Project: travel journal

I hate feeling like a tourist. So when I travel, I don't like to have my camera out a lot. During my college travels in Europe, I carried a little notebook instead and jotted or sketched. Espresso cups, men in velvet jackets, cute babies on the Metro - it all went into the notebook. I carried a little flat watercolor set with me and added color in the evenings. I also used it to keep track of the money I was spending, partly for actual financial reasons and partly as a record of the trip - I can look back through the list and remember the details.

Jeff and I will be spending some time in Quito, Ecuador later this spring. (After I bailed on the Peace Corps four years ago, I think it's about time we do some world traveling before we're too tied down.) So I wanted a notebook to take with me. Particularly because the library and internet are full of advice about traveling in Ecuador, some of which I want and most of which I don't. This I can copy into it exactly what I want.



I covered two rectangles of cardboard in some fabric from a partly-shredded silk scarf.



Next I cut three kinds of pages: watercolor paper for drawings, lined paper for listing money spent, and graph paper because I had some. I marked the covers and pages with where I wanted the holes. I could use a hole punch for the holes in the pages, but the covers needed a drill.



I bound them together with keyrings (the kind that hinge open, because the spiral kind are too much of a pain to get through the holes).

Now begins the process of writing my own travel guide: map printouts, things I want to see, addresses, flight details, the instructions for how to take anti-malarials, and so forth. While I'm there, I'll add sketches, a spending record, and notes.