In this ongoing series I will be reviewing items that either break or completely fail in their job on our travels.  If you are thinking of buying an item featured here for travel then read of our testament first and be warned!

First up, and most unexpectedly, comes the Naneu Pro Sierra shoulder bag.

I had always wanted a bag that carried both my camcorder and my laptop and after a lot of Internet research settled on this combination shoulder bag.  The Naneu looked to be perfect for the job with its top loading laptop slot and built in camera holder.  Unfortunately the problems came quite quickly.  Firstly the fold-out shoulder strap was too small to fit me (and would struggle to fit anyone) and was very uncomfortable to wear when the bag was full as it forced the bag to stick out at a strange angle and consequently it caught on things and dug into my side.

So I cut it off and used the slot for keeping the newspaper and my diary.  Not so bad.

The real problems came to light when I used the bag in the wild.

When full the bag was quite heavy and the standard shoulder strap, even though it felt padded, dug into my shoulder evilly.  This, I believe, was exacerbated by the shape of the bag, which being very square, meant that the strap pulled the edges into my side.  Then after only a week the stitching started to come away from the strap, which suggested to me that the bag wasn’t actually supposed to be used fully loaded.  By carrying it every day and keeping a laptop, camcorder, coat, sunglasses, diary and my leather passport/ticket holder case inside, I was stressing it beyond both its and my abilities to cope.  A quick look inside the strap showed a clear plastic padding, which I don’t think was molding to my shoulder, rather it was digging in.

Cesca finally snapped when I complained one too many times and insisted that I change it for something else. It was dumped and replaced with a Crumpler backpack.  Lets see what else goes in the coming weeks and months!

On the other hand, the Rohan stuff is kicking ass!

Regards,

Basho