Lucie: Hey everyone, and welcome back to my YouTube channel! As you might know,
Michael and I recently went on a two-and-a-half week honeymoon to
Thailand and the Maldives... and besides the time that I studied abroad in London
for one semester, I had never taken a trip this long in my entire life... and it
definitely took a little bit of strategizing and organizing upfront when
it came to packing. So I've received a few requests asking for me to show you
how I packed my luggage... so here you go. When it came to packing, I have to be
honest with you... I could not have done this without my twin sister Allie. So, she
came over to my apartment the day before we left, and she sat with me for about
four hours helping me. Here was our strategy: So, we had an itinerary for the
trip... so I pretty much knew ahead of time all of the activities that we had
planned, and what days of the trip they were planned for. We made four stops in
Thailand: Phuket, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, and Bangkok. And from there we spent five
additional nights in the Maldives. I went through this entire itinerary day by day,
and we picked out outfits for each activity. Some days we had multiple
activities, like a morning hike and then afternoon touring... so I accounted for
each activity scheduled for each day. Keep in mind that I repeated various
outfits multiple times on this trip. So, on average two activities a day, across
eighteen days, does NOT mean that I brought 36 different outfits. Also, now
that I'm home, I can say with certainty that this was just a rough guideline, so
our schedule changed a couple of times. We made some spontaneous decisions on
the fly. There were also some things that I couldn't have predicted, like the hotel
giving us clothes to wear during the elephant time since the elephants are
used to those colors. I also borrowed Michael's clothes a bunch, so I didn't
hold myself to only wearing the clothes that I picked out for that particular
day. But it was definitely a useful guideline so that I didn't need to unpack
everything in every location.
The bags I brought on this trip were two suitcases--These were the Away
suitcases that I put on my wedding registry--and then one backpack from
Dagny Dover which is a company founded by a fellow Johns Hopkins University
female alum. I pretty much put all of my clothing, including shoes, in my bigger
suitcase since that's the bag that I checked. Airlines have lost my checked
luggage before, so I always try to just keep clothing in there which is easily
replaceable... whereas if you're carrying any medications or prescription contact
lenses, or any special items... I would always keep those in your carry-on.
Because if you lose the checked bag, you don't want to try to replace those if
they're lost. So, starting with the big suitcase, you'll see that I packed four
pairs of shoes for this trip. And then I basically packed all of my clothing in
reverse order. The first destination on top for easy access, and then the
Maldives clothing on the bottom since I wouldn't need to get to that for a
couple of weeks. Packing cubes would have been a really helpful thing here to help
keep my items in order, but I did try to put clothing for the first two
destinations on one side of the suitcase and then clothing for the other three on
the other side, just to keep it organized. And if any outfit was repeated in
multiple locations, I made sure that it was placed in the section of the
suitcase of the first destination that it would be worn in. I also threw my
hairbrush into this bag, and I didn't bother bringing a blow-dryer because
pretty much every hotel we stayed at had one. This is the closest thing I had to
packing cubes. There are these three separate bags, one for underwear and bras,
one for socks, and one for swimwear. If you don't have these bags, these items
are usually pretty easy to just stuff into all of the empty spaces in your
suitcase, but as for how many items of each I packed... I threw in 15 pairs of
underwear, and two bras... ten pairs of socks... and seven bathing suits. I figured
there would potentially be a chance to do laundry at one of our hotels, but we
wound up doing it way cheaper and dropping off our laundry at a local wash-and-fold
in Chiang Mai for $11. I packed my big "Hello Sunshine" hat in this big
suitcase, too... and I actually took advice from one of my followers on Instagram
who DM'ed me with an interesting strategy for packing a hat like this.
So, instead of crunching it in, just keep it in its shape, and then put some
clothing inside of the head hole. I also always bring my pillow with me when I
travel... and I can't sleep without my pillow. It's really light and it flattens
down to basically nothing, so it's easy to put it in last and then just close
the bag on top of it. And now, on to the smaller bag. So, in the zipper section I
packed some extra contact lenses, my eye mask for sleeping, and then some other
items that I'll get to in a minute. On one side of the bag, you'll find my
toiletries organizer... So, I've used this for a couple of years now... It's the
absolute best thing for travel. I didn't bring much on this trip by way
of toiletries, so on the top you'll see my toothbrush, tongue scraper, and the
only dental floss that seems to work with my teeth. The middle section has
some q-tips, pimple cream, and a headband... and in the bottom section I have my face
oil and sunscreen. I didn't bring the retinol cream that I typically use on my
face at home, because that's not the best thing to use after going in the sun... And
in fact, these are the main products that I brought on this trip for my skin.
Number one: My Meow-Meow Tweet sunscreen. Number two: My Crude cleanse oil, for
taking off makeup and also moisturizing my face. And also some organic sesame oil
which I use on my body after I shower. My makeup bag is in here, too. I actually did
not wear very much makeup at all on this trip, but I did forget to pare it down
before I left... so I basically brought everything that I typically use at home,
and it's all inside this blue little bag. And this grey bag has something very
special in it... So, as their wedding present to us, my twin sister and her
boyfriend gave me and Michael this memory book to take on our honeymoon with us to
write down all of our adventures in. They also gave us an instant camera, some film,
and a glue stick for pasting photos into the book, and then this awesome painting set
for painting on-the-go. Every time we took a flight on our trip--so, going from
Phuket to Chiang Mai, or from Chiang Rai to Bangkok, or from Bangkok to the
Maldives... I sat on the plane, decorated the book, pasted the photos in, and
painted a little bit, so now it's all saved forever inside this book. Also on
this side of the bag, I put my curling iron... which I wound up using one
time on the trip. And now for the other side. I have a baseball hat, a fanny pack,
and a purse... And then, as I mentioned I try to keep items that are more
difficult to replace than clothing in my carry-on bag. So in mine you'll find my
medicine bag, my GoPro camera for underwater shots, and my handheld iPhone
gimbal. I decided not to bring my heavy camera or any loose lenses with me on
this trip... So I just filmed everything with my iPhone. I changed the camera
quality to 4k, and I think the footage looks great! Also, devices like this
gimbal make the footage a lot smoother, because usually when I'm filming with my
hands it can get a little bit shaky. Michael and I also packed our mini drone.
This is the DJI Mavic Air, and we got some awesome footage throughout the trip.
If you follow me on Instagram, you'll know that our drone actually
crash-landed in Phuket... but, thankfully, we had insurance on it, so we were able to
get another one really quickly. So, now, on to my backpack. The front zipper pocket
carried my passport and my wallet, as well as a non-toxic vegan lip butter. Of
course, my reusable water bottle was tucked into the side pocket, and then I
had hand sanitizer on the other side. I normally use an essential oils hand
sanitizer that's not as harsh, because this type tends to dry me out... but I ran
out, and this was the only option at the airport. And in the main section of the
backpack, I put all of my electronics in one clear bag--very easy to see and easy
to access everything. So this included all of my chargers, travel adapters, my
Apple watch, my hard drive, and my earbuds. I also wanted to read a lot on the
honeymoon, but I didn't want to carry books... so Michael's mom let me borrow her
Kindle for the journey. I pre-loaded about four books onto it before we left.
Michael on the other hand, brought five physical books with him... He clearly
didn't mind being weighed down. And, in his defense, he finished four out of the
five on the trip. Also in the backpack, I put two glasses cases--One with two pairs
of sunglasses in it, and one for my regular glasses.
I also brought an aluminum-free deodorant with me which was very
important to keep in my backpack on the plane with me because I always start to
sweat during travel. Next, my pencil case and my journal for some daily journaling, my
2020 planner for habit tracking--and also so that I could use our 18-hour
flights to do some organizing... And then in the very back of the backpack there's
another zipper pocket, and I put my computer in there. And I didn't use this
to do work or check emails throughout the trip, I was just using it to offload
all of our photos and videos onto my external hard drive along the way.
Because I was using my cellphone for everything, I just didn't want to risk
breaking my phone and then losing all of our digital memories... So I definitely
offloaded footage and videos at pretty much every destination. I used mostly
sustainable and reusable bags for all of this packing. The only plastic bag that I
brought was for my large bottle of sesame oil because I really didn't want
it to crack in the suitcase and ruin all of my clothing... So if you have any
suggestions for a zero-waste option for something like this, please comment down
below. I hope you found this video interesting and that you're inspired to
pack neatly for your next travel journey, wherever you're headed. Let me know your
biggest packing tips in the comment section, and I'll see you next time on YouTube.