I have had the great and wonderful fortune to get to travel a fair amount in my life. Part of it is being the child of immigrants and occasionally getting to go back to the homeland for visits, and then in university I got to go on exchange, do some backpacking, and do some work in Cuba, but since the pandemic happened I haven’t gotten to do so much (minus flying all over Ontario for work and to see my parents), but in short I have gotten good at flying, although I think that my upcoming trip is going to test even my travel abilities.

(For safeties sake, I’m not going to share my travel plans publicly on the internet and destinations until after I’m back).

Travel Prep

Step 1: If you are travelling internationally, CHECK YOUR PASSPORT EXPIRY. You should do this before you even book your trip, countries have the right to deny you entry if your passport is within 6 months of expiring, don’t pay for the flight, get all excited, get all the way there just to get put right back on a plane home.

Step 2: If you have to drive to the airport, book your airport parking. It is so much cheaper booked in advance. This also goes for booking airport shuttles to and from your hotel if that is an option for you. Knowing you have a ride to and from the airport is so soothing. I think you can also book Ubers and such in advance, but I don’t live in a town with Uber, so I don’t actually know.

Step 3: Is to consider what time you take off and land and how far you live from the airport. If, like me, you live hours from your airport and you need to be there at 4am, you are probably not going to want to drive from 11pm to 4 am to get there on time, so you may want to think about finding somewhere to stay the night before. The same goes for what time you arrive home, if you arrive at 11pm and have a long drive before you get home, you may not want to drive home right away. So book any pre and post-travel accommodations that you may need. This also goes for asking friends or family for rides/booking Ubers. At most airports (although I’ve heard that not at LAX?) you can pre-book Ubers, taxis, or if you’re really fancy you could get a town car.

The rest is the fun stuff.

Plan your outfits. I’ve never had to pay such close attention to dress codes as I have on this trip. I am specifically travelling for different events, have very different climates, and while I have accepted that I will have to check a bag, I am not going to have an overweight bag. I refuse. So I am going to be doing some serious outfit planning, particularly planning outfits that are either just straight up repeats or reuse a lot of the same pieces.

Plan your toiletries. When I am checking a bag, I don’t stress about this as much, but I do always like to be prepared in case my bag gets lost (my bag went to Egypt once when I was like 10?, I was going to Ireland) and I have never forgotten) with a small bag in my carry on. I also do typically prefer to travel with only a carry on and as we all know it is hard to fit everything in that tiny plastic bag, so we have to prioritize. Switching to exclusively bar shampoo, conditioner, and soap has saved a lot of space. But my musts are contact solution, tooth paste, Biossance Vitamin C + Rose Oil, a tiny container each of Green Clean (I actually use these salad dressing containers to decant my cleanser and night cream) and Ultra Repair Cream or a travel size heavy moisturizer if I happy to have one, SuperGoop Glow Screen, setting spray, concealer, mascara, and a lip gloss. I have heard different takes on whether or not mascara has to go in this or not, but I can get by with only having mascara and concealer and if I do lose my luggage I also don’t want to risk losing my mascara because it doesn’t fit in the bag.

*Also I have never had issues with either the Vitamin C + Rose Oil nor the Glow Screen full sizes, but they do make minis if that would be better for you.

There’s also another step to planning your toiletries, and this is maybe more for event-specific travel rather than vacation travel, but think about your events and how you are going to want to do your makeup/skin care/hair. Are you going to a humid or desert destination? You always need sunscreen, but are you skiing or sitting on a beach? Those are instances where you may need stronger sunscreen than say a work conference. Do you need to be heat styling your hair or are you going air dry all the way? Do you have outfits or events you want to do specific make up for? Etc. For me this is part of my outfit planning because to me red lipstick or a smoky eye is a part of the overall look, as is hair. But you have to think about these things when packing.

My last packing tip is relax. Unless you are going on a voluntourism trip (which like stop, don’t, cancel that and read this) or to a deserted island, you will be able to find almost any product that you could need (my one exception to this is sunscreen in southern Europe, it’s really hard to find, really low SPF, really expensive, and teeny tiny bottles).

Also, my last thing. If you are planning on moving from country to county for a Euro Summer. I think you should take a backpack. If you’re going to be on buses, trains, and planes, all over cobblestone streets and up and down stairs, a backpack is so much easier. Last time I went to New York I was speeding down the streets and my friends were really slow with their wheelie bags. However, I do think that a backpack does really mark you as a tourist, so there are cons.

So double check your flight times, pack your bags and enjoy your trip!

Laura