4 1/2 more days before I leave for Africa! I finally got my butt into gear and started packing today. Yes...I REALLY slacked off this trip. Last night, I spent my Friday night spraying my clothes with this stuff. Mosquitos LOVE me, and I am not taking malaria home as a souvenir. My toiletries are the only things I have not packed light (4kg!~), cause 1) I am bringing a ton of insect repellent, and am not skimping on that 2) Sunscreen!!! 3) Shampoo and Conditioner. I normally just use whatever the hotels have or whatever I can get my hands on, but since I just got the Brazilian Blowout I had to search for hair products without Sodium Laureth Sulfate. Since it was such a hunt to find it in Southern California where we have organic everything, then I can't imagine easily finding it in Africa.
3 ounce bottles. The tops are taped up to prevent it from opening up mid-flight and all over my clothes. To be even more safe then put it in a zip lock bag.
I got these monstrous pill containers from my pharmacy, and since I can't take the pills out of the labeled container I filled it with wrapped over-the-counter medications. So what does a nurse bring overseas? Tylenol, Tums, Imodium, Dramamine and Motion Sickness patches, Benadryl (as a sleep aid), Sudafed (the real stuff), antibiotics, and for this trip Malaria pills. Don't forget bandaids and some topical antibiotic (like Neosporin).
My make up, toiletries, and misc bag. I bought it from Target awhile back and I love it! On small trips this is all I usually need to pile all my makeup, toiletries, and other random stuff. Since I splurged quite a bit on my toiletries this ended up being my med and makeup bag.
The top compartment has some meds, and first aid stuff. The middle compartment has hair accessories, makeup, and my comb. The last compartment has more medications, and the little bag has some necklaces and earrings (cheap ones of course!).
Rolling, Rolling, Rolling! Like I said in a previous post, I love my packing cubes, and I also love to roll my clothes. It saves so much on space!
My clothes for a month long trip to Africa. Just to give you an idea, the two on top are SMALL size packing cubes, and the bottom two are MEDIUM.
Also, to get more of a sense of the power of rolling, here are the contents of the above packing cubes....
- 5 pairs of socks
- 12 pieces of underwear
- 2 hats
- 1 Original Buff
- 1 Bathing Suit
- 2 Bras
- 1 Scarf
- 1 Skirt
- 4 Shorts
- 2 Pajamas
- 2 Cardigans
- 12 Shirts/Tank Tops
- 2 Dressy Tops
- 3 Pants
Wear your heaviest or bulkiest outfit for the flight. I am wearing my jeans, jacket, top, and my cross training shoes.
Other Tips:
- Scan or take a photo of your passport, immunization record, and other important documents and email it to yourself. I don't own a scanner so I just use macro mode on my camera.
- When packing, pick what you want to wear, and then narrow it by half! Pick outfits that are versatile, and will all somewhat match if you want to layer them together.
- Research the weather of the areas you are visiting. In the areas of Africa I am visiting they have cold nights but hot days, so it will guide you in what you have to pack.
- Don't forget your adapters, and camera chargers. Most popular camera brand chargers are already dual voltage. If any of your chargers are 3 prong, make sure your adapter can fit that!
- Print what you can double sided and use light weight paper. The weight of paper really adds up, especially for long trips where you need to print a gazillion pages.
- I can't help but reiterate how useful an iTouch is, download AppBox Pro and you have a translator, alarm clock, currency converter, unit converter (to convert Celsius to Fahreinheit, etc), and many more. If you download TextFree then you can text your family for...you guessed it...FREE! Don't forget WiFi wherever you can get it, and also it's entertainment use with its plethora of game choices, movies, music and TV shows.
- Call your banks and credit card companies of your upcoming trip. I use a credit card and my check card (also my ATM card). I always use my check card first since I usually get better rates, and then my credit card as a backup. In Switzerland and New Zealand I had some problems using my check card, so that's when my credit card came in handy!
1 comments:
I love packing posts! Great ideas, thanks! If I ever have to check luggage (which I avoid as much as possible) I also take a photo of my luggage contents and the bag itself so if it gets lost or delyed I have pictures for identification purposes. I once had to describe a blue duffle at the Rome airport and their English and my Italian was sketchy at best. I hate having to learn the hard way!!
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