Do You Keep A Journal Of Your Travels? (1 Viewer)

[DBK]

As there isn't a section in the Forum called The Sad old Men Corner I'm posting this here.

I have been keeping a record of my travels for the past few years which started when I kept a record of my cycling trips on the website www.crazyguyonabike.com then when we got the MH this Forum became the recipient of my electronic ramblings.

Then last year we met a couple who were using an atlas and a notebook to record where they had been and what they had seen. So this year I am trying the same, which does mean a bit of duplication as I am also posting daily updates here on our current trip but the written journal is also being used to record the shorter trips which don't really justify a blog on MHF.

Here are a couple of pictures to show the system I am using:

I am using little numbered stickers, one stuck on the atlas and another in the journal. Yellow stickers are places of interest, blue are the overnight stops.

When the subject of blogging came up here on MHF there were several who said they just relied on memory and didn't bother to write anything down. In my experience memory is unreliable but a written record, even if quite terse triggers the memory. Re-reading my short accounts of cycling trips brings memories flooding back. Without the journal I would remember the trip but not the detail and the impressions each place made on me.

A hard copy journal just lacks one thing- pictures. Our forebears seem to have had no problem illustrating their journals with pen and ink sketches and even watercolours but my skills in that department are sadly lacking so I just rely on uploaded photographs, stored as albums, one for each trip.

So, however you do it, long-hand on paper, a blog here on MHF or on your own website I recommend you keep a record of your travels!

 

[32143]

I keep a blog on blogger, written as though by our middle dog Indian Bones, for family and friends. Within the blog there are other factual pages to assist us with remembering stuff, I also keep a separate spreadsheet of costs, fuel, tolls, campsites, ferry etc. Day to day I jot down things in a notepad to add later.
One of the other reasons for doing the above is that Nige suffered a head injury and it effects his memory, we don't know how bad this will become as the years progress so keeping the blog and info pages will also hopefully enable him to recall stuff easier Also take tons of photos.

Lin

 

[Easyliving]

Hi

Quite agree with you DB that its a good idea to keep a record of your travels. We have only been motorhoming for about 3 years but its surprising how quickly you forget about places you have visited or stayed at.

I take the lazy way out though and have a blog on BlogSpot.com, its dead easy to keep up to date and gives me something to do when SWMBO is glued to the tele in the evenings.

Paul

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[2657]

I kept a record for many years of our trips, longhand in decent journals but no pics which are either 35mm slides or prints and then from 2002, digital.

When we sold up in 2008 I and my wife have both kept separate diaries, mine is usually a little sparse but hers is quite detailed, all our pic's are now digital but unfortunately I am not organised enough to have them all properly labelled, though they are indexed. I have relied on my memory to recall where and what but I really should start digitally labelling them but there are so many it will be a daunting task, a little editing may be in order.

My disordered mind cannot even keep track of the location of our old journals, some are in storage at our daughter's and some are dispersed throughout our increasing collection of caravans.

 

[Mags52]

I've kept a travel journal ever since we started caravanning more than 20 years ago. Won a competition back in 1996 for the best Caravan Diary for one of the caravan magazines. That inspired me to write a few articles that were published - all based on the notes in the journal. One thing I've started recently is a "Things we've learned on this trip" section at the end of a tour. Very tongue in cheek but it gives us a laugh when we read it again. Considering moving over to blogging but there's something lovely about sitting with a nice hard backed book writing about your day. Mags

 

[DBK]

I kept a record for many years of our trips, longhand in decent journals but no pics which are either 35mm slides or prints and then from 2002, digital.

When we sold up in 2008 I and my wife have both kept separate diaries, mine is usually a little sparse but hers is quite detailed, all our pic's are now digital but unfortunately I am not organised enough to have them all properly labelled, though they are indexed. I have relied on my memory to recall where and what but I really should start digitally labelling them but there are so many it will be a daunting task, a little editing may be in order.

My disordered mind cannot even keep track of the location of our old journals, some are in storage at our daughter's and some are dispersed throughout our increasing collection of caravans.

I've recently scanned all my old slides. Some, particularly the old Kodak slides with the cardboard mount had something written on them and the date was always added to the mount by the developer. Others in plastic mounts were mostly unlabeled and the best I could manage now several decades later was "somewhere in France (?)" or something like that!

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[Deleted member 29692]

Not a journal as such but we have Jim's "Destinations" book which is a great records of places we've stayed.

 

[JJ]

My blogs are really my own diaries...

They are really put together just for me...

At first, years ago, I imagined millions of folk around the world would be really interested in what I was up to and what I thought and what I was doing.

Of course I now know they aren't and why should they be? I am not interested in reading what other people are doing or thinking.

But I enjoy reading what I was doing years ago... it brings back memories!

AND... I can write what ever I like on my own blog... no Rule 1.

JJ

 

[chaser]

Not a journal as such but we have a large map of Europe on the kitchen wall with all our trips and stops written on, which we also use for planning the next one

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[buttons]

My sister has kept a daily diary for years, she phones me at least once each week reminding me of an event that I was involved in 50 years ago today. I find it really interesting but I dont have the devotion to keep one myself. She also never misses an episode of the Archers.

 

[Neilfg]

I am starting to think about this, we sort of relied on google calendar and picassa for the photos and our own computer, we have a paper notebook as well. Would love for some way to organise and store all the information Calendar, Photos, Notes, Routes, Technical Notes, Rants etc... have looked at some online travel diary sites but none have really appealed. Never kept a diary (not for long) so this is all a bit of a pain, but really want to be able to look back in 5/10 years time. I think the personal blog sites like @JJ and @Milliemobile maybe the way to go and the notebook of course.

 

[Judge Mental]

to lazy and cant type fast enough..+ inarticulate

regret it though when you try and recollect stuff

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[DanielFord]

I have a travel journal, it's a moleskine one, and also there is a photo printer in the van, so we tend to print pics and stick them in as we go.
I like the atlas idea, I may add some pages so I can mark it up

 

[vwalan]

while traveling on my winter trips i just keep a daily diary note
good for remembering a water stop etc
not detailed just minor scribble

 

[Easyliving]

If you have an online blog there are various ways of getting a hard copy of it. I was just playing about with www.blog2print.com, they take your blog and print it out for you. Quite expensive though at up to $147 for a deluxe hardbound colour version (that's with about 1500 photos though).

Paul

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[Forestboy]

Kept a diary when I rode to China but got fed up with it. With 10 years pretty much constant travelling under our belts we probably should have over 70 countries and 5 continents. To be honest I have no interest in other peoples travel blogs and cant imagine anyone wanting to read mine.
The occasional short summary on here is the extent of my efforts. Been asked several times to do write ups for internet mags but really cant be bothered too much like work.

 

[dippingatoe]

I always imagined I would like to keep a diary, but it rarely got beyond Jan 10th of each year, but when I was leaving everything behind friends and family asked that I keep in touch to let them know what I was up to and where I was going. I thought the easiest way would be an online journal, www.theworldismylobster.org.uk which I kept for just over a year, though it got a bit cumbersome, so at the start of this year I changed to a blog format. www.theworldismylobster.me.uk

I still haven't got my head round quite how it works, but I can add photos and little YouTube clips which I have discovered I enjoy making. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3ruSi9fP4ke7ZowPkn_BlQ

Before I never really bothered taking photos, but I do find that now it is lovely to look back at the places I have been, and the journal keeps a note of things I would have forgotten long ago, so it is well worth doing for me. And the thought that at least some others might be following it as well makes me keep going with it

 

[JohnM]

We have kept a log of our outings mileage and everything else of interest since 1983 nice to go back at times and see the changes.

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[Wildbill]

if I kept a journal of any thing by the time it was completed folks would be jumping off cliffs and in front of trans

 

[Detnor]

Many years working on cruise ships, I kept a daily diary. Sometimes only 1 line, other times I obviously had lots of time or something happened. Good to read occasionally, funny and sad. Like the time 5 RV owners wanted to get off at a different port than they had booked, we had to move 16 RVs on the car deck....

 

[Popeye]

I do Not keep a diary or any kind of record of my travels, apart from photographs but I did back in 1983 when I first took my two boys and Jackie away in our first MoHo.

The joy my boys get from reading this record is fabulous to behold which makes me think I really should bother now.

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[Jim]

We've got a record of almost every time the wheels turned on our motorhome. Looking back is great for the memories but good for future planning too. We also got the kids to write in it on the way home from trips, pure gold.

 

[Neilfg]

Not sure all of us want to keep a log/journal so that others can read it, I am not a writer and if my notes were made public pretty sure boredom and libel would come to mind. I do like the notebook with map and stickers as it is easy, but photos seem to complicate it. Am trying Wordpress out (as alot use it) entering the last year's trips and used the App when out and about.

 

[2657]

I've recently scanned all my old slides. Some, particularly the old Kodak slides with the cardboard mount had something written on them and the date was always added to the mount by the developer. Others in plastic mounts were mostly unlabeled and the best I could manage now several decades later was "somewhere in France (?)" or something like that!

My dad was a keen amateur photographer and I have lots of his slides from the 50's when colour photography was very much in it's infancy as far as private use was concerned. He experimented with developing the slides himself, using our small bathroom as his darkroom but the results were not great and a lot of them have degraded over the years.I think mostly he used either Kodak or Ferraniacolour and a Finetta camera, which my brother still has, these slides have lasted much better and I started digitising these a few years ago but came to a halt , mainly through laziness. Must start again.....and then I can start on mine......and then the prints.......must be thousands!!

Here's a couple of my dad's

2 adults, 2kids, a dog, camping equipment journeyed overnight from Rochdale to Par sands in Cornwall in this Morris 8 tourer in the early 50's


This was the tent and mostly ex army camping equipment, we had a bit more room in the Austin shooting brake in the background, both cars lovingly hand painted by my dad.

See what happens when you start down memory lane!

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[Reallyretired]

I have Jim s Destinations book and try to write in new places we go. I'm not very reliable with it and probably miss 50%.

 

[gus-lopez]

I keep a daily diary anyway. Only way I can tell what day of the week it is !

 

[DBK]

We had a tent a bit like that in the 50s too. Wooden ridge pole etc. In the early 70s we reproofed it and then didn't use it for a couple of years until my brother and I went on an expedition to Scotland. Driving from Carlisle we got almost to Fort William and then put the tent up as it was getting dark. At this point we discovered the tent had shrunk and not only was the ridge pole too long but the bottom of the tent was about six inches off the ground, like half-mast trousers! We got round it by digging holes for the poles to sit in and used guys to tension the ridge. Happy days!

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[Wildbill]

We've got a record of almost every time the wheels turned on our motorhome. Looking back is great for the memories but good for future planning too. We also got the kids to write in it on the way home from trips, pure gold.

sumthing the weeman can do

 

[steviebouy]

We keep a journal affectionately referred to as "The Captains Log" which as well as the obvious reference also has a personal meaning to us through a seafaring role in a local drama production! We keep dates, miles, places, Camp sites and costs in it. We are on our third volume now. I also keep an spreadsheet of miles, fuel costs, servicing, repairs and modifications. I also keep another list of things that still need fixing, adding, modifying or improving!
Maybe we do need a Sad Old Man Corner as suggested by the OP.
Steve

 

[tjay]

Work in stores most of my life, all those parts, and place where things have to, items issued. requisitions done ect.
At wife says I have OCD lol !!
Being keeping diaries for years so when we bought our motorhome it was natural to start a log book with all details of our trip, expenditure's site information/location ect.
Ditto re my GPS, kept duplicates as POI's c/w co-ordinates. good to go back and check previous entries.
Have done it with every car, motorbike,car/caravan and now with our motorhome.
Also keep notes of good accessories shops everywhere.

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