I have this thing for notebooks. I don't know what it is, but I absolutely love them. I buy them as often as I can, and I love shopping for them at places like Target and TJ Maxx.
When I studied abroad in Spain, I came across this really cute one. It says (in Spanish) "I'm going to live a million adventures," and has sketches of adventure equipment. I couldn't help myself – I had to buy it. I didn't start my travel journal right away while I was still in Spain, unfortunately. But I did have a cute notebook to use later on, when I started traveling again.
I use my travel journal to document different places that I go and memories that I make. It's been with me to places like my island home in Washington, the U.K., my university in Southern California, and Yosemite National Park. It chronicles some sweet moments that I've spent in transit or at home. I get a lot of compliments on it, so I'm going to share some basic tips for how you can create a travel journal, too.
Save Everything That's Flat
This includes anything and everything - maps, those stickers you get when you check a bag at the airport, ticket stubs, (clean) napkins and food labels, newspapers, brochures, pressed leaves or flowers, teabag tags, and business cards, to name a few. Even if there might not be a use for it, save it! Maybe it will come in handy when you get home or to a quiet place and start to paste stuff in your journal.
Learn to Recognize Memorable Moments
I've been learning a lot about mindfulness in the past few years, and this is definitely a great skill to have when you're traveling. One of my favorite quotes goes like this:
"I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, 'If this isn't nice, I don't know what is.'" -Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
When you're traveling and think, "wow, this is a really nice moment," sketch it or write about it. Maybe it's the way the sunshine feels on your skin or the way a particular field that your train just passed looked. Maybe it's a beautiful building or famous piece of art or enchanting doorway or yummy dish of food. Many of these moments that I have documented aren't particularly flashy or touristy, but they mean a lot to me when I revisit them. They are preserved moments of time when I was thoroughly enjoying myself and what I was doing or observing.
Plan ahead...
When I left for my study abroad in England, I knew I would be drinking a lot of English Breakfast Tea. I saw a cute idea for a page on Pinterest, and I really wanted to do something similar. I made sure to keep as many tea bag tags as I could so that I could make the page that I had in mind. The page was a documentation of a couple of especially memorable cups of tea that I had while I was there and how I enjoyed them. I think it turned out to be kind of cute, and each of the teacups reminds me of a specific moment of time. Planning ahead can help you know which flat items are especially valuable, and can give some of your journal pages direction.
Or don't.
Some of my favorite pages have been spur-of-the-moment decisions. I've just started gluing things to the page without thinking about how it would all go together. That's okay sometimes!
Find inspiration in everything
When you're looking through all of the flat things you've collected, you'll inevitably find a really awesome clipping. Create a page around that clipping. My very favorite page in my travel journal, pictured below, is about a sweet and carefree day that I spent in Scotland. This page came about this way. When I saw the "Travel Far and Wide" clipping, which came out of a brochure for the London Tube, I knew I needed to include it in my journal somewhere, and for some reason the "HERE:" clipping and the flowers from my hike seemed to fit really well with it. When you see a clipping that speaks to you, make it the centerpiece for a page!
Start journaling
So now you know the basics of how to start your own travel journal. What special moments will you document? Where will you go next? What kinds of pages will you create? And as for the most important question, what notebook will you "need" to buy to put them all in?
