Do you keep a travel journal?
 

I keep travel journals and enjoy reading about what we enjoyed and not so much enjoyed on holiday.

What is so amazing is I always note the price of gas.

I travel alot without my husband. I keep a journal during my travels then when I return give it to him to read.

In addition to observations I also write down things that I know he would have enjoyed if he were with me!

Have done so for 33 years. Did you know that I spent 1975 June 25th at the Kaibab National Forest just outside of the Grand Canyon? Did you care? 99% of what I've written is of no value, but it helps to keep track of when and with whom I've visited something.

I keep specific journals for cities that I visit repeatedly. For instance, I have a journal for New York, so that when I re-visit I can easily find that little boutique or that great place where we had breakfast 5 years ago. It might not be open any more, but I know where it is!

I always used to have good intentions about journal keeping on trips, even bought journals and took them with me, only to return with not a word written. But in recent years my memory has gotten so bad I religiously make notes on all our trips. When I get home I transcribe what I've written in my word processing, print it out and put it in my picture album.

I really enjoy rereading them and looking through my photos now and then. Kind of like taking the trip all over again.

I have an online journal for trips. I make notes during the trip and then put them together when I get home. It works pretty well for helping me remember where things were, names of restaurants, and so on.

Yes, I do it on-line.

http://www.travelpod.com/members/laorfamily

My wife, with my help makes one every trip. We buy a cheap notebook and write down each days acitvities, meals, etc and compliment the words with pictures which we now develop each night on our printer. Yes the price of gas is heavily mentioned in each trip book. We started traveling in 2000 and now have several books that are so much fun to look back on. The boys were so little when we started and we have many quotes from them that without the books I would have long ago forgotten about. Yesterday as I watched Hurricane Gustav, I pulled out the book with our trip through La. and checked out Lafayette, New Iberia and Avery Island and remembered our fun time down there. I hope the boys want these because they're worthless to anyone else but priceless to me.

I'm an artist, so I keep a sketchbook/journal. Started in 1970 when I started a round-the-world trip that lasted over 3 years, and have been doing so ever since.

Even if I start taking notes, I never finish :) But I write detailed (I think) reports, post on Fodor's, and keep a copy at home. For memories.

I do keep a journal. I find I use the comments I made when I put together a scrapbook. Short snippets that give "life" to the photos.

We do tours in which we cram a lot of sightseeing in only a few days. The journal helps us remember what we saw where. I also find the journal extremely useful when I label all of the photos I took and put them in a logical order (which sometimes isn't chronological).
Dining is important to us, so I have always recorded where we ate. Now I also include the main courses, because my girlfriend would always ask me what we had where.

I try, and fail, every time. I have many journals with only 1 page filled out. We spend every minute of our trips experiencing things, walking, hiking, exploring, meeting people, etc... There is never enough time to write! We even do night hikes! I love it!

My husband does record our expenses in a booklet, which is a handy reference later.

I keep a travel journal in my bag, so whenever we are away in the rv or on a day trip, I have it handy. Usually at night, I take it out and jot down what we did during the day. This goes for mountain hikes, concerts, cool bike trails, etc. If I take the grandkids camping, I have them color a page in it. I have a friend who's an artist and she has drawn in it. My memory is like a sieve, so it helps me to keep those good times handy, especially during the cold winter months when not much is going on. I also put pictures on the opposite pages of the written part. It is rather scrappy, but it is really a memory book just for me. :)

I don't keep a journal but I always travel with a 3x5" spiral notebook & ball point pen to jot down addresses, restaurants, prices, things I want to remember (for posting here or future trips).

I do take notes in a notebook throughout the trip, and then write up a trip report (with photos) when I'm done. I've done this for each trip to the UK and Ireland, and to Maine/Nova Scotia - basically, ever since 1996 :)

I write notes at night about the sites that we saw each day. I note the names of the restaurants where we ate and details of favorite meals. I try to include humerous things that happen to us along the way. It is very easy to forget the details of your trip but when you've written a summary of it, you'll have the memory forever.

I write my actual trip report when I come home. It is primarily done to document our trips for us. I enjoy reading them and reliving our vacations.

The computer has revolutionized my journelling. We usually have a laptop on vacation and at the end of every day I post to my blog with my photos. It's a permanent record for me and much more accessible to me than paging through my old handwritten notebooks. As a plus, my friends and family can travel along with us and check the blog daily if they like. I've always wanted to write a book and this is the next best thing. Blogger is so easy to set up. Try it!
www.maggiwun.blogspot.com

I took my trip of a lifetime to Australia when I was 60. The first day I started a "journal" by writing events, thoughts, food and everything else on the Hotel Stationary. I kept it up for the whole three weeks. Each hotel - new stationary.
My children bought a wonderful photo album that would fit my odyssey. I added ticket stubs, admission cards for parks and all sorts of other things with each days recordings.
Winter is coming and I know I will enjoy at least a few Saturday afternoons thumbing through a really great trip.

I keep a journal regularly and, when traveling, sometimes do a trip journal in addition. It is amazing how many details can be lost or distorted in memory. Re-reading the journal brings everything back as I experienced it at the time. It also helps when my husband and I "remember" things differently. :)

My row of journals sits right here by my desk and computer. I can't believe how often I refer to them -- especially when posting here, when I can tell you in an instant how much we paid for our meals at _______, what the cost was of an apartment we rented, or even how long it took to get from point A to point B.

One of the best and most meaningful gifts I ever received was a travel journal from my daughter. Previous to that, I started with a notebook on my first trip to Europe, and now I have a supplementary spiral book in case I need to expand on the basic journal info. I have sketched in this supplemental journal and also used it to write notes about my life situations in general at the time of the trip. Most helpful are the notes about who I met on the trip, what restaurants I found, and for an annual Caribbean trip I take with friends, the trip cost and likes/dislikes.

Hi
I'm new here and I'm wondering if any of you use an online travel journal? If so, which one? I would like one that is EASY to use and has EASY photo uploading.
Thanks

For our long road trip (once a year in August) I make an outline (Word document) of the places we plan to visit -- names, addresses, phone numbers, hours of operation, price, etc. Plus the list of hotels (confirmation numbers etc.). When we get home I revise it to include entertainment, restaurants, etc.

Usually my only souvenirs from that trip are the brochures & booklets acquired along the way. All go into a big envelope. Plus the CD/DVD of digital photos and I have a great "memory file".

I wish I did....the times that I have written notes, it is a very detailed personal experience with my impressions and reactions to events that occurred to me. It is an emotional photograph of that time and much more meaningful than the visual photographs I always take. One snaps the outside and the other the inside.

I tried keeping a travel journal, but quickly got tired of writing instead of gawking around.

Now I take a micro-recorder and just talk while I'm looking around.
I note places, prices, favorites and especially record info about pictures taken.

When I get home, I just play it back and make my travel album. I've been doing this for years and I label each tape and play it back whenever I want a good laugh.

I have a great travel journal source online. It is free, easy and fun.

What is this wonder you might ask -- we'll it is ... drumroll...

<b>Fodors!!</b>

I was very bored last night. I was sitting on couch with laptop and thought I would see how far back my posts go on here.

As I scrolled through the pages and pages of threads that came up when I clicked my name, it occurred to me that so many [of course, not all - especially the ones in the lounge] of them were question I asked before taking a trip and all the trip reports I posted after I took the trip.

I enjoyed looking back at the thousands [ yes, thousands] of thread I have posted on and seeing the questions I asked; that you all so graciously answered and it was truly a trip down memory lane.

Try it.

Deb

Texrockhound, I use Picasa as an online journal of sorts. It's easy to upload pictures, and you have a pretty good amount of space for captions.
picasaweb.google.com

Here's a link to our England and Wales pictures from 2007 as an example:

http://preview.tinyurl.com/25xs9t

Lee Ann

I keep a travel journal but wow, I wish I was as detailed as others. I have nothing but admiration for people who write down names of restuarants and what they ate and paid.

I jot down notes at the museums.

I go into an office supply store in whatever country I am in and buy some kind of notebook or blank book and a glue stick. Then I turn it into a collage of my trip. I often get two of brochures etc so I can use both sides in my book.

I don't journal but...www.tripadvisor.com has a neat website where you can post reviews of attractions, hotels etc. It even has a world map where you can place a &quot;pin&quot; for every area visited. I've posted more photos lately and I can always go back and read my reviews of sites to bring back the memories... Happy traveling.

oops, www.tripadvisor.com no &quot;but&quot;
;-)

And www.igougo.com has a system where you get points for each review, experience, journal and photo posted - and you can trade in points for amazon.com gift certificates and the like.

I didn't think I was but I was surprised to find out I did.

My ex-mother-in-law loved to hear about my travels so, after each trip, I would write a Charles Kuralt-like report of where I went and what I saw for her. I tried to write as if I were writing for publication and she especially loved my occasional drift into lyrical metaphor.

If I was busy and got &quot;late&quot; sending one, she'd be on my case about where it was.

When she died a couple of years ago, my ex-wife found out that she had saved all of those reports and the photos I sent with them and had put them into several 3-ring binders. Reading back through them both reminds me of the trips and of Wilma, who, by the way, was the best mother-in-law in human history.