JUST 3 SHY OF A DOZEN TRAVEL TIPS

ON GOING ABROAD

Trying to escape your four walls from having survived cabin fever? Wanting to stretch your horizons, kick up your heals and have a funky good time abroad?  Then share these tips with those of you who aren’t afraid of Homeland Security’s looking under your clothing with an airport x-ray machine:

First: Be sure you have valid documentation (Express delivery on Passports/Visas and renewals at www.therandlgroup.com, click “Extras”. And don’t take the emergency info on your documents of passage lightly. Fill them in. There might be a celebrity look-alike out there trying to impersonate your good character especially if you look like Anna Nicole Smith or Jim Carrey.

Second: Get a really bored person to go over all the Consular Info pages, Public Announcements, Travel Warnings. . .etc. for countries you plan to visit. As the old folks in my family used to say, “When in doubt, keep your butt at home.”

Third: Don’t try to play the game “fake-a-culture.” It’s bad enough that we have wanna-be’s a plenty in America. So educate your brain with the Travel Channel or somethin’ and get wise on local laws and customs of the countries to which you are traveling. How does that phrase go? “When in Rome . . . etc. etc. (Or is that “When in Compton?”)

Fourth: Twin-out (make at LEAST two copies) of your passport page. Traveling always seems to attract Murphy’s Law scenarios. So if your purse gets snatched or your wallet falls overboard from the cruise liner and gets devoured by a whale in the South Pacific during mating season, at least you’ll have a copy. Leave copies at home with Aunt Mabel who didn’t go with you because she’s afraid of snakes on a plane or whatever excuse she has for never traveling, and keep duplicates with you in your shoe, your underwear, your bra, etc. If you sweat a lot, forget storing extra documents next to those previously mentioned body part coverings. And when in doubt . . . put electronic copies on those doo-hickey things that keep files on your keychain that you get at any office supply store. (You techies out there know what I mean. . . I call it my ‘email key fob’)

Fifth: Unless you’re a fugitive, leave an itinerary at home with the folks too broke to travel.

Sixth: Although this should go without saying, don’t trust the little girl selling girl scout cookies next to the man in a raincoat. She might be a professional midget serving as a decoy that’ll get you ripped off. And please Please  PLEASE accept NO packages from ANYONE (unless it’s Ed McMahon with a million dollar envelope) and don’t talk to strangers. If you want to talk to strangers, just cruise your own neighborhood. (Nix Ed. . . he might be a celebrity look-alike that’s a stranger.)

Seventh: Now all jokey jokes aside, this is critical if you plan to leave home with as few hitches as possible: Before you leave the country--and we’re not talking the day before either--register with the nearest U.S. embassy or consulate through the State Department's travel registration website (https://travelregistration.state.gov/ibrs/home.asp) in case it is necessary to contact you in an emergency so you can get outta-Dodge if national security needs to notify you.  This lines up with the Privacy Act, (See paragraph 3 of www.usdoj.gov/oip/how_to.htm)

and information on your welfare and whereabouts may not be released without your permission.  This is why it’s important to leave behind a detailed itinerary and contact numbers with copies of your passport or other citizenship documents with a trusted contact friend here in the good old U. S. of A. that you can trust. So if you don’t trust Uncle Pookie, don’t leave your stuff with him if you know he’s notorious for losing everything except an invitation to a free dinner.

Eighth: Sorry y’all, but geeky tourists make the dumbest crime victims. If the shoe fits, wear it. Next to last: Now . . . to avoid being hit by some Euro-thug, don’t wear your bling-bling or your Versace eyewear and your Zsa Zsa Gabor boa. Anything conspicuous, gaudy and expensive just screams “Rob Me, PLEASE Rob me!  And if you need to carry cash, don’t carry more than you need. If something you see on your trip is just so blasted irresistible, buy it online and have it shipped back home. Beats the heck out of getting a lump on the brain with a 2 x 4, or worse.

(Back to that law thingy: Stay on the safe side and do consumer business with authorized agents when you exchange money or purchase art or antiques. Remember, WalMart is worldwide.)

And Ninth: Finally, if you or the person(s) you’re traveling with act stupid and get into trouble, don’t hire a street corner lawyer, contact the nearest U.S. embassy and be sober when you get there. We're with YTB, not PrePaid Legal.

Courtesy of Cynth’ya & Ken Reed,
The R and L Group of YTB Travel.

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© 2007 cynth’ya lewis reed, certified referring travel agent and 24/7 author loving life.