BootsnAll Travel Community

What specific resources do people take with them when traveling for pleasure / study trips?

Some of the places I am considering for future leisure / study travel include Buenos Aires, Cuernavaca, DF, Antigua, San Jose, Colombia, Playa del Carmen, Spain etc.

Do you take travel guide books or just use your laptop to look things up? What about mini-grammar references, phrasebooks, mini-verb references, mini-dictionaries, electronic translators etc?

I always bring at least one travel book, my laptop, and a laminated map of the city to tape to the wall of our hotel/apt.

I also like to bookmark some of the most information rich websites using the "make available offline" option of Internet Explorer. That way you can refer back to a travel site without being online.

I grew up in a bi-lingual household but I still brought an electronic translator on our trip to SA for extra help.

It really depends on the kind of trip it is. I hate dragging my laptop around but it is very useful. I always worry that someone will steal it.

I will usually bring a guidebook, but sometimes I just photocopy pages from several guidebooks to save weight. But then, I tend to be impulsive in the months before a trip and buy several guide books. I find it easier to read from a book than online, so hence I end up with photocopied pages that I discard as I travel through places.

I usually bring a phrasebook for the local language. I am especially fond of restaurant phrase books because I love to eat! For my last trip to Japan, I made myself 3 x 5 cards of useful phrases to quiz myself on the flight.

My dilemma is usually around bringing cameras. I love taking photos but I hate dragging cameras around. I bought this tiny tiny digital camera and it's my favorite now. But I have this absolutely wonderful old SLR camera with a telephoto lens that's fantastic for wildlife. So, if I'm traveling for wildlife I feel I need to bring it with. Once again, with the digital camera, I have that urge to bring the laptop, but I hate the weight of it.