We are now one month away from taking off for Europe. I can't wait! Chris has never been there before, and I can't wait for him to get to see it all. I think we're going to be on serious sensory overload! Of course, with international travel comes worry and nervousness. Not a lot, but there's always a little niggling in the back of your head (or mine, at least). It seems like there's a lot to do before we leave even though we've been planning for months!
Things To Do (Buy)
Something we already have is an All Terrain Money Belt for Chris. This is the coolest thing ever. It's a regular old belt, but on the side facing the body, there's a zipper. It's specifically made so you can fold up some money and hide it in your belt. Love it! We're totally going to be using this. Rick Steves recommends taking out large quantities of money when at the ATM because the charges/fees have seriously increased. What a perfect way to store & hide said dinero!
So, if you followed any of the above links, you surely noticed that quite a number of them led to the Rick Steves' site. I mentioned just a bit about him in my last post. I am an avid Rick Steve's follower (although he tends to be a tidge too liberal/one-world-ish for me). I love his travel philosophy, and have always tried to travel the way he does, even before I knew of him. I love to meet people wherever I am (I AM my mother's child) and learn as much as I can about their lives and how their society works. I love to find the differences and likenesses. When I studied in Mexico, our leader told us that looking for the differences was wrong. I don't see it as wrong because I see beauty in the differences. I love that someone's life is very different from mine, yet still wonderful. Not only do I learn more about them, but I almost always end up learning scads about me & my life and come away apreciating what I have more OR seeing things that in my life that I can change for the better.
Back to Rick. Sure there are other books out there, and good ones at that. Let's Go (it was our lifeline when I lived in the Netherlands), Frommer's, Fodor's, Lonely Planet, Eyewitness, and now even National Geographic (among others). I love Eyewitness because there are pictures of everything, so you know exactly what you're reading about, and while I haven't taken a National Geographic on a trip yet, they seem to be the same. Lonely Planet are geared toward people our age, but seem to have more of a party/do whatever the heck you want attitude (I think they're Australian). Fodors tends to be too stuffy for me, and while Fommer's tends to have great budget stuff, they just aren't Rick! In his regional/city guides, he includes detailed walks. Love it! They guide you through sections of different cities going into in depth detail about the different interesting sights/aspects of the area. He does spend a little more on food and lodging than I want to, though. I'm not a tightwad about much, but $50 for dinner every night (evern for two of us) just seems like too much. Also, he doesn't include a lot of hostels in his books, but does mention them on his website. For info on specific places, the Graffiti Wall on his site is fab. It's other travelers posting all kinds of interesting info.
There are also other places to buy many of the things we'll be buying from him (travel wash, travel towels, sleep sacks, picnic ware, etc.), but his prices are pretty darn reasonable, and it's so nice to get it all done in one place. You may be wondering about the travel lock. We're not allowed to use them on our luggage any more right? Well, these are special TSA locks. The deal is, there is a special key hole on the bottom of the lock, and the TSA has a master key that can unlock any of the TSA locks. Love it! We won't be checking the packs (on the way there, anyway), but they will be an awesome deterrent to theft while we're over there.
Speaking of packs, this will be our second set of backpacks. Yep, you read that right, 2nd. We each already have a backpack. But, they can't be carried on, they're too big. I think I mentioned before, we're thinking carrying on is the best plan (that's a whole 'nother post). Soooooo, we're getting another bag each. Thank goodness they're not nearly as expensive as the first two we got! If you want to see our original bags, follow the links for Chris' and mine. At least mine has been used already. It went to Ukraine with me. I didn't really use it as a pack that much, but it was perfect for the transporting of all my stuff!
On another topic, I just saw a mouse in my house. Again. I HATE MICE.
