“Flashpacking” (flash + backpacking) is an affluent backpacker. A “flashpacker” might travel light, but has access to money and can travel expensively, if necessary. The website backpacker.com was created on June 4, 2001. A page on April 9, 2002 describes “flashpacking.”
   
 
Wikipedia: Backpacking (travel) 
Flashpacking
Flashpacking is a neologism, a combination of flash, as in fancy, with backpacking, used to refer to an affluent backpacker. Flashpacking has an association of more disposable income while traveling and has been defined simply as backpacking with a bigger budget.
 
Network Solutions
Whois Server Version 2.0
Domain Name: FLASHPACKER.COM
Registrar: MESH DIGITAL LIMITED
Whois Server: whois.meshdigital.com
Referral URL: http://www.meshdigital.com
Name Server: NS.HEARTINTERNET.CO.UK
Name Server: NS2.HEARTINTERNET.CO.UK
Status: clientDeleteProhibited
Status: clientTransferProhibited
Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Updated Date: 10-may-2013
Creation Date: 04-jun-2001
Expiration Date: 04-jun-2018
 
Flashpacker.com (page from 9 April 2002)
What is a Flashpacker?
“Thirty-something backpacker who does the budget hotel thing but jets around on internal flights or helicopters because they can’t be bothered with 20 hour bus trips” 
Evening Standard  
 
31 October 2004, Times (London):
Time to go backpacking in style
As a Flashpacker, you get the best of both worlds: the joy of real travel, and a rescue from it
   
USA Today
‘Flashpacking?’ Don’t forget you still need room for extra socks
Posted 6/20/2006 8:45 AM ET
NEW YORK (AP) — There’s a new type of backpacker roaming the globe — the flashpacker.
 
And no, it has nothing to do with how fast you pack your bag. Nor is it a streaker or a weird dude in a raincoat.
 
“Flashpacking is just backpacking, with an awful lot of tech gear going along for the ride,” said Lee Gimpel, 29, a writer from Virginia who “flashpacked” around India for a few months and recorded his adventures at http://www.passingthroughindia.com.
     
Word Spy
Posted on February 27, 2009
flashpacker
n. A backpacker who travels in style. Also: flash-packer. [Blend of flash and backpacker.]
—flashpacking pp.
(...)
Earliest Citation:
You can hike the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, backpacking for four days with guides to carry the gear.
 
Or like us, you can take the “flashpacker” route — a train from Cuzco and a zig-zag bus ride to stay at the hotel at the ruins.
—Dennis Edensor, “It’s simply Inca-redible!,” People, October 27, 2002
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Backpackers & flashpackers in Eastern Europe : 500 hostels in 100 cities in 25 countries.
Author: Hardie Karges
Publisher: [s.l.] : Hypertravel Books, 2012.
Edition/Format: Book : English
 
OCLC WorldCat record
FLASHPACKERS: An Emerging Sub-Culture?
Author: Cody Morris Paris Affiliation: Middlesex University Dubai, United Arab Emirates University of Johannesburg, South Africa
Edition/Format: Article : English
Publication: Annals of Tourism Research, v39 n2 (April 2012): 1094-1115
Database: ScienceDirect
Other Databases: British Library Serials; Elsevier; WorldCat
Summary: The purpose of this study is to examine the emerging flashpacker sub-culture in relation to the backpacker culture. Cultural Consensus Analysis is employed to examine the potential cultural divergence between flashpackers and non-flashpackers. A mixed-mode dual-frame sampling procedure was employed for data collection, as surveys were administered through Facebook backpacker-groups and in hostels in Cairns, Australia. The results indicate that flashpacker and non-flashpacker groups have a shared cultural understanding of backpacking. In addition to the conceptual clarity of the emerging flashpacker, this study also provides some interesting insights into contemporary backpacker culture and the continuing convergence of physical travel with information and communication technologies
 
Twitter
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@famoushotels  
Flashpacking, a neologism, is an association of more disposable income while traveling: it is simply backpacking with a bigger budget. AA
8:43 PM - 27 Feb 13
 
Twitter
Jakarta Jalan Jalan ‏@3
Triple_J  
Flashpacking is a neologism used to refer to an affluent backpacker. #TipsFlashpacking
12:57 AM - 20 Aug 13