I spent years trying to find a bike bag that would be accepted at an airport but was also easy to transport on a bike. Every trip I took before 2019 either involved lengthy bus and train options to avoid the hassle of boxing the bike for a flight (and sometimes still required boxing the bike) or I spent the last few days of my trip trying to find a cardboard box that would actually fit my bike, arrange a ride to the airport with the packed box, then struggle to maneuver the unwieldy box from the car to the baggage counter. It was always a stressful process and required spending at least one full day somewhere near the airport at the end of a trip to handle the logistics.
This last winter I stumbled across the Dogsbody bag made by Ground Effect, a New Zealand bike gear company that has been around since 1994. This bag is designed for touring cyclists. It is a longer bag to accommodate the longer bikes often used in touring. It is soft sided so that it can be stashed in a pannier while riding. It is simple and doesn’t provide any protection on it’s own but it has plenty of space to stash your gear and that has been sufficient protection for my bike thus far.
My first time using the Dogsbody bag was when I became the first person to launch a bike onto the Colorado River at the Hoover Dam. My main objective on that trip was to test out a bunch of gear for my summer trip to Scandinavia and this bag met my expectations. I rode to the airport, packed the bag a few feet from the baggage counter, and didn’t have to spend any time searching for a bike box. It was the easiest airport bike experience I had ever had so it was a no brainer to take the bag to Europe. I kept the bag stuffed in the bottom of my pannier for the whole trip. Fortunately I never needed it on any of the buses I took but it was anxiety reducing just knowing that it was there in case I got stuck someplace that wouldn’t accept an unpacked bike.
I had an early morning flight out of Helsinki. The airport in Helsinki is a bit north of the city. If I had had to find a bike box in town and then get to the airport, the cab would have been a bit pricey. However, biking to the airport was incredibly easy and I was on off road bike trails for almost the entire ride. I walked my bike to the baggage counter, took the bike apart, stashed my gear in the bag strategically to prevent sensitive parts from breaking (eg socks wrapped around my light, foam sleeping pad lining one side and empty panniers lining the other).
There are a lot of airports that are bike friendly but most cyclists never get to experience this because they have to lug a box around. Flying with a bike is still somewhat stressful but not worrying about procuring a sufficiently sized box and getting that box and your bike to the airport makes a huge difference in making bike/air travel easier and more pleasant. I can’t recommend this bag strongly enough. It has fundamentally changed my attitude towards flying with my bike.
If you are interested in my experience cycling at various airports, check out my experiences.
