Merry Travellers

Packing and then unpacking my much too small for everything I'd like to take along backpack for the seventh time last night, I remembered this photo taken at a restaurant in Hartebeespoort dam, South Africa on the very first day that the four of us actually sat down face to face to discus our holiday.

That was four months ago, and by then Martin had spent hundreds of hours scouring travel sites and journey planners to get the itinerary to a shareable point.

Much has changed and progressed since, and time has both dragged and flown, but here we are on the eve of our last day of work and a holiday a year and a half in planning is a mere 5 days away!

More shopping and preparation ... With just 16 days to go!

It seems that one of the key things about a backpacking holiday is weight. Everything needs to be as light and as space saving as possible. It's a good idea to take that little black number so that you don't scream 'tourist' when you go to the Opera in Prague but it is essential to take accessories that make that same little black number into a practical easy to wear and more importantly quick drying beach dress in Spain This does take some inventive shopping... for a start, everything has to be 100% cotton. Also, everything needs to colour code, because there's only space for a limited number of things!

Then there's the equipment. Now, because we're sometimes self-catering, sometimes b&b, sometimes eating on the go... we decided to take cutlery and crockery, like plastic cups and plates and the 'sporks' in the picture... a hybrid spoon, fork and knife which should pass airport security.

The piece de resistance is the brand new backpack which comes with a detachable day pack, a money belt and an additional carrier bag for excess luggage, a rain cover and a coverstrip for the straps... what a great bag!

With just on 2 weeks to go, all that's left to do now is figure out where those passports are!

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Toiletries packed and ready to go!

Well, the time has finally come for us to do some traveling again! It's been over a year since our last holiday trip (excluding of course the visit home earlier this year). At the moment we're just finishing off work, packing up our house (at least we're well practiced at this now) and getting slowly excited about our 27 days of holiday!

Things are slowly starting to come together. Martin has collected our train tickets between Rome and Milan today, and we received our Monza F1 tickets a few weeks ago. I have bought loads of little 100ml travel bottles for facewash, shampoo, conditioner, moisturiser and other such things (including the tiniest toothpaste I've ever seen!)

So... with just four weeks to go, we're getting REALLY excited!