Travel journal? Forget it!

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Forget the generic travel journal…

when going off on a short break or holiday in Australia 

Lets face it, you’re on holiday ~ you want to relax, have fun.

For highlighting your holiday adventures simply summarize your trip on a single sheet  with a Journey Jottings Map Journal.

  • For flying visits  make a dash to your destination!
With a thick red felt tipped texta pen against a ruler make dashed lines on the map from your home town to your holiday destination to illustrate your flight path if going by plane.
  • Dot your trails on the map
If travelling by road, use dots as these are easier to place in between the winding road edges.
  • Arrow in your destination
Arrow in and name where you’re staying then use each of the jotting boxes around the edge of the hand-drawn pictorial map of Oz to jot a few tales.
  • Jot your tales in the boxes
There are eleven boxes around the outside, which unlike a journal is happily not an overwhelming amount of blank space to fill ;)
  • Highlight *your* holiday adventures
On a short break a mere highlight or two a day will encapsulate the trip and months later will have the memory jogging as to where you went and what you did!
  • Postcard Jottings
Its amazing how the shortest of notes can spark a recollection otherwise buried deep beyond recovery ~
What could be simpler? :)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAvtHx1V0A4[/youtube]
Happy travels :D

Have you been anywhere recently?
How did you highlight *your* holiday adventures?

Journey Jotting

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No generic journals, please!

I never take a generic journal away with me when I go travelling , bought prior to the trip. 

One of my ‘travel secrets‘ is to buy a small (my preference is an A6 sized) jotter/notebook in each country/region I visit so associations of the travel journal are connected to the place – It also means I get to have my first interaction with the locals as I make it’s purchase.

On the first day of my recent trip to Scotland I sought out a local supplier of stationery ~ in this instance the local newsagent ~ and purchased an A6 x 80 page notebook with the blue and white cross of St Andrew Scottish flag on the front, and the yellow and red Royal flag of Scotland on the back.

Not keen on feeling I have to make time, for what otherwise requires an obligatory evening journal writing session, my favourite way of recording my travels is to stop and take stock at pertinent moments in the day and simply jot a few words of response to:

  • what I can see
  • what I can hear
  • what I can feel
  • what I can smell and
  • what in the atmosphere I can taste, that will serve as memory joggers years later when the moment for nostalgia strikes.

See, Hear, Touch, Smell, Taste

I find this technique cuts to the chase and omits obvious mundane words such as ‘I went for a walk…’ :(

I also like to bring encounters with people I meet along the way more alive by incorporating their notations in my jotter too!

When in Cairnsmore Nature Reserve I was having trouble finding the location of a sculpture located on the top of a mountainous cliff – I met a girl who sketched this mudmap for me to follow, which being in a rugged moorland area with blanket bog of varying depths of peat, I was most grateful for ~ It’s also a great reminder of my conversation with her :)

Mudmap

Once filled, or as the trip draws to a close, I make a visit to the Post Office and select as many pretty stamps as possible and post it home ~

GR George Rex (King George V) Post Box

Its such fun opening the mail box and finding a package from a far flung place…

My Mail Box in Australia

Adorned with local stamps and precious overseas postmarks that fix the trip in time

Scottish stamps and precious local postmarks :)

These stamps illustrate the monarchy of Scotland – On the right is Mary, Queen of Scots 1542 – 1567 and to her left is James Vl, King of Scots 1567 – 1625 (becoming James l King of England and Ireland 1603 to 1625) ~ The stamps on the left portray the Thistle, Scotland’s floral emblem and the lion rampant of the Royal Standard of Scotland

Its great, a week after returning home to receive my holiday memories encapsulated in a jotter; walleted in an envelope that is adorned with stamps from the country/region I have not long before visited and date stamped for future musings…

revealing another chapter of my travelling life :)

Journey Jottings highlights holiday adventures

 

30th December 1878

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“Up at 8 this morning & prepared our luggage for landing. Mr Tate & the Guv’nor arrived at 10.30 & soon we had all our cabin stock on board a small sailing yacht & landed at Sandridge Pier at 12 where we were soon spotted by a buggyman, who seemed very sharp fellows & anxious for a job (no growlers mind.) We engaged both one for the luggage & the other for ourselves & then took to the road through Richmond to our little cottage which was already for us thanks to our kind friend Mr Tate.

“PS

“This diary is a true collection of the facts occurring during our voyage from London to Melbourne & with the exception of a few yarns here & there (easily to be detected) you may believe all to be the strict truth & I hope that those kind friends who have read this far may not be tired of it, as it was written solely to show that I had not forgotten any of my old friends in England. The following is an account of our arrival copied from the Melbourne paper ‘The Argos’”

Iron sailing clipper

The Hesperides

“The Hesperides which has arrived from London is a fine looking iron clipper ship of the modern school and is now only on her fourth voyage her first two ventures having been to Adelaide and the third to India. She is commanded by Captain Upton who was last in the China service in the clipper Pak Wan and of the voyage he reports leaving London on the September 28th and passing Start Point on October 4th Strong southerly winds and south westerly gales with very tempestuous weather beset the ship as far as Cape Finisterrre, whence light airs and variables followed to latitude 25 N. The northeast trades were also light and the equator was not crossed until the 6th November at Longitude 29W. The southeast trades proved light also and Tristan d’Acunha was passed 23rd November two days after in Latitude 42 10”S and Longitude 3 19”W. The ship was in the vicinity of a huge iceberg. It is a rare circumstance for ice to be met with in such low latitudes and it is to be hoped that no disaster will occur on its presence there.  The meridian of the Cape of Good Hope was crossed 29th November in Latitude 44S and that of Cape Leewin on December 21st.  The easting was also run down in the parallel of 44 with moderate winds chiefly north and a great deal of wet disagreeable weather. The Hesperides entered Port Philip Head on Saturday morning 90 days from London or 84 from Start Point.”

Australia travel journal handwritten

Arrived in Melbourne 28th December 1878

Landed at Sandridge Pier 30th December

A.S.A.Whelen

Final extract from A.Whelen’s Australia travel journal aboard the iron clipper “Hesperides” sailing from England to Melbourne in 1878