Preparing to Travel To-Do List
| by Jason | 26 Comments » | Reflections, Travel Tips, Trip Planning
Packing And Selling Stuff
Preparing to travel, regardless of travel style, can be a stressful task. We weren’t able to sleep; awake until 3:00am thinking about all that remained to be done for our backpacking trip.
When you live in the United States, traveling to another country typically means you have a long trip overseas. It means you have to research passport and visa requirements, book flights, and ensure things at home are taken care of.
Don’t expect your planning to be perfect, it’s impossible for long term travel. This is a journey that will be filled with the unknown; new cultures, language barriers and obscure villages. For me, it is was about letting go of control. “I am unable to prevent the inevitable stress we will experience.” Being able to control yourself when in a situation that is out of your control is a skill you will attempt develop.
What is involved in preparing to backpack around the world?
That is the question we asked ourselves repeatedly, never really getting an answer. The fear of not accomplishing everything before we departed kept us awake at night. I would wake Aracely up and say, “I can’t sleep. There is just so much trip planning left to do. Look, our room appears as if we haven’t accomplished a thing. All of our clothes are still in our closets and we haven’t sold any furniture yet. We don’t even have plane tickets!” It seems funny today, now that we have more experience planning for long term travel.
Backpacking Around the World To-Do List
- Sell Your Stuff on Ebay
- Create a Budget
- Purchase Backpacking Gear
- Purchase Camping / Hiking Gear if appropriate
- Purchase Camera Equipment
- Purchase iTouch
- Create a Skype Account
- Tell Your Families
- Notify Employers
- Check Passports
- Notify Landlord / Sell or Rent House
- Create a Twitter Account (cool travelers on there)
- Create a Facebook Account (global address book)
- Create a Couchsurfing Account
- Are Going to Play Fantasy Leagues on the Road?
- Create a Rough Itinerary
- Check Visa Requirements for Each Country
- Choose a Departure Date
- Get Required Immunizations
- Put Remaining Stuff in Storage (don’t store old photos in hot attic)
- Purchase Travelers Insurance
- Change Auto Insurance
- Open Travel Friendly Checking Account
- Open Travel Friendly Credit Card Account
- Change Address or Set Up Mail Storage
- Cancel Cell Phones or Consider Global Phone Plan
- Practice Packing
- Break in Boots or Shoes
- Set Up First Aid Kit
- Purchase Lonely Planet Guides (if needed)
- Travel Immunizations
- RTW Trip Budgeting for Central America
- Choosing the Right Backpack
- Leaving Our Home
- How We Paid for a Year of Travel
- Lack of a Travel Itinerary
Solitude In The Woods
This is why preparing for our around the world trip became overwhelming. It is a lot of tasks to complete, especially while you are still working your normal job and trying to visit with friends and family on the weekends. Most of the tasks revolve around long term travel. You will notice that when you plan for a short vacation, most of the research surrounds where you will be traveling to, lodging and sight seeing. This list has very few of those items. This is the challenging, uncontrollable part of the journey. It is the unknown. You don’t exactly know where you will be staying week to week. You won’t know many of the places you will be traveling to yet. Plane tickets will be purchased as needed. You will need to trust in the kindness of foreign peoples.  All these unknowns are what make long term travel so exciting, and at the same time overwhelming.
Related Posts
- How We Paid For A Year Of Travel
- Lack of a Travel Itinerary
- Are We Really Doing This?
- What Will I Miss While Traveling?
- Budget Travel: The Good, Bad, And The Ugly
Written by Jason
Co-founder of TwoBackpackers.com. Jason has been traveling, writing, taking photos and creating adventure videos since 2024, when he departed on his first year long travel backpacking journey. Jason is a full-time blogger and social marketing guru trying to find the way. Visit my website
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well. if it makes you feel any better, you have a few things ticked off your list that we haven’t done yet and we leave in 2 weeks. gah! like plan a budget. haahhhaha…wonder how long i’ll be giggling about that.
Hey at least you are giggling about it. Stay positive!
I know you will get it all done. It’s all the stress, that keeps you going, Jay.
It’s going to be the greatest experience of your lives, and Mommy is jealous!!
Well, you will be visiting us somewhere along the way I am sure.
“Being able to control yourself when in a situation that is out of your control is a skill I hope to learn.”
Man I can’t tell you how I’ve learn that on my trip so far. And in a way that is so deep for me and applies to so many facets of my life. I’m really excited for you guys.
Guatemala is your first destination? Guatemala has a very special place in my heart. I hope you guys fall in love with the people there as much as I have.
That list looks SO familiar! We are about 3 weeks away from our year long adventure – although we are making some domestic stops first (Atlanta to Seattle and Alaska) but will be on our way to Tokyo the first week of September!
We just actually applied for a Capital One Travel Rewards Credit Card – no international 3% conversion fee, and am setting up an HSBC ATM account which also lets you take out money with no transaction fees with their premier account all over SE Asia and a lot of other countries.
We would love to keep in touch, maybe meet up and definitely exchange tips as we plan our RTW travels!
this is a savage list i will be coming back and forth to this before i leave.
Excellent! Glad we could help Kevin.
there is very little you REALLY need. backpackers generally take far too much. All you really need: a few clothes, swiss penknife, basic toiletries and an IPOD.
It all depends on the individual. I say, “pack what you want.” There are no rules as to how much or how little you should bring.
Oh my! Looks like a lot to be done. It sounds exciting as well as nerve-wracking…this is one of those things I would love to do, or at least love to think about doing once in my lifetime. It looks like you’re coming to the end of your one-year vacation. Do you have plans on continuing, or are you going to go home?
-J. P. Cabit
Editor-In-Chief, Fedwick Agency
Ahh! You said it! “Vacation.” We like to think long-term travel isn’t a vacation, but rather a lifestyle. We are living on the road, cooking in kitchens, trying to find free or cheap places to stay and sometimes looking for work or volunteer opportunities.
Our year long journey has come to an end and we are back in NJ. We are going to continue to travel and remain digital nomads. A term that is used to describe someone who can work from anywhere, as long as they are connected. This is basically what we did the past year to maintain our blog. Only now, we need to do it to maintain an income. A bit more pressure.
Stop thinking, get out there and do it! I know, it’s always more complicating than that, but a little support helps.
very nice blog !!
Great informative list
Nice comprehensive list. It looks daunting, but if you take a day or two you can knock most of them out. Procrastinating is where I get into trouble…
You and me both, Phil.
Trusting in the kindness of foreign peoples is key. It can and it will happen. Most people are happy to have you in their country, and some will take you under their wing and help in a time of need. Trusting can be the hard part though-if a situation doesn’t seem right, it probably isn’t!
I think as travelling becomes more of a lifestyle and less of a thing you do between other things, the dauntingness of it all lessens. You will find yourself wondering how it was you thought you needed 73 pairs of underpants and all those t-shirts, and compressing your life down to a tiny amount. It’s amazing how paltry airline allowances can cause you to substantially rethink your travelling needs, not to mention the fact you usually have to lug this stuff all over the place! I’ve been on the road for around fourteen months now, and am down to about twenty kilos, which includes a drum I thought may come in handy. My advice would be to start off taking everything you think you will need, and then not being afraid to give stuff away when you realise you actually don’t need it. And don’t take stuff you would desperately miss if it gets lost/stolen/covered in strange goo.
Laurence, great advice. I completely agree with your comment. We definitely brought stuff we didn’t need and we ended up either sending it home or giving it away. When we came home to a bunch of stuff I got annoyed as to how much crap we had. I will try to travel will less on our next trip for sure!
Thank you for this list! I am helping a friend pack for her backpacking experience and I will be sure to get this over to her ASAP. Thank you again for your help!
So glad we can help Melissa. Best of luck to your friend!
Great blog. We are agree with your advice.
This is a great list! I’ll be sure to pass it on
Hi! I just stumbled upon this today because of a twitter post by @travelogged. I left Florida on January 31, 2024 on a one year adventure and never returned! You mention changing car insurance. It’s important for Americans to realize that having a gap in your car insurance is viewed as a risk. It’s something I learned and always stayed as a driver on my family’s policy. That way, if I ever return to the US, I can get normal rates. Also, whenever I do go home to the US for a visit, I am able to confidently drive any car (including rentals) and I know I’m covered.
My other advice is to put a limit on how long you can stomach your things in Public Storage. I never did this and I only cleared out my unit one month ago! I only had ‘stuff’ in there – not even furniture. Whenever I do the math on how much I spent over the years, I get queasy. When I left, I would have sworn that I’d never be in a situation where I was still paying on a storage unit all those years later. I wish I had set a limit on how much I was willing to pay in Public Storage fees. Great blog – thanks for the insights today. Cheers!
Thanks so much for this list—so very helpful. Will definitely revisit this site before I head off again.
Glad we could help Charu.