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How do you remember your vacations?

talkamotta

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I was on another blog....Worldmark. The lady was saying she had checked her log and had been to this many worldmarks. I was amused because I had looked at my vacation history because I couldn't remember how long my now husband and I had been dating. I'm 65, we got married when we were 60 and we dated for 5 years. I kind of keep a log and have pictures logged per trip and dates. I've been retired for about 8 years and the days, months and years go by so fast and get a bit blurry. There are little things that will make a trip extra special. I want to remember and keep things straight.

My question is does anyone out there keep a journal of album or log of some kind and how do you do it?
 

bluehende

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I always take pictures and then put them in a new file that is dated and placed so I can look them up. I go through the file structure often to reminisce.
 

DaveNV

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My question is does anyone out there keep a journal of album or log of some kind and how do you do it?


We have two. I keep separate folders in my online email account (gmail) with year, month and name of trips we've made (e.g. 2009 09 Las Vegas). They go back to 2005. There were trips before then, but my local email crashed once, and that was that. In each folder is all the reservation and travel info about that trip. Rental car confirmations, plane flights, hotel/timeshare reservations, tour reservations, and whatever else. I use it to reference very quickly when and where we went someplace.

The other is on our home network, there are folders with similar names and dates that contain the photos we took on that trip. It an easy way to access things. I am often asked, "Have you ever been to..." and I can quickly find out. It helps when trying to locate trip pictures, too. (Specific pictures are stored in other ways, too, but this method is the major warehouse. My spouse has a degree in commercial photography, and we have hundreds of thousands of images on the network.)

Dave
 

Passepartout

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When my DW and I started traveling, she started a red file folder for each trip. In it, in chronological order are original order, down payment and confirmation, flight orders and confirmation, insurance payment and confirmation, rental cars, side tips, cruises, etc, etc, etc. They are all labeled in Sharpie on the spine with destination and month/year. These are all filed chronologically on shelves in the home office. There can be maps, photos, items of interest like menus we come across. Our travel has slowed down some, but even now, we have 2-3 upcoming trip folders out, and working.

As we all know, the most enjoyable part of travel is the planning. Not the actual going, or the remembering it after you return home, so this is a way to reduce the stress of a trip (Ever have a desk clerk try to tell you that you are not expected on that day, or that there is no record of your rental car) when you have their printed confirmation. On occasion, long after a trip, someone will ask, 'Have you ever been to. . . ., Where to stay there.' We can easily open the file and get the information. It also allows us to reminisce on past trips.

I have no quarrel with those who keep it electronically, but we do hard copy.

Jim
 

slip

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We have photos and videos, all kept on the cloud. We don’t do bucket lists either but we do take photos and videos to share. Most of the special moments are memories and those are the stories told most often.
 

Chrispee

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I'm one of those weirdos who finds taking a bunch of photos and video detracts from my experiences, so I try to take minimal photos and just live in the moment. However, my wife does the opposite and she makes a photo book after every one of our vacations.
 

PigsDad

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For the last several years, almost all of our photos have been taken with our iPhones. With the Apple Photos app, you can choose "Places" and it brings up a map with all our photos placed on the map. Easy-peasy to zoom in to, say, Hilton Head to see our photos, see the dates, etc. Other than that, we don't keep any formal records of our vacations; just the memories.

Kurt
 

dsmrp

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When we started travelling regularly about 10+ years ago, we would buy a fairly inexpensive art print of the city/town or sight on our trip. Then frame and hang it on our kitchen 'travel' wall. We started with street scenes such as white washed Crete greek town & Assisi Italy, to volcano & Waipio valley on the Big Island Hawaii, Sedona red rocks and others. Last one was a small sketch of Westminster Abbey. We also save some of the pamphlets and flyers we
get from the sites & attractions we visited.

Early on in some of those trips, my husband also bought me a couple pieces of jewelry :whooopie:( for anniversaries ) which I remember for the trip too. An eastern mediteranean style ring on Crete & a pendant from Florence Italy. And I got myself a snorkeler pendant when we did a lot of snorkeling on St John, VI. In fact, I happened to wear the ring last week, and my co-worker from Turkey noticed and liked it cause it reminded her of her old country.
 
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DaveNV

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As for memorabilia, we buy a refrigerator magnet on every trip. Just one. It can't be any old magnet - it has to be evocative of the vacation it came from - color, shape, an image on it, or something. The fridge has been covered, uncovered, and recovered several times with magnets from our various trips. Kind of fun, actually, to dig around in the bag of spares and replace one on the fridge door with another, just to change the view.

I mentioned in a previous thread the the other item we like to get are better-than-tourist-junk coffee mugs. Two that match, from a certain place we especially liked. When we share that first cup of coffee every morning, the mugs match, and it's a memory of that vacation. We've kind of slowed down on it, because there are a LOT of mugs in the cupboard, and only two of us using them most of the time. But the ones we use are cool.

Dave
 

WinniWoman

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Well- I never liked to take photos as I thought it distracted from the experience. BUT- my husband did and I always "supervised" his photography. LOL!

Then- my employer gave me an IPHONE. That and Facebook changed everything and before you know it the journalist in me came out and I went haywire with snapping photos and documenting our trips.

Prior to the technology we did keep photo albums of the "big" trips like to Alaska, Hawaii and Arizona. I even had some photos blown up and framed.

But in the last few years my husband makes CD's of our special trips using our photos with appropriate music. For example, for our trip to Yellowstone he put all the photos to the "Dances With Wolves" soundtrack. He even puts "credits" at the end- "Produced by" and "Photos by", etc. LOL!

We enjoy watching these sometimes and we do subject some friends and family to them occasionally. Our son HATES when we show them! Has no interest. Ha! ha! I read somewhere that younger people don't like vacation CD's.

In my earlier days I had kind of a bucket list, but I have decided as I have gotten older that having a bucket list puts a kind of competitive stress on and with myself and a comparison with others. I also belong to the Vermont 251 club (goal to see all 251 towns in the state) and I feel the same way about that. I think if I never complete the list it will be ok, as long as I enjoyed visiting what towns I could.

I feel the same way about travel. I am glad we have done what we have done. I am now into slow travel- not trying to check things off a list.
 

mentalbreak

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We have photos and videos, all kept on the cloud. We don’t do bucket lists either but we do take photos and videos to share. Most of the special moments are memories and those are the stories told most often.

Up until last month, I used the term “bucket list” to describe those things that I’ve always wanted to see/do. Then my 75yo father almost died when we were pursuing one of those, and I will never use that reference again.
 

Timeshare Von

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I keep an excel spreadsheet on all of our timeshare use, but that hardly takes care of remembering all of the great vacations (timeshare of otherwise).

I too take a lot of photos . . . and for the really special trips (like international, or "once in a lifetime" destinations) I create Shutterfly photo books. Last summer my sister and I did a great trip to Myrtle Beach and the OBX. I did a photobook and gave her one too.

I always see my later years like Rose in Titanic . . . and I want to be surrounded with photos of the great places I've been and experiences I have had. If I should become like Allie in The Notebook, I want for David to be able to be like Noah and tell the stories of our life together through our travels together.
 

AnnaS

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I definitely take pictures. Not a ton like I did many years ago. I also like to print most of them and put them in an album. I love to browse through old photo albums, mine and my parents'.

I also type up a trip report. Print it and place in folder. Hubby and I tend to forget quiet a few things. If driving, which state we stopped, which hotel we stayed overnight in, what we did new/different, etc. etc. When we discuss something and can't agree on it, I look back on those reports and see if it's something I jotted down :)
 

geist1223

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We use to take a lot of pictures. But over time they disappeared into a box (if taken with a camera) or transferred and stored on a computer if taken with smart fone, but seldom reviewed. We have cut back drastically and simply enjoy. Then I heard Garth Brooks talking about taking pictures of his kids. With the first kid he had numerous albums full of pictures. With his subsequent kids there were drastically fewer pictures. When the younger ones asked him about this he explained that he discovered it was more important to simply enjoy his time with the kids (to live in the moment) than to try and document every event in detail.

So now we take fewer pictures. Then go through after the trip and get rid of most of them and keep just a few. Which are stored in separate folders on the smart fone, on the computer, and on a thumb drive.
 

geekette

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I've never been a picture-taker and that hasn't changed. I live the experience and file it to memory. Sure, just like real life, little details will get buried but the overall experience sticks.

Just back from the Ozarks, no pics taken by me, and so far as I know, my travel companion didn't take any, either.
 

Passepartout

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Early on, in our travels, I carried a video and a film, then digital camera, and took tons of pictures. It felt like I was seeing our trips through a viewfinder. The pictures/videos ended up in labeled boxes for each trip. Then it dawned on me that I was missing the joy of the travel. I was just collecting 'tourist views'. No one is going to ever look at my pictures. So with the advent of better phone cameras, I just take a picture to trigger my own memories. The result: better memories, and fewer photos.

Jim
 
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mentalbreak

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We have albums full of photos from family vacations from my childhood. The ones that we treasure are the ones that include our family members.

Not the scenic photos of just Mt Rushmore, the EPCOT ‘golf ball’, the Grand Canyon, etc. that you can find on the internet. But actual people enjoying their vacation.

So these are the only types of photos that we take on vacation anymore. And they may include ‘poses at the sights’, but often they are photos from playing games in the condo, sharing a meal, being goofy, etc.
 

aandmrun

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I love to look back at my photos and remember the good times so I am one who scrap books. I take photos and also jot notes on favorite tours and/or restaurants so that I can share with someone who asks me about the locations when they are traveling. It got to where I had way too many large books for my bookshelf, so now I do small 8x8 books on-line. It's fun remembering the good times as I organize the photos to use for the books. My friends always ask to see what we did and where we went in order to assist them in their vacation planning. It's much nicer to just show them the books.
 

talkamotta

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When we first started traveling and I had my new digital camera. I had lots of pictures, since then I've deleted a lot of them. For example Maui where I've been there several times there are only a few scenic pictures. Most are of people. Last year I went to Maui and Kauai with my son and the older children. Some had to leave earlier because of school so the last 2 days it was me and my 18 year old Makena. She is a marathoner and extremely active. I am 65 years old, over weight and have a bad back. Our last day we went to hidden beach for snorkeling. For those of you haven't been there it was a little strenuous. Couldn't take pictures because I needed both hands to hold on to the ropes. Would have loved to have proof of that one and the views are beautiful. But there was a U tube of someone doing that hike. Makenna asked me if I was going to show grandpa. I said hell no, he will be mad, but I'm going to show all my grandchildren because they will think I rock. The day before we went on a kayaking trip and went to secret falls where we had to climb down using the roots of trees. I had a camera for that one. That trip i gave Makena the blue books and told her she was the travel guide. We went to poipu for snorkeling and a seal swan in between me and this girl. The look on her face was priceless. I lost 14 lbs on that trip and I ate a lot and slept great. Because of our trips to Hawaii Makenna is going to BYU Hawaii and she is so smart that her 4.0 how gives her free tuition. Those are the things I don't want to forget, so I guess along with the fewer pictures I need to write down some of these stories.
 
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I was on another blog....Worldmark. The lady was saying she had checked her log and had been to this many worldmarks. I was amused because I had looked at my vacation history because I couldn't remember how long my now husband and I had been dating. I'm 65, we got married when we were 60 and we dated for 5 years. I kind of keep a log and have pictures logged per trip and dates. I've been retired for about 8 years and the days, months and years go by so fast and get a bit blurry. There are little things that will make a trip extra special. I want to remember and keep things straight.

My question is does anyone out there keep a journal of album or log of some kind and how do you do it?
I have always been the worst at journals and pictures until a year or 2 ago when I discovered Instagram . I use it as my travel log to document dates, places and even room numbers in case I want to request that room in the future. Wish we had Instagram back in the early 70s when I really started traveling.



Sent from my SM-N950U using Tapatalk
 

geist1223

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When we first started traveling and I had my new digital camera. I had lots of pictures, since then I've deleted a lot of them. For example Maui where I've been there several times there are only a few scenic pictures. Most are of people. Last year I went to Maui with my son and the older children. Some had to leave earlier because of school so the last 2 days it was me and my 18 year old Makena. She is a marathoner and extremely active. I am 65 years old, over weight and have a bad back. Our last day we went to hidden beach for snorkeling. For those of you haven't been there it was a little strenuous. Couldn't take pictures because I needed both hands to hold on to the ropes. Would have loved to have proof of that one and the views are beautiful. But there was a U tube of someone doing that hike. Makenna asked me if I was going to show grandpa. I said hell no, he will be mad, but I'm going to show all my grandchildren because they will think I rock. The day before we went on a kayaking trip and went to secret falls where we had to climb down using the roots of trees. I had a camera for that one. That trip i gave Makena the blue books and told her she was the travel guide. We went to poipu for snorkeling and a seal swan in between me and this girl. The look on her face was priceless. I lost 14 lbs on that trip and I ate a lot and slept great. Because of our trips to Hawaii Makenna is going to BYU Hawaii and she is so smart that her 4.0 how gives her free tuition. Those are the things I don't want to forget, so I guess along with the fewer pictures I need to write down some of these stories.

Maybe this was Kauai?
 

linsj

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I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who prints pictures, so I can label them and add appropriate details--something I can't do with the digital files that I keep too. I don't keep all the other details of vacations that some of you mentioned; they're not important to me. I have kept the reports I've given for international missions trips as I want a record of those details.
 

WinniWoman

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I'm glad to know I'm not the only one who prints pictures, so I can label them and add appropriate details--something I can't do with the digital files that I keep too. I don't keep all the other details of vacations that some of you mentioned; they're not important to me. I have kept the reports I've given for international missions trips as I want a record of those details.


I actually would love to print some pics but I just haven't. I don't know how- my husband does. I am not even sure we have what we need to. He used to print some, but usually had some trouble with it.
 
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