Expanse Convertible 29 Inch

I took this bag on a 2 week trip to Croatia to carry my personal items as well as some of my children's items. It was easy to roll but the best function was converting it to a backpack for cities with old cobblestone streets and sidewalks with lots of stairs. We knew we wouldn't always be able to roll it but wanted our hands free to help the kids navigate safely and to hold onto railings as needed. This worked out well. I appreciate the compression straps inside but wish that it had more pockets to help organize items inside or on the outside. My second comment is that the blue bag isn't available in California due to the plastics used to make the bag, so I had to go with yellow/gold and the bag stained immediately from the conditions in the airport/on the plane.

[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] I kept the smaller bag because of size restrictions on my upcoming trip to Costa Rica, hiking into retreat, carrying our own baggage. Truthfully the 21" is too small (for me), the 29" too big. I wish you made a size in between! I love your products (have several) but the 21" bag is too small.

[This review was collected as part of a promotion.] My wife and I each have a 2020 version of the expanse. We have taken it on three different multi-month trips to Europe involving planes, trains, ferries, buses, subways, taxis, etc… and lots of stairs. Honestly, they still look almost new. They handle cobblestones well, I think because the wheels are not the spinner type that stick way out. There is some moderate wear on the wheels, as would be expected. Though we don’t use the backpack feature often, it has been really nice to have at certain times…like when you are looking at several flights of stairs to get to your AirBnB in an old European building without an elevator. For someone with a touchy back, and I’m 64, it’s much better for me to be able to strap it on and carefully, slowly, go up the stairs vs lugging it up awkwardly. It takes about 20 seconds or less to unzip the back and click in the two harnesses. They are large enough to handle enough stuff for multi-month trips in winter without too much compromise. Though when fully loaded, it gets heavy. As others have noted in reviews on other sites, they aren’t super stable when left alone upright and will tip over easily. But we can live with that. The handles on top, side, and bottom make moving it around in tight spaces easier. It’s hard for me to find much fault with the Expanse. Because of the functionality of the bag, it allows my wife and I, in our 60’s, to be more versatile or DIY in our travel. We stay at AirBnB’s almost 100% of the time and self-plan our movement from place to place. So the ruggedness of the wheels and the backpack feature have been very useful for us.