What are your favorite travel tips and/or habits? Do you have any superstitions relating to travel?

Always get the aisle seat (for easy escape… to the loo if nothing else).

Always drink liquor in first class.

Save first-class upgrades for bad weather flights.

Don’t eat coach food. First-class is okay.

Never carry more than 3oz. of explosive solutions in my shampoo bottle.

Follow every bit of advice from Rick Steves

Keep as much information as possible on my iPhone, but always have a paper backup of everything crucial

Drink lots of water

Wear comfortable shoes (ditto airport flip flops – T-shirt & shorts when flying)

Never travel farther than a horse and buggy can take you in one day.

@robmandu – Hilarious! I have to agree on the aisle seat – I love http://Seatguru.com

@pupnTaco – Great link & good reminder on water & personal info. I also PDF docs to myself so I can access it electronically if need be.

Never, EVER, EVER, put cough syrup (with a child-proof lid) and your address book in the same bag.

Always have your own barf bag, that way you’ll never need it,
but the person next to you might.
and have it where you can fetch it on a moment’s notice, especially if you are sitting next to a little kid

Get to the airport early! It will save you getting bumped in these over-booked, under-aircrafted times.

I only have one superstition. I generally use the same 6 airports on a regular basis. I have made friends with at least one bartender and/or waitress in each airport. My superstition is that I must go to that restaurant/bar upon landing or prior to take off and look for my friend. It really is a mood elevator when you see a familiar face in such a shitty environment. And, if your friend isn’t there, you just chat up the other workers. By now, I know almost everyone.

Quick aside story: I was at BWI at the Green Turtle and I saw this familiar face having breakfast at the bar. I walked up to her and said “aren’t you working anymore?”. She looked so surprised to see me. “Yes”, she said, but I am on vacation”. “On vacation? And you eat at the place you work?” I said. She looked at me and cracked up. “Sue!! I work at Tampa-St Pete!” Ok, not so funny. But it was a little weird.

sorry for the digression

Don’t Wear a belt.
Wear shoes you can slip off
Pack a set of underwear, socks and a top/shirt in your carry on luggage.
Leave your pockets empty (or avoid having any).
Make sure your iPod and iPhone are fully charged, but have an adapter at hand.
Use a purse/wallet with more than one coin compartment for different currencies.
Make sure you’ve stored an ICE on your phone before you go.
Don’t binge on coffe and alcohol in the airport – airplane toilets are terrible!
On long flights, have a couple of glasses of red wine – it’ll make you sleepy but not running to the toilet.

Wildflower: I got so tired of watching my husband and son slow up the security line with their loose change that now we stop and regroup before we go through it and I get any change that they have on them at that point. I ended up rich once, now it’s not a problem.

My superstition is the spare pair of clothes thing, since I flew stand-by so much as a child. If I have it, I figure I’ll make it all the way through. We were on a flight that took 36 hours to get from California to Bermuda. The airline put us up in a hotel for a few hours. We were the only ones who could shower and change into fresh clothes.

The thing that I learned from that trip was to ALWAYS have food. We went the same time without food because the cook at the hotel walked out and refused to serve anyone.

I fly alone as much as possible. Other people just slow me down.

true that, @breed! Especially infrequent flying family.

—

Getting in the car: “Do I need my drivers license out now?”
“No.”

At the ticket kiosk: “Will this thing need to see my drivers license?”
“No.”

At the security agent: “Well, gee I didn’t know I’d need my drivers license out now. Hold on. I think it’s in my pocket. No, where’s my purse? Did I check that in my luggage? Oh, here it is. Huh, my wallet’s not in here. Where could that be? Do you have it?”
<Grinding teeth> “No.”

Well being single helps, but I’ve gone on trips with friends or family before where I’ve made up an excuse to take a different flight because I travel so much better on my own.

@robmandu: That may have been the 2nd time you made me laugh…today :)

If I’m driving, a wear a spare key to my car on a lanyard and wear it around my neck. This has saved me from several near-lockouts.

I usually take an extra pair of contacts just in case because without them I’m nearly blind, and I don’t especially like wearing my glasses in public.

put your toiletries in a zip lock
bring extra zip locks
bring masking tape ( for leaking toiletries, labelling things, etc.)
wear shoes that you can easily slip on and off (airports may require you to remove your shoes so that it passes through the xray machine)
pack or carry a shawl
remember to bring a multi purpose adapter or know beforehand what specific kind of adapter works in that region
always be careful with your wallets and passport when sight seeing
make sure to have a photocopy of your passport, plane tickets and itinerary just in case it gets stolen or lost

Duct tape. Don’t leave home without it. You wouldn’t believe when that will come in handy. My best story was at my sister’s wedding. My cousin split the zipper out of her dress. You can guess the rest.

I don’t know if it would be a good idea to put it in carryon luggage these days, though

I finally found a decent pair of slip on shoes for my recent trip. It really made a difference.
The book idea is great, as is an iPod, iPhone. I found that in airplane mode the battery on my new iPhone barely discharged on with about 7 hours of use. I listen to old time radio shows with earbuds that counteract the noise. On the way there, we were stuck on the tarmac in a thunderstorm for nearly an hour, and my iPod kept me sane.

When I was in college, I went to the airport and just listened and then wrote a paper on it. This was back in the “olden days” when anyone could go to the gate and sit.

My mom taught me when I was a little kid that deep breathing and even holding your breath on take off and landing would prevent motion sickness., especially on a jet when they land and reverse the engines.

I still can’t believe it when they do that, it’s amazing to me that it works