At home and abroad

My friends often laugh at me because I pack so early, often weeks in advance. For at least one or two trips, I’ve been known to have all my clothes stuffed into my little roller bag two months ahead of time. This makes me feel calmer, knowing that at least this task can be crossed off my To Do list. I also like being able to refine my choices as we draw closer to departure.

For our current trip, however, to Brazil, I only loaded my gear in the suitcase on Thursday. That’s because we will spend most of our time in and around the Amazon River, a notoriously buggy place. We wanted to spray all of our apparel with Permethrin (an insect repellant), close to the departure date. Above you see almost everything I’m taking, hanging in the closet to dry. (Steve nobly sprayed it all outdoors, as it’s not great to breathe.)

Now we’re in Dallas, waiting to board our flight to Bogota in Colombia, where we’ll sleep tonight. Tomorrow afternoon we’ll fly south to the jungle town of Leticia. There the real adventure will begin.