Remember the folding travel clock?

The tick-tock as the second-hand moves around.

The tingling alarm.

The dread as you realize you forgot to set the alarm; or worse, you forgot to wind it up!

And you missed your flight!

How times have changed, and as we travel long-term, we discover that what we take with us also changes as we proceed with our trip.

1.  SPRING CLEAN

We have found ourselves in the past week sorting through all our clothes and travel gear.

We spent time majorly spring cleaning.

So here are some of my tips for long-term travelers I’d like to share with you.

2. LITERATURE

Photograph, scan or use a Word Doc or Spreadsheet to input important literature. If we needed something special, I rip out just the pages I need from a brochure to lighten the load.

Catching up on my writing, and planning, we had a bag we have carried since Greece last October, then Italy in March is finally empty of 10 kg of travel literature.  It had been slowly accumulated and dragged around when we had the car.

Time for it to go.

3.  CLOTHES AND WEATHER

We go through all our clothes and plan what seasons we will be traveling to.  As mostly ours was summer, most of the winter clothes had to go. So check out the short and long-term weather forecasts for where are heading is a job for Explorason.

We end up donating a bag of clothes to charity.

We shopped for summer clothes, and we culled a lot of what we no longer needed.

I found 70% of Explorason’s clothes we no longer needed. He had marks on that did not launder out, were faded after heavy wear of the same favorite items, or he was outgrowing them.  Time for them to go.

4.  POST IT BACK

We love our treasured memories, and we want a house filled with them one day that will be our home.

So we sent a 20kg box back to Australia with Mothers’ Day gifts and a few souvenirs.

UK Postage was horrendous, and the cheapest postage worked out at $400 Australian or 200 GBP – I nearly flipped!

But I think the memories are worth it.

5.    SMARTEN UP

Wear and carry what makes you feel good.  Nice clothes, bags etc.

We had a torn suitcase and so we used this to throw all the items we no longer needed in as we culled, and then took it all down to the charity store.

6.   ORGANISATION

I sorted through all our travel documents. It was time to get organized.

We also ordered a lovely luxury leather passport wallet from Maxwell Scott Bags. I chose The Prato design from their range.

They posted it to us in the same week, so that was awesome, and we were able to select the color online too.

As we now find ourselves reviewing more and more luxury accommodation, it is nice to arrive with quality travel accessories.  I was so thrilled, as it came with EXPLORAMUM embossed in silver lettering on the front, so it is also a treasured keepsake.

It is ideal the ideal size for UK passports, but a bit of snug fit for my Australian passport, but we managed to fit both Explorason’s passport on one side and mine on the other.  The Maxwell Scott Bags Passport holder looks a lot smarter than the plastic waterproof pouch we purchased in South America that suited our Amazon Jungle experience.

As our travel times change, so does what we need to carry, and the classy Maxwell Scott Bags Italian leather passport holder certainly makes me exude confidence at the resort and hotel check-in desks.

7.  LUGGAGE or BAGGAGE ALLOWANCE

Aim to take less than the maximum weight allowed.

This allows for extra last minute things or scales that are not accurate.

By any extra baggage allowance needed on-line first, as it is about 1/4 of the airport price.

8.  IF YOUR BAGS ARE OVERWEIGHT EVEN AFTER YOU CULLED

If you are slightly over the baggage allowance (we used the household scales to weigh the bags), we suggest the following.

WEAR

• Try to wear your heaviest clothes on the plane if you are flying from Winter to Summer climates or vice-versa.
• This includes closed in shoes, sneakers or hiking or dress boots etc.

PACK

• Pack a small bag of the opposite season clothes to change on the plane or airport on arrival.

CARRY

• Carry any hat or jacket with you, even if it is the wrong season

EAT

• If you have food or snack, put it in a little cooler soft sack and carry with you.
• They rarely weigh this and usually allow the extra small bag

KIDS CAN CARRY TOO

• If you have a child, give them a small backpack and also a trolley back to take on-board too.
• This can include all their electronic games, iPad etc, and shares the load.

DRINK BOTTLE / FLASK

• If you carry a metal drink cup, thermos, flash or bottle empty out the contents and fill once inside the security gates or on board.
• It can be carried in the side pocket of your backpack or trolley bag easily and weighs next to nothing.

9.  CARRY SHOPPING BAG THE REST

Put any treasured items you really have last resort excess items to discard if you are overweight.

Place in your suitcase on the top.

If the airline says you are an oversight, one by one pull them out of the sake.

Roll on deodorant, toiletries etc are good for this, as well as out of season clothes.

Or sometimes you can pull out the carry bag, and make it look like you’ve shopped at the airport.

10.  DRAMA KIDS WIN – A SNEAKY TIP IF YOU HAVE KIDS

Explorason knows that baggage check-in time if we are over is his time to perform.

It is the time he starts to complain that each item is treasured, and starts to beg them not to make us discard them.

Usually, after about the 4th or 5th item, the airline staff pity him and give up !!

And we get free baggage excess.

If we can get away with it, I’d rather give it to the poor in a developing country than bin it at the airport.

SUMMARY

We managed to go from 60 kg of car luggage to one X 22kg bag, and two X 10kg trolley bags, a handbag, and a computer backpack – perfect

What are your tips for travel? Please share them in the comments. We’d love to know.