When you’re traveling, your trip will require a few pretty standard things: clothes, luggage, money, travel documents, and maybe a guidebook. Of course, your ideal trip might include a few more items than that. This article will explore some of the things you might want to bring along with you on your next trip, no matter where you’re going. Read on for Travel Items: 8 Things You Should Consider Taking on Your Next Trip!
1. A Notebook
Even if you’re not a writer or someone who journals typically, there’s something about wandering a foreign, ancient city or climbing up a mountain and viewing an entirely new terrain that sparks the imagination.
Travel journaling can also help you keep all the details of your trip clear in your mind (and every so often a traveller turns what they’ve written into books and they become memoirs). Have a notebook handy in case you feel inspired (or if you need something to do while you wait for that train that was delayed four hours). One incredibly fun thing to do is to ask the people you’ve met to sign their names and write a line in the book. Don’t read what they’ve put down until you get home.
If you’re specifically travelling by RV, keeping a notebook handy can be especially useful for noting down information about various RV parks (which you can learn more from the Area Guides page), routes to destinations, and any tips or recommendations from fellow travellers!
2. Dental Hygiene Products
This seems like a funny one to include, but it’s really important. Traveling is hard on our bodies, on our teeth especially. We’re trying new foods especially sugary desserts, and we might be drinking more as well. Dental hygiene is always important, as it’s intrinsically linked to our overall health, but while we’re traveling, it is especially so. Do you want to waste part of the trip dealing with figuring out how to go to the dentist in a foreign language? Then take care of your teeth! Besides, you want a shiny white smile in the photos you’re taking, right?
3. Solid Headphones
Our ears and brains are used to a certain type of sound in our day-to-day life—especially when we’re sleeping. It can be hard for travellers to get the right amount of shut-eye with non-stop honking going on the outside or the gorgeous sound of foreign birds cawing through the night or street vendors hollering out mango prices at six in the morning.
A good pair of headphones can get you through that adjustment period, so you don’t end up losing out on not-so-focused energy. They’re also wonderful for long plane rides, train rides, bus rides, or atmospheric tuk tuk adventures into the countryside. Look for something hardy that can handle a few bumps or nicks (and doesn’t look too expensive if you’re going somewhere where mugging or pickpocketing is common).
4. Health Food Products
Food standards around the world are drastically different, and this means it might be tougher to find the things you’ve included in your daily health regime like smoothies, juices, and supplements. If you take a moment to look, you’ll be shocked at what you can find in travel-friendly sizes and packaging.
For example, Blendaco even makes a portable, water bottle-sized blender. Travel doesn’t have to be an excuse to let your positive habits lag for a few weeks. You want all the energy and happiness-associated neurotransmitters you can have to keep you going on those eight-hour walks through the city or climbing up the 1000 steps to the temple that the girl in your hotel said was her favourite place on earth.
5. A Trusted Water Bottle
Staying hydrated is key. In a new terrain and climate where your skin doesn’t know what it’s doing, and you’re sleeping far less because you don’t want to miss out on anything, it’s even more important. A tried and trusted bottle will help make sure you’re getting the water you need.
If you’re traveling somewhere where the water isn’t trustworthy, you might want to get purification tablets or a bottle specifically designed to clean the water held within. If you’re going to a climate that is considered extremely hot by your standards, you might want to include an electrolyte drink mix in your bag. These powders are added to water that you shake up and drink (sort of like making juice in the 90s) and give you the minerals and trace elements you need to keep yourself hydrated.
6. Culturally Sensitive Clothing
This is a big one that a lot of travellers flub. Take the time to research what the standard expectations are wherever you’re going and ensure that the clothes you’re packing aren’t causing offense. Chances are you’ll meet more locals if you’re dressed appropriately, and this lowers the risk of not being allowed into a cultural landmark. As well, it is unfortunate, but in some countries, dressing inappropriately can result in unwanted attention and harassment. Cultural norms are different everywhere, as are the social methods people use to keep those norms in place.
7. An Adaptor & Portable Charger
When we’re wandering around a stunning new place, the last thing we want to do is run out of phone battery. Our phones are crucial travel tools: they have our booking confirmations, maps we’ve downloaded, translation apps to help us communicate, and they take photos and allow us to make calls for leisure or safety reasons. Look up what sort of adaptor you need for the outlets in the countries you’ll be traveling to and bring along a portable charger that can help keep your phone working all day.
8. That Book You’ve Always Wanted To Read
It seems a bit funny to talk about bringing a book someplace that you want to be fully present in, but the truth of travel is there’s the occasional waiting around. There’s also going to be days where you’ve been burning the candle at both ends for a week and need to sit by the water and relax—a good book (whether a Lonely Planet guidebook, or an enriching autobiography) will get you through those days. Besides, there’s something about being somewhere completely new that opens you up to new ideas and ways of looking at the world. You can guarantee that reading a book someplace foreign to you will result in a greater depth and vivid emotional relationship to it, connecting to you more than if you were just at home.
The above things should help keep you energized and supported on your excursion into the unknown. All these fun items aside, research is the most important thing to bring on a trip. Be sure to read up on what is culturally acceptable wherever you’re headed, as well as the proper safety precautions to take.
What items would you recommend to take with you whilst travelling? Let us know in the comments below, and join in the conversation on Facebook, Twitter & Instagram!
