Ah…the joys of travel

I did a lot of traveling this past year...and summer time is the vacation season. Christmas in Hot Springs, Arkansas, company trip to Austin, Texas in January, work trips to Palm Beach, Florida and Washington DC, and even Ocean City for the Fourth of July. Needless to say, I’m grateful for Southwest Rapid Rewards points.

I love traveling. Planes don’t bother me much (except when they’re floating around in the Hudson), I love hotel rooms and amenities, and exploring new cities and nightlife. Still, traveling is not fool-proof or for the faint of heart. Here are some things I learned about traveling from my recent journeys. Each is listed in the form of a sound piece of advice.

A. Never make a list in advance of what you will need while you’re there. Lists can be so binding. You’re much more likely to pack things you don’t really need without one. Plus, isn’t it more fun to realize upon arriving at your destination that you’ve forgotten your hair dryer, toothbrush, curling iron, toothpaste and bathing suit for the hotel hot tub? You needed a new toothbrush anyway…

B. Always wait until the morning of your flight to pack your suitcase. Your half-awakened, eyes-half-open, stumbling-around state makes for great remembering-of-what-you-need. If you’re lucky, you’ll trip on your suitcase, fall face first into the door frame, but then catch yourself with your big toe. The sobering thud will send you screaming into the next room, but not to worry, you’ve now woken up all those pre-packers at an ungodly hour; they’ll come to assist you. The throbbing phalanx will have you limping for the next two days, but at least you’ll have a great conversation starter while on vacation!

C. When you come to a security checkpoint, make sure you take off your shoes, coat, and carryon bags and put them all in separate plastic bins to be passed through the detection device. Whatever you do, don’t proceed to walk ahead through the metal detector without pushing your bins through the conveyor belt first. If you do, you’ll look like an idiot staring longingly at your belongings from the other side of the checkpoint as they sit there idly stagnant on the other side. You’ll look like an even bigger idiot when you shout across the checkpoint to a fellow passenger to kindly push your bins onto the conveyor belt so you can be reunited with them.

D. Pack your coat in your suitcase when you’re going somewhere cold. You don’t want to carry it around in the airport and take up valuable space on the airplane. Once you get there, you’ll survive the 45 minutes in the freezing cold, top-five-arctic-blasts-in-the-history-of-the-world weather in the time it takes to get a rental car. Stick your hands by the heater when you get in the car to regain feeling in your fingertips.

E. (Learned while traveling to Palm Beach) Wear your coat, hoodie, scarf, snow boots and thermal on the plane when you’re headed somewhere hot. Yeah, you’ll be in the sun soon, but it’s negative five degrees in Baltimore now, and your timbers are shivering. You’ll probably be suffocating from the 103-degree humidity when you get off the plane, and look like a wide-eyed desperate cocaine addict in withdrawal waiting for your suitcase to come around the baggage claim so you can get to that pair of shorts and flip-flops you packed, but at least you were maintaining a healthy body temperature in your home city. It may be a good idea to have a medic standing by in case you faint.

F. Make sure you pack all those pesky liquids in your suitcase. Security checkpoints will be a breeze. Except for the pepper spray you forgot to take off your keychain…oops. How were you supposed to know the United States Secretary of Education was on your flight, too? Secret service: “Ma’am, what had you planned on using this for?” Me: “Umm…fend off bad guys?” Sorry Margaret.

G. Know who you’re sitting next to on the plane. Secret Service to the right, check. Secret Service to the back, alrighty. But try not to have a whole conversation about why Secret Service is on the plane, while the person they’re protecting is sitting right in front of you listening to every stupid thing you say.

Person A: “If they’re so important, why aren’t they flying on their own personal jet?”
Me: “Well, just because they’re important, doesn’t mean they’re rich!!”
Person A: “OMG, what if they’re sitting right in front of us!?”
Me: “They’re NOT sitting in front of us…”
Me: “Do you think that guy is Secret Service? How about that guy? Ooo, that one! He’s definitely Secret Service." *Whispering to Person A while slumping down into my seat* "OMG that one just pointed at me and whispered into his watch…”

H. When standing by the baggage claim after de-planing to get your bag, don’t stand directly in front of the bag dispenser. If you’re like me, you probably want to be the first one to get your bag and then run so you don’t have to wait five minutes for the conveyor belt to circle your bag around to where you are standing. What you probably didn’t count on was the five-year-old diva who packed an 80 pound pink luggage trunk to transport her Barbies (and probably a dead body) in. When normal suitcases come waddling down out of the dispenser, they stop at the edge of the baggage claim moat. When an 80-pound trunk comes flying out of the dispenser, it barrel rolls down the ramp, picks up speed when hitting the edge of the moat (which also puts a nice little spin on it’s projected path), and scrupulously takes out anyone who is standing directly nearby. As for the bruise the trunk left on your knees and the side of your head, I would tell people you fell down some stairs and save yourself the embarrassment…I know I did.

I. When you’re in a strange city, ALWAYS carry singles with you. You never know when a “street musician” is going to want to serenade you at the bus stop. When he asks if you liked it and you say yes, he’ll say “was it worth a dollar?” If all you have is a $20 bill that you’re not willing to let go of, you might be dubbed “cheap” by the English-accented “street musician.” Nobody wants that…

J. Remember where you parked your car at the airport. It can be tough trying to find it when you get back from a long trip. After spending 45 minutes walking around aimlessly trying to remember where you left it, emotions quickly run from happy-to-be-home to where-the-f***-is-my-damn-car in a matter of minutes. Furthermore, if you’re with your family trying to find the car together, don’t follow your dad three lots over when he guarantees he remembers where he parked it. He doesn’t.

Heed these words and I hope that everyone has safe and happy travels this season.
If I learn any other important traveling lessons, I’ll be sure to pass them along,

Bridget Marie