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  • Day 33

    Offline Travel Journal

    June 27, 2022, North Sea ⋅ ☁️ 59 °F

    Do you keep a physical journal when you travel? I do! It makes a nice keepsake, plus it helps me compost my experiences and keep research notes.

    Lately, I’m fond of these cheap 100-page, 9x6 inch spiral notebooks. On one side, I keep a daily scrapbook with a few brief notes.

    The ship issues a daily schedule, so I cut the date out of that and paste or tape it into the page. I jot a few brief notes with daily highlights and add anything pertinent, like small maps, receipts, and other ephemera. It’s a tidy little summation of our daily activities. (I also have a separate bag for naps I’ve collected along the way and may refer back to.)

    Pretty straight forward, right?

    Here’s my personal quirk, though. I also flip the notebook over and start writing in it from the other side, as well. This side is for random thoughts, research notes, possible blog post topics, observations, rants, to-do lists, doodles, daydreams, and so forth.

    It’s messy, but that’s fine. To me, this side is a compost pile for ideas.

    When the two halves of the notebook meet in the middle, I start a new notebook. Seems to take about a month.

    How about you? Do you keep any sort of physical journal or scapbook? What’s your technique?
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