A few years ago I did a long trip with 2 bodies and 5 lenses. I found that I usually stuck to a combo of 3-4. I took two canon crop lenses, the 10-22, 17-55, 70-300, 50 1.4, and a superzoom (Tammy 18-250). Overall it was a good combo. When I was doing serious photography (like trekking the in the Himalayas) I threw the 17-55 on a 30D and the 10-22 on the 400D and had the 70-300 ready. When I wanted to walk around for good portraits, the 50 would go on a body, when I was lazy, the superoom did it all.

Now I am upgrading gear, and wondering... just how many lenses is the perfect amount? I tend to go this time with one FF and one crop, which will give each of my lenses double usage. However, I tend to think I need at least a Wide Zoom, a Standard Zoom, a Tele zoom, and a low light lens. I have considered the 16-35, 24-105, 70-300 or 70-200, and 50 1.4 or 135L. I would imagine for walk around I would use either the 24-105 on the FF or the 16-35 on the FF or my portrait lens.

While it is hard for me to imagine giving up any of these lengths (I mostly shoot landscapes, street scenes, and portraits when i travel) I would still love to get it down to 3 lenses. I have considered these two combos:

16-35
24-105
50 1.4

16-35
24-105
135L

I suppose I could also throw an 85 into the mix. The 24-105 on a crop counts for a short tele.

Your thoughts? How do you guys roll? How many lenses is the perfect amount?

(for arguments sake, I have been considering the same thing on a nikon system, the problem is, nikon's lenses, arguably better in some ways though bigger, have less overlap. For instance, if I go D700, D90, and 14-24, where do I go from there? maybe 70-300 and be done? Then the crop doesn't do much for me, maybe I go 16-85 on a D90, and then 14-24 and... 70-300? Hard to figure out. And what about a lowlight lens?)