. Wondrously absorbing, time-dilating, perception turning into clumsy lines. A visual bookmark of a fleeting moment, made meaningful by the attention and effort granted. I happily suck at sketching, and it’s one of my favorite little new things.
BIKEPACKING.com Bandana
Miles Arbour link
It’s funny how our most-used items are the ones we’re most likely to forget about. After some thinking, this rings true in many aspects of life, not just bikepacking. Like a favorite pair of shoes, that old leather wallet, or a well-loved hat, my first submission to the new Five Small Things series is none other than my BIKEPACKING.com cotton bandana.
One thing that drives me up the wall while bikepacking is the rattles, squeaks, and clunks that always seem to materialize when you strap a bunch of bags and gear to a bike. A stove is often the number one culprit of unnecessary noise. I find that most all-in-one canister stoves never seem to pack tight enough, with the fuel canister and burner rattling around incessantly inside.
Over the years, I’ve found that a lightweight cotton bandana is one of the most effective remedies. I place the burner in the middle of the bandana before stuffing it inside the pot, wrapping and stuffing the extra fabric around anything else that might make noise while riding. Plus, the bandana doubles as a dishcloth or rag at camp, so it’s easy to justify all that extra weight.
That’s it for our first Five Small Things! What do you think? Are you interested in seeing more installments? Have a favorite small thing you want to share? Let us know in the Conversation below.
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