travel catering - plastic knife

Before our last trip, we bought a Zyliss plastic lettuce knife to possibly take with us. As commited one-baggers, we were only taking cabin luggage. We wondered whether one of these knives would be ok to take with us. We figured that it wouldn't show up really obviously on an xray scanner, but if our bags were manually searched then it would easily be noticed. It was cheap enough that if it was confiscated, we wouldn't be too upset. However, in the end we decided it was best to leave it at home. Didn't want our holiday spoiled just for wanting to take a plastic knife.

I still do wonder though, whether it would be acceptable. We did take plastic picnic cutlery with us. In that, there were of course, knives. What's the difference between a plastic picnic cutlery knife, and one of these? I don't know.

The points for it were that it was reasonably light, and definitely not metal. Despite being plastic, its serrated blade was really quite good at cutting. Before we decided not to take it, I actually prepared a whole meal using it once. (I think it was a mince meal though, and didn't need any raw meat cut in preparation!) The vegies were much more roughly cut than I would normally have, but it did work well enough for vacation cuisine!

I'm still not sure about it, but present it here in case the idea is of use to you.

Tom Bihn's new Tri-Star

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you'll know that I have toyed with the idea of designing my ideal travel bag. Its something I'd still like to do, but getting the quality products that I'd like to make it with is not particularly easy! Also, I have recently resumed writing my book, so things are a little busy in my brain to be thinking through designing a bag.

Today, Tom Bihn has released his much-awaited Tri-Star bag. I've been very interested in this one, because while I love the design of his Aeronaut, it is simply too large to be used on Australian airlines (particularly Virgin Blue) which have smaller size requirements than US airlines seem to. The Western Flyer, his other major travel bag, has always just seemed too small for my liking.

The new Tri-Star does fit the Virgin Blue size requirements - I know because I specifically checked! And it looks to be a very nice bag. The size seems to be a much more useful one than either the Aeronaut or the Western Flyer, as it sits nicely in between them.

It has backpack straps, which for me are an absolute must, and an optional waist band which is something I would appreciate. It has cinch straps in one of the compartments, something that as a bundle packer, I definitely prefer. I'm not used to packing with three separate compartments, but apart from very fat bulky things, I think I could get used to it. It would certainly stop a lot of things just tumbling around as I suspect that they might in the Aeronaut.

I really love the colour combo of the "indigo" outer and "solar" interior, though really I think that indigo is misnamed - it doesn't seem inky and dark enough to really be indigo!

At 1230 grams (thanks TB, for having metric measurements!), it is significantly lighter - actually less than half - than the wheelie bag that I currently use, which you can see my photos in a previous blog post. I've mentioned before that I'd love to ditch the wheels and have a bag without. It saves heaps of weight, leaving you more of the weight limit in which to actually pack the things you want.

The Tri-Star has handles just where you would want them - on the ends for using in the aeroplane overhead storage bins. There's a lovely padded handle on the side so that you can carry it like a suitcase, which while not my preferred method, is a useful feature for quick "pick it up and move it" occasions. It has backpack straps as I've already mentioned. You can also use it with a shoulder strap, but as I'd never use it in this manner, this doesn't particularly excite me.

The two outer compartments open out flat, though one side has an unzippable divider to divide the pocket further into two. The middle pocket doesn't open out flat, but is instead a slip in pocket. I imagine that this would be the perfect place to put your netbook, to keep it nicely sandwiched between your other things to protect it.

Of course it is made of the beautiful, high quality ballistic nylon fabric that we've come to expect from TB, and has their splashproof zips - something I'm not likely to need, but something I'd certainly want to use if I was making my own.

For me, I think this bag looks just fabbo for travelling lightweight with just one bag/only carry on luggage. I'm pretty sure that it would be large enough to take all my stuff for a several week vacation trip. It also would take all the things that I need for a domestic business trip.

My only beef (which Tom Bihn has no control over!) is the Australian dollar does not compare very well with the American dollar currently, and with the rather hefty shipping that gets added on, it would be extremely expensive to get one from there (Seattle USA) to here (Sydney Australia).

My very wise mother-in-law once said to me that "just because I like something doesn't mean I have to own it." And I think that is how this will have to stay for the time being. I'll have to wait until I can afford it (the dollar goes up?!) or somehow justify the large outlay... Or maybe Tom Bihn would stretch to sending one gratis to this lowly blog so that I can evaluate it fully... Yeah right. Dream on!

Photos swiped from the Tom Bihn website. As I am basically advertising for them, you sort of hope that they won't mind...

Ladies travelling light packing list

A week or two ago I read an article on the Skyscanner website about travelling light. The author, Sam, wasn't sure that ladies would be able to manage a 3 day weekend with only carry-on luggage. I wrote to him to let him know that of course you can! I sent Sam my packing list, including weights and even some photos.

Sam was pretty impressed by the list, but later the same day I received an email from one of the female staff at Skyscanner, noting that I didn't include any make-up, and THAT was the real sticking point for so many of the ladies in the Skyscanner office. Well, personally I don't bother with make-up unless I have teaching engagements, which I don't when I travel internationally. I just think that the people I meet while travelling couldn't care less whether I wear make-up or not - and if they do, that's their problem, not mine!

The follow-up article has now been posted on the Skyscanner website, with a large slab of it devoted to my personal packing list.

The photos haven't been included, so I've got them here for you.

First up, we have the contents of my packing list, all laid out for you to see. For the details, see the article at Skyscanner.

Next, we have everything packed into the bag - very messily, I might say!

Lastly, we have the packed bag, ready to go.


Travelling light, with one bag is completely achievable for ladies. As for the make-up issue, if you're only travelling so that people will see you and appreciate how you look, maybe you've got things the wrong way round? On our last holiday I saw a T-shirt which said something like "Come to play, not to show off your clothes". Amen.

DIY toiletries bottles

It is a fact of life that if you want to take liquids on board a plane in your cabin luggage, they now have to be a tiny size. Depending on where you are, they have to be either 100ml or less OR 3oz or less.

Its a bit silly really (well, completely) because those two amounts aren't even the same (100 millilitres = 3.38140227 US fluid ounces), so we people who use millilitres actually have a larger capacity allowed than those who use fluid ounces...

But anyway, you can either buy travel size products, and get to like them (!) or buy generic bottles and put your favourite products in them. We go for the latter. The problem with buying generic bottles is that the authorities in charge of these things like to SEE what the capacity of the bottle is. Its not good enough for the bottle to LOOK like it is 100ml/3oz or less, it has to SAY it is. And often the generic bottles don't have their capacity marked.

Now, on a good day, you'd probably get through. But if you just happened to get the security person who's had a bad hair day, you can say goodbye to your carefully re-packaged favourite toiletries!

For our last trip, I bought small empty bottles from the local pharmacy that had no size on them. I knew they were less than 100ml, so that was ok. Took them home, worked out that their capacity was about 75ml, and made up some pretend labels for each of the products I needed to take (with my own fake brand name and logo etc) and their capacity clearly labelled on each. Doesn't hurt that I'm a graphic designer so can make them look pretty respectable. :)

You can use plain coloured paper as I did, and put clear packaging tape over the top to stick them on, or use Avery type adhesive labels that are suitable for getting wet.

No-one questioned my bottles, and over the course of our trip, we went through many checks.

There are lots of rumours going round that the liquids rules might be relaxed some time this year, so we can all hope for the best! However, if you are travelling light, then its always a good idea to keep your liquids to a minimum, because they're quite heavy.

The process of learning to travel with one bag

Our journey from too much luggage to one bag each has taken a long time, not the least because we only heard about the idea of one-bagging before our last trip. We immediately fell in love with the challenge!

But we expect that with each big trip we take, and with the changing needs as our children grow older and larger, that we will change and improve our packing list a little each time. With each trip we have taken, we have learnt something new. With each destination and season we will adjust our packing to suit.

From our first big trip, I learnt that you shouldn't allow your mother and sister ANY access to your suitcase beforehand. As it was for our honeymoon, they thought it would be fun to put confetti in everything. Thanks SO much!

From our second trip, we learned from one of our travelling companions, that a bag weighing 28 kilos is just TOO heavy! Try lugging that up and down steep, narrow stairs... or any stairs for that matter.

From our next trip, we learned that things can easily get crushed in checked luggage. We had a number of plastic items in the bags that got broken or cracked, and therefore were rendered useless. Fortunately this happened on the homeward journey, so we weren't without those things while we travelled.

On our most recent trip we learned that one bag/carry-on/cabin luggage only is the way to go!! I also decided that I would prefer not to have a bag with wheels, though my husband still prefers wheels on his.

So for our next trip, we will certainly take some things off our packing list - at least one of the car seats, for example - and add new things on. We learn a little more each time, and I'm constantly searching forums, blogs etc for new ideas.

So if you've never tried one-bagging before, don't expect that the first time you do it, your packing list will be perfect. We'll be trying to shave off a little more weight and a little more bulk each time.

But you have to start somewhere!

another reason to travel with one bag

Earlier this week Qantas workers went on strike for about 4 hours at various domestic and international airports across Australia. This meant that no baggage was loaded until the strike was over. It held up flights and got many people extremely annoyed.

Apparently people eventually got moving by leaving without their luggage. The luggage was to follow on later flights. What an absolute pain! You'd really be wondering if it would actually turn up.

Hmm... I can't help but think that if you only have one bag that doesn't need to be checked, there wouldn't be that problem. You'd still have the inconvenience of delayed flights, but at least you'd know where your stuff was.

The lost bag episode...

For our trip to the US, Yvette made a travel bag for each of the kids to take onto the plane. In it there was a selection of storybooks, activity books, pencils etc. The Bookworm's bag was hot pink, and Bendy's luminous lime green: deliberately done so that they were easily identifiable and not easily overlooked.

However... on our return trip from New York, we occupied the two seats adjacent to the window in the last 2 rows of the plane. I was with The Bookworm, and Yvette with Bendy. Our flight was delayed in New York due to a storm, and as it was underbooked, it was diverted to Los Angeles to collect more passengers instead of flying direct to Papeete in Tahiti. So the flight was several hours longer than expected, and we arrived in Papeete at about 2am. We were exhausted, and the kids were too - though both had slept on the journey.

We checked into our hotel and had a lovely relaxing two days thankyou very much, looking out over the coral-fringed lagoon towards Moorea. All the more enjoyable knowing that my work colleagues were at a boring conference and I was on a South Pacific Island.

Our departing flight left Papeete at about midnight. We had the kids take an early nap while we packed our stuff. I was out dealing with a frustrating cheese emergency (maybe a later blog post) when Yvette was overcome with a nasty sinking feeling. She searched everywhere for Bendy's green bag, but it was nowhere to be found. We scratched our heads to think of the last time we'd seen it, and Yvette came to the sick realisation that she had tucked it under the back seat of the aircraft prior to arrival and left it there.

Bendy hadn't missed it yet, and we couldn't tell her just yet with more than 8 hours travel to go. We rang the airline in Tahiti - nothing handed in or found - and also enquired at the airport when we were checking in. There was absolutely NOTHING identifying the bag as ours - no luggage tags, name etc. because we expected to always have it in our possession. That made it even more difficult to describe to airline staff. We were really, really hoping that the lime green colour would make all the difference. We were told to check the luggage claim in Sydney, as that was the destination of our original flight. No luck there either.

I went around to the lost luggage office and filled out the paperwork, not really holding out much hope for ever seeing the bag or the $150 worth of books it contained (some of which were gifts). 

About a week later, Yvette received a call from the lost luggage office at Sydney airport. The bag had been found, and would we like to come and collect it? It made Yvette's day! The following weekend we paid the exorbitant parking fee and went and collected it. We had to go to the storage area where the lost and severely damaged baggage is held, and it was a real eye-opener. We've had checked luggage damaged before, but some of the bags we saw were literally smashed to pieces. It was quite a shock - luggage is not cheap!

Well, the bag was safely returned to Bendy, who was overjoyed to see it, and we learned a few lessons ourselves: know where all your belongings are before you exit a plane; label ALL luggage, even if it is going to be with you all the time; and travel only with carry-on luggage if possible; make sure you luggage is distinctive - the lime green colour saved us; and to avoid being the owner of one of those smashed up bags.

Need another reason to carry-on only?

According to SITA's 2008 baggage report about airline luggage, more than 42 million bags were mishandled in 2007, with 1.2 million of them irretrievably lost. They estimate that if things continue in the same fashion, about 70 million can expect to be mishandled in 2019.

The most likely point in the bag's journey for something to go wrong is if they have to be changed from one plane to another.

The report points out that actually only 3% of bags never turn up, which they try to spin as being a positive thing. And I suppose that it is better than 10% going permanently missing. However, if you're the owner of one of those 3%, that's quite an inconvenience!

A far better way to travel, in my opinion, is with no checked luggage at all - travelling light with carry-on or cabin luggage only. That way, there's no chance that you'll lose your bag (unless its YOUR fault - and I have done that!) and it'll be much easier to enjoy your trip, knowing that your bag will arrive with you.

Of course, one wonders where the lost bags all go. Is it to the same place as socks, biros and coathangers?

Why Tom Bihn's Aeronaut bag is a work of design genius

I think I've mentioned that in my everyday life I am a designer. I am trained as a graphic designer, and regularly employ my skills as a book designer in publishing my own books. However, I primarily work as an embroidery designer. Because of that I have pretty good sewing skills, and occasionally try my hand at drafting my own patterns. (Oh, how I would LOVE to do a pattern drafting course to really understand garment construction...!) I think I have also mentioned that I am currently working on designing my ideal bag for my personal requirements.

With all that out of the way, by way of background, I now come to my main point:

Tom Bihn's Aeronaut bag is a work of design genius.

Now let me tell you why.

Good bags are made to last. The ones that last are the ones that don't develop spots of particular wear, because that's where holes are most likely to develop.

The places that are most likely to wear are along the edges. Most bag manufacturers get around this problem by putting vinyl piping along the edges. This is pretty ugly, and also adds to the weight. It does counteract the wear in those places though.

A far more stylish solution is to build it into the bag so that there are no sharp corners.

Let's think about your regular suitcase. Its basically a rectangular prism. (fig a)

Its pretty easy to round off some of those corners by rounding the corners of the end panels. (fig b) However, that still leaves us with a sharp edge at the ends. (fig c)

So how can you round that off as well?

Ok, shift your mind to thinking about a tennis ball. (fig d) It is covered in that weird felty sort of fabric. Its a sphere, but its covered in only two pieces.

By creating two curved, interlocking pieces (fig e), you can cover the whole tennis ball in two almost flat pieces of fabric (not completely flat, because felt has a bit of give, and will stretch somewhat around the ball shape too).

This is what Tom Bihn has done with the ends of his Aeronaut bag. By curving the ends of the bag body into the end panels, he has managed to round off all the edges and corners of the bag. Pretty clever!

Seams add structure to a garment or in this case, a bag. You end up with a double thickness of fabric along the inside of the seam, in the form of a seam allowance. Along the length of the seam, this double thickness of seam allowance gives body. Tom has seams along (or near) most edges of the bag, which helps to give the bag structure, helping it to hold its shape.

However, seams are also naturally weak points across their joins. Its because they have only sewing thread to hold them together, which is not nearly as strong as the woven fabric itself. In looking at the Aeronaut, one of the things I noticed was that most of the seams are curved. I figured there had to be a reason for it. (You wouldn't do it just for fun, because it would actually make sewing the bag together considerably harder, and time is money...) However I realised that by curving the seams, Tom has cleverly moved them away from any absolute edges of the bag (which are rounded anyway) to reduce the impact of these weak points being on the edges.

In having the separate end compartments, he has created "baffles" (by use of the internal walls) which also add structure to the bag, making it stronger and less likely to bulge outwards. Bulging can be a concern for any soft-sided luggage, but the baffles cleverly help to minimise it.

I can see all of this just from analysing the pictures on the Tom Bihn website. I've never even seen one of these bags in the flesh, yet I can tell the guy is a genius. I take my hat off to him.

So the question you're probably asking is, "If you love it so much, why don't you just buy one?" The answer to that, my friend, is that unfortunately the genius Aeronaut is way too long for the maximum legal carry-on of the airline that I most regularly fly with. :-(

make your own gear: luggage without wheels

On our last trip we adults took a wheelie bag each, that converted to a backpack. I find that having a backpack is essential when travelling and needing to hold children's hands. Sure its great for stairs and things like that, but my prime love is for how it helps me maintain my children's safety.

I have been thinking that I'd like to ditch the wheels.

I walk everywhere when at home, and I always carry a backpack on my back. This is a product of pushing a stroller for many years - a backpack just suited me best for carrying things.

So I've been thinking that if I want to reduce the weight of what I take on holidays with me (and I certainly do!), one big way to do that is to lose the wheels, because in so doing, you don't only lose wheels but the whole handle structure of the bag that goes with them. That certainly reduces the weight.

I've been looking at bags. One website that I have been particularly taken with is Tom Bihn Bags. I love the look of their Aeronaut bag. It seems to me to be fabulously practical. It has a main central section and two separate end sections. It can be hand held like a normal suitcase, used with a shoulder strap (I cannot fathom why you would do this - it would be dreadful for your back!), and when the stowable backpack straps are whipped out, it can be carried like a backpack. This is what I would do. I like the way it has inbuilt sections. This would help to stop all the little "bits" falling around in a bag that is anything but completely full. I don't want to have to travel with my bag full, so this is a consideration for me.

However, it is TOO big for me. I often travel with Virgin Blue (an Australian airline) when I travel for business, and the Aeronaut is way too big for their maximum carry-on size. Of course, I would not be wanting to check my bag if at all possible, so this too is important to me.

There are a couple of other changes I would prefer to be made to the lovely Aeronaut, to suit my needs too. Like it would be good if the compartment sections could be zipped down to fold them out of the way if you did want to use the bag as a one or two compartment bag - if you had something long to carry, for example. And it would be interesting to see whether one of the end sections could be collapsible, for the sake of travelling on Virgin Blue with its very short maximum length.

But I really like the functionality of their design. And they look to be exceptionally well made.

I am quite handy with fabric and a sewing machine (in my work life I am an embroidery designer) so now I am considering designing and making my own bag just for me and my personal requirements. My brain has therefore been working overtime on this little design dilemma (a good dilemma though!)

I have looked and looked at all the bits I would need. Things like fabric, zips, buckles and attachmenty sorts of things. I can get everything locally except for water-resistant zippers - IF I decide to go for water-resistant zippers. And if I don't then I still want YKK zips because apparently they are the BEST, and I still need to find them locally.

And all for a lot less than it would cost me to import one of the gorgeous, luscious Tom Bihn bags. Of course their bags are designed and constructed by people who have been doing it for years. They have knowledge and expertise that I don't have. No doubt they have made and fixed lots of mistakes to come up with the designs that they now have. I don't have the luxury of all that, but still, I reckon I can make a sturdy, well constructed bag that suits my needs.

I'm certainly willing to give it a go.

Items I wish someone would manufacture...

With the introduction of LAG (liquids, aerosols, gels) regulations, travelling light has become somewhat more complicated. A number of companies manufacture travel-friendly empty bottles for toiletries (hooray!). Some even make travel sized products - like tiny toothpaste tubes (more hooray!). But I wish someone would manufacture...

• 100ml ice bricks. The smallest we've seen so far are 150ml. When you travel without refrigeration throughout the day, an ice brick can be extremely useful to keep food cold for longer.
• quick-dry breathable kids clothes (at reasonable prices). You can get all manner of quick-dry clothes for adults, but nothing for kids. There's only so much beachwear you can have your kids in before it looks really out of place. For dining out, rash vests don't really cut it. Similarly, some sights such as historic churches require long pants and covered shoulders - items lacking in kids quick-dry clothing ranges. You would also think that manufacturers would be making quick-dry underwear for kids - but they don't. 
• 100ml concentrate washing powder (or liquid) and stain remover. Getting a huge chocolate stain off a t-shirt in a hotel sink can be a struggle without it. Yes, I know that supermarkets are everywhere, but we don't need to buy (let alone lug around the countryside) a huge quantity of it. We tried to take a small bottle of washing powder on our last trip, but it was confiscated at customs because it was detergent, and therefore not permissible in the aircraft cabin.

Many toiletries are irritatingly just over the 100ml limit. We found toothpaste, sunscreen, moisturiser, shampoo, conditioner etc. at about 120ml. So close, yet so far. We did find the toothpaste and the sunscreen at or under 100ml, but all the rest we packed ourselves into individual empty bottles.

working with LAG regulations

After September 11, some of the more annoying regulations to come into effect are the Liquids, Aerosols and Gels (LAG) regulations. It means that you can only carry a limited amount of liquids etc in your carryon luggage. Containers must be 100ml/grams or less, and you can only have as many as will fit into a transparent 1L (approx 20 x 20cm) ziplockable bag.

This isn't a problem if you're travelling with checked luggage, but we like to travel with carryon only, as its so much easier getting around that way, with kids in tow.

Before our last trip, we tried shampoo bars of soap. We were really hopeful and I tried it for about 2 months, but in the end, I just didn't like the feel it gave my hair. I also didn't like the fact that the conditioner used with it is Apple cider vinegar (which I don't particularly like the smell of) and that would mean that we'd have to take that with us (or buy it) because it too is a liquid, which sort of defeated the purpose...

Today I found an interesting product while searching on the web: shampoo, conditioner, soap, etc that comes as dry sheets, meaning that they aren't liquid anymore and therefore not an issue for flying. With a dry hand (interesting idea in a shower) you get the sheets out of the packet to wash or condition your hair. Great idea.

But what I wanted to know was "does it work?"

At Gridskipper - The Worldwide Travel Blog I found a review of the products. There are fifty sheets in each pack, and apparently you need about 6 each time to get a reasonable lather and for it to feel like it is doing something. They go a bit globby, and as for getting them out of the pack with a dry hand while in the shower... So while they sound great in theory, perhaps they're not in practise.

Yesterday I read a tip about toothpaste dots. The idea of these is that you can use a dehydrator to dry little dots of toothpaste that can be rehydrated when you need to use them.

My mind got to wondering... can you dehydrate shampoo and conditioner in the same way, so that you can use a dried "lump" of shampoo or conditioner for each time you want to wash your hair? That way, you know the product already, because you can just use your normal haircare products. But, I wonder if they reconstitute to work in the same way that they would have before they were dehydrated.

Anyone with a dehydrator tried this? Does it work? Anyone want to try it for me?

Surely some hikers have tried this before, as liquids have more weight than dry stuff and hikers have long wanted to reduce the weight they carry - long before general travelling light became fashionable!

No 1 piece of advice: travel light

Our favourite piece of advice is to travel light. Navigating metros, taxis, cobblestones, stairs and fast paced cities with kids is much easier with small, light luggage.

We chose wheelie bags that also had zip-away backpack straps, meaning that we could wheel when we wanted to, and put them on our backs when we needed to. In many situations I’d much prefer holding my children’s hands and having my bag on my back, than holding onto my luggage and having my kids wandering free. Sometimes this is just a matter of security and safety.

Our older child has her own wheelie bag, and our younger child carries a small backpack.

We now travel with cabin luggage only. It is a pleasure to travel this way. This is especially useful if you will be taking lots of flights, as there will be no lost or damaged luggage. There is less stuff to keep track of as well, and you’ll know that when you have kids, there seems to be an inordinate amount of “stuff”!

If you think that this sort of travelling light might be for you, we recommend that you visit OneBag.com for helpful information on how to do it.

And if you think it sounds impossible for travelling with kids, it certainly isn't! We've done it and loved it.