by Catherine Blackburn
•
18 Jul, 2019
As the summer holiday season is approaching, we are all thinking about our packing. Which case do we take? Have we got luggage for the hold? What shall we take? Brilliant bear has been on his travels recently and has become a packing pro so here are his top tips to help ensure hassle free packing and a smooth start to the holiday. 1) Check out and understand the destination , is it going to be hot, cold, dry, rainy. Do you need to take those thick jumpers and jeans or are they better replaced by shorts and thin tops. Do you require a long sleeved top for the evening to keep the biting insects away. Is it all casual, or will you want a smarter outfit or two for going out in the evening? 2) Make a list of everything you want / need to take. Include everything down to your underwear and socks, toiletries and other essentials, travel documents, games, notebooks, electronic devices. 3) Lay out all of your clothes in the outfits you plan to wear them as, remember that you can use an outfit 2 or 3 times with careful accessorising, different shoes, a scarf, jewellery. Always pack more underwear than the days you are going ensuring you always have some clean. 4) When packing roll items rather than folding, they take up less space and are less crushed when you arrive and take them out of the case. Don’t forget to leave a little bit of space for those holiday purchases. 5) Use packing cubes or even just a zip lock bag. Very useful for underwear. Place all your knickers in the bag squeeze out the air and zip up, you can then stuff into shoes to take even less space. 6) If you are checking luggage into the hold, take a change of clothes or at least a change of underwear in your hand luggage, just in case you it goes astray. If there are more than one of you travelling split your packing between the cases so that if one of the cases goes missing, everyone has a change of clothes. 7) If you are travelling with hand luggage remember the restrictions on liquids. You can buy bars of shampoo and conditioner which are easier than taking liquids in hand luggage and stored in a zippy bag are not going to leak over things. 8) Its also a good idea to pop a small folding bag in your hand luggage, just in case the cabin is full and you are asked to put your bag in the hold. You have somewhere to put your essentials for the flight. 9) Take a copy of your travel documents on your phone, even if this means taking a photo and saving it to your phone. 10) Add some stickers, ribbons or pipe cleaners to your case so you can easily spot it on the luggage belt. 11) Instead of packing lots of adaptors, for your electronic devices, pack one adaptor and a multi plug extension cable. Don’t forget your camera and batteries or chargers. 12) When travelling with children, especially on a plane get them some new games, magazines or puzzle books and give them one at a time as they start to get bored during the flight.