Originally posted by PDL I went on a two month vacation through Central Europe (Germany, Slovenia, Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland) to France and Great Britain (England and Scotland). I took:
K-3II
16-50mm DA*
50-135mm DA*
Bower 8mm
Laptop (circa 2008 running Windows 10 Pro and Lightroom 6) and bought a 512MB SSD for image storage.
Four batteries plus charger.
Four 32GB SD cards where a days images were copied to the SSD, except for one day and I managed to recover those images a month and a half later. I really don't like it when my "process" gets all messed up.
My bag had its usual complement of "stuff", X-Rite color target, 18% grey card, flashlight, microfiber cloth (carry a big one since finding towels to wipe off wet cameras/lenses can be a pain), faux lens blower (one of those little things with a brush attached), Lens Pen and notebook with a pencil. I also took a "Ultra Pod" table top tripod that never left the suitcase.
I returned with a little over 6K images.
Anything I would do different? Yes, carry two external drives and seriously think about taking only two lenses. We traveled by walking and trains for the most part (drove in France and GB) so carrying a lot of equipment on public transportation can get to be an exercise in frustration. We carried four bags at the end and that was as much as we could get away with. Leave the tripod home and you really don't need a flash.
I think a lot depends on your planned activities - how much gear will you be hauling around?
in our long vacations, I carry a lot of equipment, knowing that most of the time the vast amount of it will be in the vehicle we are touring in while we are either in the vehicle or very near it.
if we are walking, then the excess gear stays in a location as secure as possible.
and I make sure before leaving home that the insurance policies will cover lost, theft and damage
so the weight factor is important only for carrying the back pack and its load along with any other carry on items to the ticket counter and to the gate at the air ports
I'm lazy and out of shape and old enough to have given up impressing others unnecessarily
so the cost of the rental cart, if I can't find one abandoned, isn't too much
YMMV