practical stuff blog posts

I've had my hardworking Deuter Gogo daypack for three years now, and after much use all over Australia, Europe, and New Zealand it’s getting very worn – the main compartment zip has broken and it’s got a few holes in it – so the time has come to replace it.  When I’m traveling I use my daypack a lot; I usually have it on every day so to get one that is close to perfect for my purposes is important, and I put some effort into choosing one.

As a sub-tropical Australian, I get nervous if sunlight falls on my eyes or face for any length of time.  

Obviously, the best solution for this problem is to wear a hat when I'm out in the sun, and the best sort of hat to travel with is a floppy hat!

I’ve recently travelled from Sydney to London, via Tokyo, on an aeroplane. That’s a 10 hour flight and then a 12.5 hour flight, with a one-night stopover in Tokyo to break the long journey.

I was convinced to wear flight socks for the first time, for this journey.  That’s because I’m getting older, which is annoying, but a good thing to do, considering the alternatives. 

I’m on my way to a visit to Scotland, and to house-sit in Europe.  

In my preparations I made sure that I had travel adaptors for the United Kingdom and Europe.  But I've realised at the last moment that I’ve forgotten about my stop-overs in Japan in both directions, and, unfortunately, I've discovered that Japan has a power outlet issue that makes it difficult to use a travel adaptor! 

Many travellers are focussed on visiting cities and towns; but visiting wild places is also an important part of travelling.  An important part of visiting wild places is ensuring that you know exactly where you are, so that you can get to where you want to go, and are able to get back afterwards. While paper maps are pretty useful for this, the modern method is to use a navigation app on a mobile device.  So just what can a navigation app do, and what’s a good app for bushwalking navigation?

Have you ever thought how handy it would be to have a large computer monitor with you when you travel?  Well, you probably haven’t thought that, because, on the face of it, it’s a crazy idea: lugging around a great big heavy monitor in your luggage!  

However, this isn't an entirely outrageous idea; in fact, I’m carrying around an external monitor for my laptop, and when I’ve got some heavy computing to do it’s so convenient. So how do I manage this?

I recently had cause to drive to Melbourne’s Tullamarine Airport, for an early drop-off. It’s a one-and-half-hour trip, so I was travelling through the suburbs at 6 am.  Even then, the four lanes of the Monash Freeway are close-packed with cars travelling at the speed limit, so the freeway is operating at maximum capacity, maybe hundreds of cars per minute.  This will go on for a couple of hours yet, and this is only one of several big feeder roads into the city. It’s hard to believe that all of these vehicles pouring in are going to find a park for the day, and even harder to believe that I’ll find one too, by the time that I get there!

Most of my life I've managed to avoid going to really cold places for any length of time, so I've never really thought about owning a scarf.  

Even when I recently travelled to some very cold places, like the British Isles in early spring, and Iceland and Yellowstone National Park in the late spring, and even Scotland and Ireland in the summer, I didn't consider a scarf because I just didn't know about them – well, I've found out!

In 2015 I spent eight months travelling around the British Isles, the Iberian peninsular, Iceland, and North America, some of which I have blogged about here (with more to come.)  Now we've sold up and become completely nomadic, and we are on our way to do some extensive travelling around our home country, Australia. 

One of the most amazing aspects of flying in an aeroplane is simply looking out of the window.  This is why I usually try to get a window seat when I fly.  I know that this isn’t something that matters to everyone, and some people have a phobia about looking out of the window of a flying aeroplane, but to me it's an opportunity not to be missed if at all possible! 

The journey to Edinburgh itself explains why we are getting another hire car. Between the three of us it cost us £36.60 ( $77 AUD) to get from our house-sit in Melrose to Edinburgh airport by public transport - we can share a hire car between us for £13 ($27) a day!  When you're traveling in a group, car hire is usually the best and cheapest way to get around, especially in top-tier, first-word countries like Britain, Ireland, and the USA, where public transport is usually expensive.

I've been TSA'd! 

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) looks after security at US airports – they scan checked luggage which goes into the hold of aircraft, and they have a right to search it without your permission or attendance.  If you lock your bag with a padlock, for protection against theft or having illicit things planted in it, they will remove the padlock if they decide to inspect it, even if that means cutting it off. 

Iceland is cold!  No surprises there; the name gives it away.  We are visiting Iceland in the spring; however, we have been regularly told that it is a late spring and that it is colder than it should be.  Maximum on many days is about 4°C, with blasting wind.  Some days the temperature rises to 10 or even 12°C; however, the wind pretty much always blows at 30 to 60 kilometres per hour, which feels like little sharp knives hitting the exposed skin of your face.