Seventeen days to go. The final paperwork is now in hand after my passport was returned from the Indian Consulate in San Francisco with Visa inside. It seems I now have permission to enter India for tourism for the next ten years (but only less than 180 days at a time). Australia was an e-visa and Jordan’s will be obtained while on the ship through Princess.
Both suitcases I want to take are now open on the couch and the big one is mostly packed with the smaller one awaiting the stuff I would consider carry-on if I were going by air (basically, things I want to control access to and things I will need should the big suitcase be lost and have to catch up with me in Hawaii.
Up to now, if I thought I might want/need something on the trip it got thrown into a pile. It’s clear there is more in the pile than I need so I’m now in the process of figuring out what is a need and what is a want. Most of the wants will stay home and not go on the trip. The clothes were easy and have been packed for some time now. I put them into vacuum bags to save space. The hard stuff is harder as it can’t be compressed. So, for example, the shoes are in a shoe bag but inside the shoes are toothpaste and mosquito repellent plus some miscellaneous other small stuff. I figure I’ll need some zip-lock bags but a full box of them takes up a good deal of room. So, the box stays home and the bags get put in a bag the Sunday newspaper comes in and rolled up tight to remove as much air as possible. And, so on for everything that will go with me. I’m trying to use the suitcase without opening the expansion joint. If I can then there won’t be much problem repacking for return as a number of the hard items will have been used up and not have to return home. And, the joint will still be available should I return with more stuff (though that is not a goal – photos and maybe location refrigerator magnets are what I hope to return with to remember the trip). 🙂
