My Top 10 Best and Favorite Travel Essentials – ✈️🌎🧳 If you love to travel, or have an upcoming trip planned and are wondering what to bring and how to get organized, these are my FAVORITE items and products that I never leave the house without! All are very practical suggestions and items to make life on the road easier, simpler, more organized, and have more FUN traveling!
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The Best Products for Travel
By no means is this an exhaustive or comprehensive list. But the items below are things that I bring on every trip to stay organized and keep my possessions orderly, protected, and “all in one piece”.
From organizing cords and cables on long haul flights, to making sure I can fit 2-3+ weeks worth of clothes in a carry-on suitcase (yes it’s possible and ain’t no one in my family checking a bag!!), to having the right beauty tools and chargers with me, the items below are my essentials!
- Packing Cubes – If you’re not using them, you’re missing the boat. They keep everything so much more organized and using them compacts your wardrobe so you can fit more in your suitcase.
- Passport Holder – Great quality, I bought one. Then I bought a few more for everyone in the family.
- European adapter + charger – If you only take one charger to Europe (or South America) or another locale that doesn’t use US-style outlets, this is your baby.
- Collapsible Hair Dryer – 1875 watts so you don’t need to spent an hour drying your hair! The best compact dryer I have tried and beats those that are 3x the price of this one! This is one of those travel essentials for women (or anyone) who needs a blow dryer on a trip and don’t want to count on your hotel or Airbnb option.
- Compact Flat Iron – Love this thing. Small but mighty! Extremely slim. It’s also great to keep in your gym bag, daughter’s sports bag, or gift. Inexpensive but powerful!
- Apple Charger for Phone + Watch – A great combo that’s connected together to make for less messy cables.
- Best Backpack for Laptops + Stuff – Not only does it hold a fullsize laptop, it holds a ton of other things like your sweater for the plane and your family’s snacks, with lots of compartments, great zippers, high quality. Honestly this is better IMO than a Tumi for a fraction of the cost.
- Cord Organizer Wallet – Keeping all the cords, cables, and charging blocks organized is important on planes and in hotels or Airbnbs and this one does the trick. I have the smaller size but recommend the larger size if you have a lots of cables/cords/blocks, i.e. more than 5 or so.
- Running/Walking/Day Belt – I have the Lulu fanny pack (great, cheap dupe here) and it’s great when you need more space, but this one fits very close to your body (great when traveling to prevent pickpockets) and can hold chapstick, a full size large iPhone, ID, credit card, a little cash. I run marathons with this and tour European churches. Super practical.
- Best Suitcase EVER – Saved the best for last. This suitcase has been to 3 continents with me including a month’s worth of possessions for South America, 3 weeks in Europe in summer 2022. And we went in June 2024 for 3 weeks to Italy, Greece, and Paris with just this and the Best Backpack (linked above). The suitcase is expandable, and it’s a CARRY-ON. We don’t check bags. We carry-on. We lift and carry our own suitcases up steep staircases in Portugal and hoist them into water taxis in Venice. The smaller the bag, the easier it is. I don’t assume someone is carrying my bag for me, ever. Rule of Thumb: If you can’t carry it up a flight of stairs, it’s too big. Those huge, huge suitcases that I see people with are basically impossible in many parts of the world on cobblestone streets and winding staircases and they aren’t practical for us. If you use packing cubes (linked above), you plan your wardrobe and yes repeat outfits, don’t go crazy with more than 3-4 pairs of shoes, bring compact beauty tools (linked above), you can fit your life for 3-4 weeks in this suitcase! It’s super high quality, it has so many pockets and compartments, it’s just a super solid piece of luggage. My daughter and I both have had this suitcase for 6-7 years and it’s still going strong with tons of travel later. Suitcases, like purses or wallets, are very personal and for me, this is so much better than a Tumi based on the actual available interior size compared with the exterior footprint. Best of all, it fits in overhead bins on domestic airlines like Southwest (sometimes the bins can be smaller) and it fits in the overhead bins when traveling on long haul flights internationally.
If you have travel products you love and can’t leave home without, please tell me about them and share in the comments below! Note that all comments are held for moderation so don’t be surprised if you don’t see it immediately.
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I love your recommendations. What I’d like to know is how do you get all your clothes and make-up and iron and shoes and blow dryer in such a small bag? I have a wedding to attend next May and I don’t know how I can get everything in there. My grand-daughter is getting married so I’ll have to have a Mother-of the Bride dress and shoes plus everyday wear. Can you Please show us what you pack and how to pack it? Plus I have a walker too.
The beauty tools are very small. They are definitely travel sized. Makeup, I honestly do not travel with that much makeup. And what I do have is all in flat compact. No bottles.
From there, I roll up my clothing into the packing cubes, I tuck shoes around the perimeter of the suitcase. And I smoosh the hairdryer in the middle of it and I’m good! Obviously, this might not be for everybody or for every situation, but just sharing what I do.
Thanks. I appreciate your quick reply. I think I take too much stuff. I will have to pare down. Have a great trip. Can’t wait to see the pics.
It’s tricky too if you’re going to a wedding or an event where you have multiple formal long dresses, shoes for each, jewelry for each, or as a man if they have suits, or more than 1 sportcoat, it can be tougher. But honestly it’s harder for women :) we just have more stuff from bras to multiple shoes to makeup to hair tools, they just don’t have that!
I constantly pare down and edit. And everything matches. Whites, tans, grays, and black for things like – tops, tees, pants, shorts, skirts. And maybe 2 fun but very slinky and thin sheer dresses that are statement dresses but fold up into nothing. So even if they match nothing else and they are very recognizable and I can’t repeat them for photos, at least they are slinky and thin and weightless and don’t take up space.
How much does your carry on end up weighing? Some airlines between Europe and US have a carryon weight limit of 18lbs and the suitcase you recommended weighs 9.7lbs so that doesn’t leave much, especially if you pack anything in addition to clothes. And yes, some airlines weight the carryon luggage when checking in so it is extremely challenging.
All very good points you made! I tend to pay for seat upgrades when I travel on long haul flights. So while not sitting in First, I do upgrade as much as I can afford or can justify for that flight. Sometimes if you have milage status with airlines, you can use points/miles to upgrade.
And the reason for upgrading apart from me being tall (5’11” so the legroom is important) is that the weight allowance is usually higher when you are paying more for your seat, and they tend to just overall be more friendly and accommodating.
I find that if you go to your gate and bypass the general ticketing area in the airport, things are more mellow. If a gate agent tells your bag won’t fit in the cabin, fine you can gate check it right there. I have had that happen more on short Southwest flights from San Diego to Vegas of 42 minutes than long haul flights due to the planes being smaller and overhead bins being smaller. Honestly though I don’t have an issue but of course, we are all at the mercy of the airlines and how the employee is feeling that day.