Six Traveling Tips

A few things I've learned from traveling that make the trip more enjoyable and memorable...:
1) Hire drivers if you can afford it. Really, it's better than trying to take taxis all the time, especially when going for day trips!
2) Indulge a little in hotels. A bad night's sleep can wreck the whole next day, plus being able to look forward to a hot shower, comfy bed, and AC makes the rougher, hotter, stuffier parts of the day much more bearable.
3) Have a designated picture taker and take an extra camera battery. (My dad's camera battery died half way through the day in Jakarta and while we didn't miss much it would have been nice to have more pictures of Monas.)
4) Save the last day to be a little indulgent in food and things of comfort. Like a massage. Because the next day is intense travel home and not getting pooped out the day before, or making up for it in good food and pampering, is a good idea.
5) In the week after you get home, designate a whole day to print out all your pictures and put them in an album. Let every other picture slot be a note that describes a story in the trip. Do it the first week or you'll forget.
6) Take a travel journal that you jot stuff down in through out the day. Just simple sentences even. You'll probably be too tired at the end of the day to try to write out everything you did and the moments you had that you want to remember. Doing it at the time makes sure you wont forget it. Then you can write those things on the papers you stick in the slots designated for stories in your photo album.