People say the best time to pack is after you get home from a trip. That's when you know what was most useful, what you didn't use much, and what you wish you had. This is the sixth in a series of RTW Tips about what to pack.
Camera - Canon SD880 IS
Loved this camera: bright, big screen (3"), wide-angle lens to take all of those food shots, and the Digic 4 processor makes pictures come out (scarily enough) sometimes prettier than reality! I thought I'd miss the optical viewfinder like my last Canon, but not once did I think, "hm, I wish I could be looking through a small hole vs. this big screen." Too bad Canon doesn't make this model anymore.
Phone - Motorola Pebl using T-Mobile US service with international roaming
I've had this phone for a while, and carried it around for emergency use. I had it unlocked before leaving the US (T-Mobile is really good about letting you do that), but I didn't end up buying a local SIM card anywhere. I just used the phone for an occasional call, roaming on other carriers and billed back to T-Mobile. I think T-Mobile has the best international roaming plan, because the per-minute fee is among the lowest, and you don't need to pay a subscription fee on top of your monthly charges like AT&T.
Music - iPod mini
Yes, I still have the first generation iPod mini! I'm not a big music listener, but I did use mine to listen to Spanish lessons on my way to Argentina, and in the middle of very long bus rides it also came in handy. It's a nice to have.
Online backup - Mozy Home
Before I went on the trip, I was considering buying a netbook with a small hard drive and just move old files to an online backup service along the way to free up space. I can safely say this would be a really bad idea. Internet service is spotty, and you can sometimes go weeks without affordable internet (ahem, New Zealand), or internet service at all. Plus, uploading tons of data (I ended up with 50GB on my hard drive) takes a loooong time: one day's worth of pictures took the entire night to back up, when I had fast internet access. When it was slow, I sometimes couldn't upload a single picture. Mozy worked okay even with spotty internet, but I haven't needed to restore any files (knock on wood) so can't say well it works there.
Camera - Canon SD880 IS
Loved this camera: bright, big screen (3"), wide-angle lens to take all of those food shots, and the Digic 4 processor makes pictures come out (scarily enough) sometimes prettier than reality! I thought I'd miss the optical viewfinder like my last Canon, but not once did I think, "hm, I wish I could be looking through a small hole vs. this big screen." Too bad Canon doesn't make this model anymore.
Phone - Motorola Pebl using T-Mobile US service with international roaming
I've had this phone for a while, and carried it around for emergency use. I had it unlocked before leaving the US (T-Mobile is really good about letting you do that), but I didn't end up buying a local SIM card anywhere. I just used the phone for an occasional call, roaming on other carriers and billed back to T-Mobile. I think T-Mobile has the best international roaming plan, because the per-minute fee is among the lowest, and you don't need to pay a subscription fee on top of your monthly charges like AT&T.
Music - iPod mini
Yes, I still have the first generation iPod mini! I'm not a big music listener, but I did use mine to listen to Spanish lessons on my way to Argentina, and in the middle of very long bus rides it also came in handy. It's a nice to have.
Online backup - Mozy Home
Before I went on the trip, I was considering buying a netbook with a small hard drive and just move old files to an online backup service along the way to free up space. I can safely say this would be a really bad idea. Internet service is spotty, and you can sometimes go weeks without affordable internet (ahem, New Zealand), or internet service at all. Plus, uploading tons of data (I ended up with 50GB on my hard drive) takes a loooong time: one day's worth of pictures took the entire night to back up, when I had fast internet access. When it was slow, I sometimes couldn't upload a single picture. Mozy worked okay even with spotty internet, but I haven't needed to restore any files (knock on wood) so can't say well it works there.
