28-300 and/or 24-120

I have the 24-120 F4 currently and I'm pleased with it. I may buy the 28-300 sometime over the next 12 months for a travel lens. My question is, would I find myself taking the 28-300 off the camera very often and replacing it with the 24-120 because the image quality is that much better? I used the have the 18-200 on my DX body for a travel/ walkabout and I was happy with that, although the 70-200 came out when I wanted real quality.

I just wonder if I would end up selling the 24-120 and maybe getting the 24-70 for when I wanted the best images even though the difference is not massive.

When traveling and shooting with good light, I think that 28-300mm f3.5-5.6 VRII lens will be a good companion. Weight wise, it is in between the Nikon 24-120mm f4 (670grams) vs Nikon 28-300mm (800g) and Nikon 24-70mm f2.8 (900g).

I personally prefer the 24-120mm f4 for a walk-around lens but when traveling, there would be times when you want that extra reach, just in case.

I've not shot with the 24-120mm, but having owned the 28-300mm I will tell you that it's a really good travel lens, but like most zooms of that range it's going to have its good spots and bad spots (primarily CA and soft edges at extremes when wide open), which will be made more obvious by the D800. I sold mine to pump some funds into the D800 pool because the only time it did get used is on vacation. But since I'm not adverse to taking two cameras along, having one with a 24-85 and something else with say a 70-200 or 70-300 (or 150-500, but that's if it's a birding vacation) wouldn't bother me.

Not sure what your thoughts on Scott Kelby's work are, but at his seminar he stated emphatically that when he's on vacation with his family he takes one body with the 28-300mm and that's it. He didn't say which body, but I'm assuming it's not the D800 because he stated emphatically that while it's a great camera, it can get to be too much dealing with image files that size all the time. He seems to like the D600 a lot, and had just returned from a family vacation after shooting with it (he'd only had it a month).