One Bag One Year - Are You Kidding?

I sat last night and really thought about what I am going to take with me on my trip.

I’m going for 14 months.  One backpack, one day backpack and a travel satchel.  Doesn’t sound like much right?

The condensing of one’s life belongings has been made a little easier, as I have had to pack my whole house into a shipping container, which is now sitting somewhere in Brisbane waiting for my eventual return.  So already I had to decide what I would and wouldn’t need for my last 5 months in Oz.  Amazing how much ‘stuff’ one doesn’t really need.

I will have a day backpack that will carry the stuff that is too important to put in the BIG backpack.  You know the stuff you can’t live without – the charges for all the appliances, personal diary, memory cards, notebook the large camera that sort of thing.

My day to day bag will carry the smaller but just as important stuff.  The Ipod, the point and shoot camera’s, the phone, passport, my bloggie, more memory cards, money matters etc…….

Then the Pièce de résistance – THE BACKPACK.  This will house the clothes, the toiletries my 3 pairs of shoes and all my purchased the knick knacks until I can get to a post office to send them.  Okay when I say it all like that – how much room do I need?  Surely I could fit all that in a 55L backpack?

I have never been a backpacker as such.  I can count on one hand the amount of times that I have travelled with a backpack in my travelling life.  All but ONE I would call successful stories.

The very first time was a 28 day Contiki European tour 10 years ago.  I was a lot younger, so backpack was the obvious choice.  It was a 4 week tour with an additional 6 weeks added for good measure in Turkey, Egypt and Africa.  I borrowed the bag from my Aunty Beth, who sang it’s praises and had used it extensively on her travels stating it was the best bag in the world.  Well for the younger folk, it was one of the old fashioned backpacks which you could only load from the top.  So if you needed something you had to pull everything out to get to the bottom and repack the whole bloody thing.  NOT SUCCESSFUL.

I travelled on a Contiki tour of Scandinavia and surrounds in 2007.  It was a ‘Concept Tour’ meaning we were going to be staying in hostels and cabins.  No tents – but not really the type of tour one would take a suitcase.  So after some homework and not wanting to go without all the nessessities, I bought a 80L backpack.  Well have you ever filled an 80L backpack before?  It was MASSIVE and it was cumbersome.  Once it was on my back, I did okay – the main factor was not to fall over and look like an upside down turtle OR trying hard to not knock some-one over on my turning circle.  I  always needed some-one to help me heft the bloody thing on my back. NOT SUCCESSFUL.

Europe was also done the same year with the same said backpack.  This was an Intrepid Tour from Berlin to Venice – solely only using the public train and bus system for 3 weeks.  I thought Scandinavia was bad and we had a coach – public transport was a nightmare carrying this sucker, just ask anyone on this tour stories of me and my backpack.  I do recall ‘bag lady’ was one of my nicknames. LESSON NOT LEARNT.

2009 I travelled for 4 weeks on a Tucan trip of Central America, Cuba and Panama.  Now I had learnt my lessons from previous trips and purchased a much smaller backpack at 55L.  Now this was the way to travel.  I also trialled the packing cubes and they were brilliant!  It was a great bag – I didn’t end up taking as much and it was much more easier to handle ( shock horror ) and no help required getting that onto my back.  This trip was also solely using chicken buses and the sort and I wondered WHAT was I thinking with the 80L MONSTER all those years ago?

So now I embark on my 14 month trip with my backpack in tow.  Stay tuned for the pre-pack dramas on what I WANT to take and what I CAN actually fit.  That will be a whole entry on it's own.

Let the packing the backpack games begin???

PS: Any hot packing / travelling tips are welcome.

I AM A FLASHPACKER AND PROUD OF IT

At first take – it is NOT what you think.  So get your minds out of the gutter.

Flashpacking according to Wikipedia:

Flashpacking is a neologism used to refer to an affluent backpacker. Whereas backpacking is traditionally associated with budget travel and destinations that are relatively cheap, flashpacking has an association of more disposable income while travelling and has been defined simply as backpacking with a bigger budget.

The origin of the term itself is obscure.  The term also reflects a growing demographic of travellers who are forsaking traditional organized travel, venturing to destinations once the reserve of more adventurous backpackers, and the increasing number of individuals who leave well paid jobs or take career breaks, using the time to travel independently, but with greater comfort and many of the gadgets they are accustomed to at home.

I have never been a backpacker as such.  I can count on one hand the amount of times that I have stayed in a hostel – not that I am hoity toity – but I am a hotel gal through and through.  With my adventures I will know I will certainly be roughing it in certain countries, but I am prepared for this and as precious as it all sounds, I am ready to TOUGHEN up PRINCESS and just make the most of what experiences come my way.  Just between you and I, I do have some nice accommodations also planned – a little pampering I am guessing will go a long way to keeping me refreshed during my 14 month odyssey.

Yep, I think they have me pegged. 

Hello my name is Bernie  - I am a flashpacker.

A Flashpacker checklist:

Mobile phone – check

Notebook – check

Ipod – check

Ipad – something has to go and unfortunatly the Ipad just doesn’t make the cut.

Drinking camera – check

Normal camera – check

Digital SLR camera – check

Yep I think I definetley fall into the flashpacker category.

Other terms floating around the place also according to Wikipedia are:

Backpacking

Good old backpacking is a term that has historically been used to denote a form of low-cost, independent international travel. Terms such as independent travel and/or budget travel are often used interchangeably with backpacking. The factors that traditionally differentiate backpacking from other forms of tourism include but are not limited to the following: use of public transport as a means of travel, preference of youth hostels to traditional hotels, length of the trip vs. conventional vacations, use of a backpack, an interest in meeting the locals as well as seeing the sights.

Gap-packing

"Gap-packing" is a neologism used typically to refer to people who backpack to several countries in a short period of time whilst on their gap year between school and university, or between university and their first job.

Hello, my name is Bernie and I am a Flashpacker!!!!

Five Hundred Twenty-Five Thousand Six Hundred Minutes

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes,
Five hundred twenty-five thousand moments so dear.
Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year?

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnights
In cups of coffee
In inches, in miles, in laughter, in strife.

In five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life?

How about love?
How about love?
How about love? Measure in love

Seasons of love. Seasons of love

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes!
Five hundred twenty-five thousand journeys to plan.

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure the life of a woman or a man?

In truths that she learned, or in times that he cried.
In bridges he burned, or the way that she died.

It's time now to sing out, tho' the story never ends
Let's celebrate
Remember a year in the life of friends
Remember the love!
Remember the love!
Seasons of love!

Oh you got to got to
Remember the love!
You know that love is a gift from up above
Share love, give love spread love
Measure measure your life in love.

Travel Doctor - Vaccinations - Needles - Drugs - Pills - Pre-travel Preparation is the Key

I can’t afford to get sick while I am away.  I have a few down weeks here and there ( recovery from long or full on trips ) but I really don’t have the time or the inclination to handle a sick Bernie while I am away.

Pre-travel preparation is the key people……..

I am not a sick person by nature – I seem to have a pretty good immune system ( according to Dr Bernie ) and I rarely get sick when at home – short of the seasonal flu ( touchwood )

Most travellers need to seek medical advice 8 WEEKS prior to departure.

For those going to live or work overseas need to seek medical advice 6 MONTHS prior

For those leaving at short notice IT IS NEVER TOO LATE to seek advice

BUT apparently 50% of overseas travellers become ill while away from home …

People heading overseas, particularly to developing countries, are often at risk of diseases endemic to the places they are visiting. The diseases are mainly associated with:

Inadequate sanitation and hygiene and can lead to diseases such as Hepatitis A, Typhoid and Cholera, as well as traveller's diarrhoea.

In the tropics, mosquitoes carry diseases such as Malaria, Yellow Fever, Dengue Fever and Japanese Encephalitis.

Longer journeys or stays, particularly if backpacking or staying in budget accommodation, may involve other disease risk.

So no matter how careful one is – there are just some things that are out of our control.  In the BIG scheme of things it seems silly to me to be spending all this money on all the tours, airfares, hotels and cruises to scrimp on $1000 or so of vaccinations and malaria tablets and pills to keep me healthy while on the road!

In some instantces – some countries need proof of vaccination required for entry.

So what is a vaccine? 

According to my wonderful world of Wikipedia and Google research:

Vaccinations are methods of introducing antigens into your body to get your body's immune system to react to them by producing antibodies to kill them or inactivate them, which will give you immunity to the antigen. In other words, vaccinations can be shots (or other types of injections under the skin), liquids taken by mouth, or intranasal sprays that give you a small dose of something that can't make you sick itself, but is just like or similar enough to something that would make you sick if you got it in its normal form. They are given to you made with the right antigens to make you immune to the disease or infection from which you want protection.

The vaccine in a vaccination contains either a "dead" (inactive), or a weakened form of the potential invading microbe (viral or bacterial). These are called the antigens in the immune system.

Our bodies use these antigens (weakened/dead virus or bacteria) as templates to create the perfect antigen-fighting antibodies. When the antibody is shaped just right to be able to match up with, and hook on to that kind of antigen, it prevents us from getting sick even when the attacker is "alive" in the wild. The antibodies do this by holding on to each antigen and disabling its ability to attack and link up with our cells. Meanwhile, other immune system cells help in the fight and clean up the debris.

A healthy immune system remembers the pattern for every antibody that it has made (either as a result of vaccines, or those created from actually having had exposure to the pathogen in the wild). It can make these antibodies when it detects the same or similar microbes in the wild (normal strength) because of the "immunity" you have from the stored patterns. If these microbes enter the body in the future, the immune system can very quickly find the right pattern and start making the matching antibodies. That way, the immune system can quickly make those matching cells again to protect us from that same specific microbe (and sometimes strains that are very similar).

GO IMMUNE SYSTEM right!!!  Amazing how our bodies work.  I ain’t going to question with what has been proven and tested – but it does sound weird that tomorrow night I’m heading to the doc’s to get my first of 3 jabs of Rabies over a 3 month period.  One serve of Rabies coming up!!!!!!

Above and beyond that I have already been tested for Turberculosis to document my immunity before travel.  I then will get the test repeated 3 months after I return to make sure I am still unaffected. 

Polio is up to date

Tetanus, Diphtheria and Whooping Cough is up to date

Measles, Mumps and Rubella is up to date

Chickenpox – check

Hepatitis A – check

Hepatitis B – check

Yellow fever – check

Additional to the above I will need to get:

The good ol’ influenza – we are leaving this one till later so I can get the next years strain

Need to update my Typhoid

Meningitis

Need to update my Cholera

Rabies – over 3 months

Malaria:  This can be done various ways – I will be doing the good ol take tablets 2 weeks prior – during the trip and 2 weeks after the trip – this is the most cost effective as I will need approximately 20 weeks worth of pills!  There is an alternative of one tablet per day but at $5 a pop at 20 weeks ( $700.00 ) I have to draw the cost line somewhere and take on the inconvenience of popping a few extra pills to keep that cost down.

 All in all – GO to the travel doctor if you are travelling off the beaten track.  You just cannot put a price on your health at the end of the day.

Safe travels xx

Contiki is the word – Brave or Stupid?

I have booked FOUR Contiki tours for my trip next year. May – to end of June 2011.

When I tell people I am doing a Contiki tour – those who know my ‘actual’ age are the first ones to pipe up ‘Aren’t you too old for them now’!  But I think I am in that age group where I still consider myself to fit into the ‘younger’ ( albeit on the upper scale ) category but consider myself too young for the ‘older’ coach style tours.  I just cannot picture myself on and Insight tour with 40 of my closest blue rinses hooning around Europe at the pace of a snail ( sorry to all the oldies that don’t fall into the blue rinse category – I know how you feel !!)

I did have to get approval for my bookings ( due to my age ) and I am unable to share with a young whipper snapper also because of the age ‘thing’.  I am also forced to pay a single supplement – as who in their right mind would want to share with an OLDIE like me!!!!  Even after all this, I still think it is worth it and needless to say my application was approved – with no cajoling or bribes needed.  

The tours all run consecutively, so it will be a 55 day long party with Generation Y.  In my defence I am on the cusp of Gen Y and Gen X so I should be able to keep up with all of my 192 potential new friends that I will make, give or take a bad egg or 2, which just comes with any group touring, no matter what the age demographic.

In my research there is also a new Generation called the Z Generation – where to from here? What will the next Gen be called as there is not much room to move from Z.

So what is the difference between the generations?

Generation X is the generation generally defined as those born after the baby boom ended, and hence sometimes referred to as Baby Busters, with earliest birth dates seen used by researchers ranging from 1961 to the latest 1981 at its greatest extent.

Generation Y is also known as Millennial Generation, Generation Next, or Echo Boomers. The earliest suggested birth dates ranging from mid to late 1970s to the latest in the early 2000s.

Generation Z, also known as Generation I or Internet Generation, and dubbed the "Digital Natives," is the following generation. The earliest birth is generally dated in the early 1990s.

So based on the above – I could technically also be travelling with Gen Z aswell.

Okay so I could handle one generational gap, but 2 – maybe I’m biting off more than I can chew – YEAH RIGHT!!!!!  I’ll show those ankle bitters a thing or two.

How to consume $700.00 of alcohol in a week. 

How to back up after a BIG night of drinking.

How to NOT lose a camera while drunk ( okay so maybe I can’t help with that )

How to take great drunk photos and have them loaded and tagged the next day on Facebook

I think I would be an asset to the Gen Y coach tour and really am looking forward to meeting some new friends along the way.  I am a big Contiki fan and have travelled with the company twice.  Four weeks Europe and 3 weeks Scandinavia.

Needless to say that at the end of the day my new found ‘younger’ friends will not know the true age of the ‘travelling granny’ and am thinking I will aim for the grand ol’ age of 29!  I think I may pass – mention 30 to them and they’ll think I am a 100.  Oh to be in my 20’s again.

Wish me luck on my quest to keep up for 55 days on the party trail of Europe, Ireland, Spain ( with a stop in Ibiza ) and of course the beautiful Greek Islands of Mykonos, Ios and Santorini.

I have already apologised to my liver in advance for the hammering it will get.

Top 10 Useless Travel Gadgets

According to Travel NineMSN.................

 

When it comes to travel, the number-one rule of packing is: less is definitely more. So you certainly don't want to weigh yourself down with a bunch of unnecessary gadgets. While some travel gadgets, like money belts and ear plugs, are very useful, there are those that are more trouble than they're worth. Here are some best left off your packing list.

The StashCard

This travel gadget comes from the "seems like a good a good idea at the time" file. Designed to look like a memory card, the StashCard allows you to hide your valuables, like money or keys, in the unused PC card slots on your laptop. The problem is that your laptop will be the first thing a thief will target. So you'll not only lose your computer, but all your money, too. Why not slip your credit card into your iPod case while you're at it?

The chamois towel

Whatever you do, don't even think about buying one of these synthetic towels. First launched as a swimming towel, this glorified car chamois must be kept moist to work which means you'll be left feeling wet and clammy no matter how much you pat yourself down. I can tell you from experience that it won't dry your hair, it won't cover your modesty, and, if you're in a cold climate, you'll freeze before you dry!

Compression bags

These are the travel equivalent of Space Bags, the huge vacuum-sealed bags on the infomercials. The idea is that you put all your clothes in them, zip them up then push all the air out through a special valve at the bottom. Then — hey presto — your clothes take up much less space. The problem is, when you pull your clothes out to wear them they'll be wrinkled beyond use. If you really want to save space, try rolling your clothes rather than folding them. It not only creates more room, but also helps minimise creases.

The Urinelle

For the uninitiated, the Urinelle is a disposable cone into which women can urinate without having to squat. Personally, I'd much rather squat behind a tree than try to aim into a paper cone while standing up. What if you miss? And what, pray tell, are you meant to do with a warm paper cone full of pee once you're done? Walk around like it's a cup of coffee until you find a rubbish bin?

Passport holder

While a passport holder might look stylish and may prevent your passport from getting damaged, they're really quite impractical. You'll invariably spend more time extracting your passport from and putting it in the holder at the check-in desk, security and the departure gate than it's worth. I find the best place to store my passport while going through airport formalities is in the front pocket of my cargo pants. Beyond that, your passport belongs in a money belt.

Disposable underwear

Underwear you can simply "wear and toss"? Talk about unnecessary and wasteful. Is it really that big of a deal to wash your underwear and bring it back with you? If it is, then why not just buy the cheapest underwear you can find and wear them until they need tossing? Or better still: go commando! Personally, I'd choose comfort any day over scratchy underwear you run the risk of getting a paper cut from

Wearable sleeping bag

Seriously, a sleeping bag you can walk around all day in? Who comes up with these ideas? Besides looking cumbersome and awkward, not to mention completely ridiculous — think Gumby meets the Michelin Man — what happens if you need go to the toilet in a hurry? Also, considering many hostels don't allow sleeping bags these days, you're likely to get thrown out before you even make it to bed.

Cotton shoe bags

These cute little bags are designed to put your dirty shoes in to protect your clothes. Besides the fact that they'll simply get dirty and require cleaning themselves, they're not waterproof so are completely useless if your shoes are muddy and wet. A plastic bag is far more effective and what's more they're usually free.

Travel humidifier

Now I'm not someone who relishes travelling in hot, dry climates — or hot, humid ones for that matter — but is a travel humidifier really necessary? My thoughts are if you can't survive a few weeks away without perfectly pleasant air humidity, you shouldn't have left home in the first place.

Garment steamer/travel iron

Any gadget designed to make you feel like a laundry slave while on holiday — that includes the portable washing machines — isn't recommended. Almost all hotels, and many hostels these days, have irons and laundry facilities available for guests. And really, you're travelling; so who cares if your clothes aren't pressed to perfection?

365 days - A Challenge Photo Shoot

"365 Days". A Challenge to Shoot a Self-Portrait every day for a year. To push myself to be creative. A reason to get the camera out of the bag every day. To document a year in my life"

Andrew G

Sometimes I can be creative - most times not. 

I saw on TV a few weeks ago Andrew Günsberg ( the guy with the locks from Australian Idol ).  He set himself a challenge to shoot a self-portrait every day for a year.  His reasoning was to push himslef to get creative and a reason to get the camera out of the bag every day. 

Well I certainly don't need help in the latter part of the statement - for those of you who know me - me and my camera are like x------x this close!  But I think the idea is a valid one and something I could look back on after I come home and for years to come.

I'm going to implement that on my 12 month journey - I really like the idea.

I am travelling for approximatley 404 days - so that's alot of Bernie camera time - but as Andrew mentioned it is an interesting way to document a year in your life - especially as I will be just about in a different place each night - I just need to channel my inner creativity.......

I am also going to select a photo of the day and pop that into a Facebook folder - I hate coming home after a 2 week trip to scour all my pictures to find 'that awesome' photo I took on 'what day' ????  I mean ALL my photo's are good ( of course ) - but there is always that WOW photo.

I generally have 2000-3000 photos from a 2 week trip.  Who wants to guess how many photos I'm going to come home to after 12 months.  I hate to imagine - but my motto has always been that you can never have too may pictures. 

Check-out Andrews photos at:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/andrewgunsberg/3708092010/in/set-72157619664755998/