How To Plan Your First Overnight Bikepacking Trip

One of the biggest misconceptions about bikepacking is that you need to have the right bike, the right gear, and the perfect route to get started. You don’t!

The first step is just to try bikepacking. Do you even like it? You won’t know until you try, and there’s no point in buying expensive gear until you’ve confirmed that.

In this artilce, I’m going to teach you how to create a micro bikepacking adventure. This will be a single overnight trip to see what you think, and to gain some initial experience and confidence.

Use The Gear You Already Have

The very first bikepacking trip I ever did was with my husband and our young son. We had no bikepacking gear and really no clue what we were doing.

What we did have was a couple of mountain bikes, two bike trailers, and our regular camping gear. We put the kid in one bike trailer, and a tent, sleeping bags, and a cooler (yes a heavy ass cooler) in the other. And off we went!

our family on our first bikepacking trip

My husband, son, and I on our very first bikepacking overnight trip

Was this an ideal bikepacking setup? Absolutely not! But it’s what we had. And we made it work.

We learned a couple of important lessons (like don’t bring a cooler), but even more importantly, we learned that bikepacking was crazy fun and that we wanted to do it again.

In terms of gear, our next couple of trips were only marginally better. We ditched the trailers and borrowed a couple of bikepacking bags from a friend, but we still had heavy backpacking backpacks and gear better suited to car camping than bikepacking.

My point is: figure out what you already have that you can make work for your first trip (or two or three). Have a backpack? Great! Been using a rack and panniers for commuting? Those will work.

If you really don’t have any gear you can already use, then choose a few critical pieces of gear that I’ll outline in future chapters and purchase those as a small initial investment.

Or, see what you can borrow. Have friends that backpack? Backpacking gear and bikepacking gear are very similar.

Even better, if you know someone who bikepacks, ask what they might be willing to loan out. Bikepackers, in my experience, are evangelical and are super excited to help introduce a potential convert.

Gear You May Already Have That You Can Use For Bikepacking:

A backpack or hydration pack
Panniers, baskets, and racks
Sleeping bag or down blanket
Tent or hammock

Pick A Route Close To Home

To try out this bikepacking thing, pick a destination that’s close to home. Bonus points if it’s somewhere you’ve already been and a route you already know.

Is there a campground nearby? A trail you ride every weekend that has a nice spot to stop and set up camp? Maybe you have friends that live in the next town over and would let you pitch a tent in their backyard for the night.

for your first bikepacking trip pick something close to home

There will be plenty of opportunities for epic adventures later. For right now, just get a single night out on the bike under your belt.

If you still need help planning a route, there are plenty of tools to help you do that, including MapMyRide, GaiaGPS, and Komoot. And while I wouldn’t recommend biting off a big bikepacking route for your first overnight, once you are ready for something bigger, Bikepacking.com and BikepackingRoots.com are great resources.

Phone A Friend

There are lots of tools for keeping yourself safe and self-reliant while bikepacking. But it takes little bitty baby steps to get there.

For your first overnight, I’d recommend having a phone-a-friend option. This is somebody you can call to come pick you up if your bike breaks, you discover your load is way too heavy, or you end up getting scared when it’s time to go to bed.

Chances are that you won’t end up needing their help, but having them available adds an extra level of security and peace of mind.

Stick Close To Food And Water

Later on, you’re going to learn all about preparing food in the woods and filtering water from streams. But that’s for later.

On this first bikepacking overnighter, prioritize readily available food and water. Choose a campground with a water spigot. Plan a route that gets you to a cafe around dinner time. You’ll still need to carry some food and water, but the point is that you shouldn’t have to be fully self-reliant on this trip.

Basic Bike Check

There are all kinds of fancy bikepacking bikes you can get, but for your first overnighter, use what you already have. Of course, this assumes you already have a bike. If not, borrow or rent one.

Before heading out, make sure your bike is in good working order. Check your tire pressure, lube your chain, and ensure that your brakes are working. If you’re not confident that your bike is ready to go, take it to the bike shop for a once-over.

Go Do It!

You weren’t expecting me to tell you to go try bikepacking that fast were you? But I am!

Go plan something for this weekend/next weekend, heck, even one evening this week after work. Just try bikepacking and you can start calling yourself a bikepacker.

Then, once you have that out of the way, come back and grab my in-depth guide to bikepacking. It walks you through all the knitty-gritty you need to know for bigger bikepacking adventures including info on bikepacking bags and equipment, navigation and route finding, safety, and personal hygiene.