My 5 Reasons Why You Need To Keep a Travel Journal
If you have ever spent any amount of time with me, then you know that I am obsessed with notebooks. I have them for everything, in all sorts of colors and patterns. I also keep a journal for each activity in my life. My camping journal is always in my duffle bag, along with a pack of pens and stickers, so that I can journal from my tent. you might wonder why keeping a journal specific to camping would help you with your travels, so here’s five reason you should keep a camping journal yourself!
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1. To Help Plan Better Trips
All too often I am returning to a site I’ve already been to, but its one or two years later, and then I’m struggling to recall some important facts. Was the campsite shaded, did I need to head far to find decent firewood, was it easy for my car to drive? What about my friends? When packing for trips, I’m quite the over-packer, so this helps me discern what items I really need to bring with me. Every time I pack, I think that I need to bring two sets of outfits for each day. I have rarely worn every piece of clothing I have ever traveled with. Food seems to always be the biggest concern when camping, but by keeping a journal I’m able to decide which meals I enjoyed the most for future trips. Hello potato packets and corn on the cob! This can be also be helpful if you’re like me, and sometimes you get altitude sickness. I notice it only happens at certain times of year for me, but for a while I thought it was every time I went up a mountain.
Overpacking for camping.
2. Cost
While it’s not expensive, I like to have an idea of how much money I’m spending per trip. It also helps me to narrow down places where I didn’t need to spend as much money, making it ideal for a quick weekend getaway when I just paid bills. You can also see where you may have overpaid. For instance, having a campfire every night for only an hour or two won’t burn that much wood, but I’ve gone through up to five bundles in a single night. It can be hard to plan for these types of expenses, so I like to keep track. Whenever I go to Cedar City, Utah to camp, I find that I get lunch from the same local place. So, I won’t pack lunch for that Saturday, and then I’m not wasting food or money.
3. It Helps You Relieve Stress
There’s something therapeutic about the daily reflection a journal provides. It was sort of drilled into me during field camp in college that I should be keeping detailed notes on my days. And when I look back at my field journal from senior year I drew intricate diagrams of which of my friends was going to die first and how, I laugh about it now, but it reminds me of how hard I worked as well to complete my degree. When I read my journal from that time, I can read the soreness I felt each day after finishing ten grueling miles of hiking and mapping. There’s no rule about how much you have to write, so it’s honestly what feels comfortable to you, but I did make a list of what I am sure to include in each entry.
4. Keeping Track of Goals and Progress
In each of my camping journals I have a few pages dedicated to just listing the locations I visit, as well as hikes and other activities I partake in. Over the last seven years, I’ve been to a number of places, and overtime the trips start to run together. The hikes I took in Utah remind me of similar ones in California. It’s nice to be able to see at a glance the places I’ve been and the things I have done. As time goes on, and your network grows, people will also ask where you’ve been and what you thought of a specific hike, so, you can check it here. I also like to see if my hiking speed gets quicker over the summer, so this is also an easy way to track that.
Even with a good journal, I still had to stay up half the night finishing my senior project.
5. For the Memories
Jokingly, my family will often ask what shirt I was wearing when I recite a very specific story for memory. I tend to remember a lot of what happened on any given day, but as time goes on, we lose that memory. Was it 5 miles or 6? Did I get blisters? Or no? Did Courtney and I answer all of the questions from the tour guide in the cave or did we let someone else try? I want to remember those specific funny stories, and journaling certainly helps me achieve this. After a trip, I tell my mother everything. At happy hour, my coworkers will ask about the trip I was on a few weeks ago. It would be very strange to pull out my journal at the bar, but I find that my memory serves me better when I have written down what I did.
Above are some of my favorite notebooks and pens. I’m not saying I travel with all of these pens, but I’m not saying I don’t.
What I Always Include
These points are what I am sure to cover for each trip entry. Again, in college, we wrote a lot of this information down in our field journals, but it really is valuable! Year to year I am often struggling to remember which type of sweatshirt kept me warmest on a given night, or if I will need my water shoes. Even if I never return to a specific location, this information is useful for any future trips in areas with similar conditions. knowing that you did complete a five mile hike in 95 degree heat and drank all three liters of water in your pack will be useful for future hikes.
1. Temperature and Weather
2. What Clothing I Wore and How I Liked It
3. Hikes I Did and How I Felt
4. Food
5. Who Was There
6. How Much Water I Drank
7. How Long It Took to Get There
8. Any Other Pertinent info
9. My Actual Journal Entry.
Of course this list is just what I like to include, but if there’s anything specific you like to jot down, I’d love to hear!