Things I Packed: A Review

After every trip, I like to review how I did with packing. What did I wish I had? What did I have and never use? What was essential? I’m please to say I packed well for this trip.

My first good choice was to insist that we all carry on only. It was a three-day trip during the busiest flying season of the year, and I didn’t want to deal with checking bags, potentially losing bags (even though we had two direct flights), and retrieving bags. The baggage carousel on Christmas Eve? Surely there’s a horror movie plot in there somewhere.

The girls heeded my edict and packed only carry-ons. When we got to the Indy airport Friday night at 8 pm, it was a ghost town. It was so slow, in fact, that TSA Pre-Check was closed for the night, although they at least let us keep our shoes on. So having bags to check wouldn’t have been a problem. The flight home, though, was a completely different story. We left our resort around 5 am on Christmas Eve and arrived to the Orlando airport by 6 am. It was a madhouse. All three lanes of traffic at departures was backed up. When we finally got to the Southwest area, the line to the skycap was at least 30 people deep. And the line inside? I’m not sure I can count that high. We passed by all that craziness and made our way to security, where I was very grateful for TSA Pre-Check. I know we spent less than ten minutes getting through security. So there’s my first essential.

Essential #1: TSA trusted traveler card. This isn’t really something you pack, but I am so grateful for it. Some day I’ll do a post on how and why we joined the trusted traveler program, and how much time I think it’s saved us.

My next good choice was packing only two shirts for a five-day, four-night trip. Actually, I wore one and packed the other. My favorite carry-on is so small that it actually fits under the seat, so I knew I would not have any spare space. And I knew that I would want to buy shirts and probably some other souvenirs. So, Friday I changed right before we left for the Indy airport into the outfit I wanted to wear Saturday at the parks. I packed one other shirt and one pair of pants. And lots of underwear and socks, of course. I wore the airplane shirt Saturday and the other shirt Sunday and made sure I bought a shirt by the end of the day Sunday that I could wear Monday. And I bought another shirt Monday that I wore home. I also bought an outfit for Madeline, and everything still fit into my little carry-on. Yay!

My third good choice was taking water-resistant tennis shoes. Except I think they’re not really called tennis shoes anymore. Athletic shoes? Whatever, they were made for walking and they were waterproof. And my feet did not get wet. So that’s the second essential, because my last five trips to the Sunshine State have been rainy.

Essential #2: water-resistant shoes.

On a related note, I took three pairs of Bombas for the three park days. I’m not sure Bombas were necessary, but I don’t know what I would have done if I’d had ill-fitting socks.

Essential #3: socks that are comfortable and fit well.

The problem with the carry-on is that a quart of liquids is not really that much when you have a whole beauty routine. I pared mine way back, but I really missed some of my products. I use a different moisturizer at night than I do for daytime, but I just used the daytime one all week because it has SPF. I usually use an astringent toner at night, but I used my daytime toner wipes day and night. I did take two different types of face wash, but I shouldn’t have, because Disney supplies a face soap bar (at least at the resort we were in).

Other things I wish I hadn’t taken are a reusable coffee cup and a reusable water bottle. I didn’t have time to use them in the room, and I didn’t want to carry their weight in the parks. So they were just dead weight that I never used and shouldn’t have taken.

Really, the only thing I wish I had taken and didn’t have is a more powerful portable phone charger. I have one that is the size of lipstick, which would have been fine if it was only me. But of course the girls didn’t take any kind of charger, and phones were essential to communicating inside the park. By mid-afternoon the first day, we’d each had a turn at my small charger and it was out of juice. That’s when I remembered something I’d either read on a blog or seen on the DisneyWorld app: phone charger kiosks around the park.

These phone chargers were a real lifesaver. For $30 (which is quite an up charge, but supply and demand and all that make it a realistic price) you get a little bundle with a lipstick-sized battery and cords that work with different kinds of devices, and one that can be used to recharge the battery. But the real beauty of this system is that you can take a dead battery to any of the kiosks and exchange it, at no additional charge, for a fully-charged one. We did this many, many times. Without these little kiosks, we would have had a much more stressful time in the parks. We also noticed a kiosk at the Indianapolis airport, so it will be a good thing to have for future travel.

But I haven’t even mentioned the most-used item on the trip.

Essential #4: a microfiber towel.

It rained the entire time we were there, off and on. Many times, there were plenty of places to sit, but they were covered in rainwater. That’s when I whipped out the microfiber towel, dried our spot, rung out the towel, and put it back in my bag. I will never travel again without one!

Someday I’ll pack the perfect bag. That was not this trip, but it was still a good effort. Next time will be even better.

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