Broken Back Packer.

"I still haven't found what I'm looking for..." U2

Screw you Bono, I just did. After years of watching with amazement at the hordes of back packers who descend on my environs with enormous back packs, I found it. The mother of all ridiculously large backpacks. It has always astounded me that someone would want to travel around the world carrying a huge, heavy, dirty backpack on their back. Surely the world of backpacking is the natural domain for the phrase "pack light". But everyday I see travellers with inappropriately oversized bags. But this was different. This was the Moby Dick, the Grand Canyon, the holy grail of Back Packs. When I asked its owner, a Swede, why his pack was so big, he replied that he had "bought a lot of shit in Thailand". I didn't ask what, partly to be discreet but also because it was obvious. Sven had smuggled back a fucking baby elephant and was planning on raising him in Stockholm after sleeping with some loose Australian chicks Down Under.

I hope this photo does it justice. I know it doesn't. It blocked out the sun, such was its size I tell you...