What To Wear When Traveling

As I outlined Sunday, I did a lot of traveling yesterday. From one bed to another, it took 29 hours. By the time I reached my bed here in Calgary, it was about 3 in the morning, which is why I did not post yesterday.

     Mondays are going to be about fashion. With all this travelling–not only between Winchester and Calgary, but between towns and cities, too–I’ve gotten to be pretty decent at knowing what to wear to be prepared for the worst of circumstances. Because I’ve been travelling by planes, that’s going to be the focus for this advice, but you can change anything to adapt to your own circumstances.

Let’s start from the bottom. Shoes. I had three pairs of shoes with me in Winchester: Boots with zippers, sneakers with laces, and flats with tiny buckles. I only brought one pair since it’s just winter break, but even if I’d brought all of them, the ones I would wear are the boots. It seems counter-productive since my boots have buckles and other metal that would set off the detector, but some dude tried (and failed) to make a shoe-bomb a few years ago so now you have to take your shoes off anyway. Plus, because my boots have zippers, they’ll be easier to take on and off.

I strongly recommend not wearing any type of skirt or dress for a flight. Sitting on loose fabric like that for a long period of time is going to crease it in awkward places. Airplanes are also often cold, and a skirt or dress is not going to offer much protection from that. You should wear something comfortable, and a belt if you have to. None of the passengers want to see the dark side of the moon, if you know what I mean. I’ve been on the unfortunate end of that. Please wear a belt, especially if you aren’t in an aisle seat and you have to climb past people to get to the bathroom. Please.

Layers are a great idea for travelling, especially if there are a lot of environmental changes like I had on this trip. What I did was wear a t-shirt, then a button-up over that, then I had an extra pullover, and lastly my jacket. For parts of my trip where I had to wait outside, four layers served me well. In the airport, I stowed both my jacket and pullover which made my load a little less cumbersome. It got cold in the middle of my flight so I put my pullover on until it got warm again.

For the flight, I also make sure I have thick socks. My boots happen to be really warm, but with other footwear my feet are often first to get cold when the cabin temperature drops. Having an extra pair of socks is good to have just in case.

With hair long enough to get in the way or get really static, a hair tie is also good to have. You can keep it on your wrist and it won’t set off metal detectors or get in the way of anything, so it’s all pros, no cons.

If you have metal jewellery you want to wear while travelling, put it in your carry-on and you can wear it after you’ve gone through security. I also recommend glasses over contacts if you have them because the air in the cabin can be really dry and if you get tired while travelling, your eyes can get irritated. On the same note, bringing lip balm and/or a small hand lotion that meets security guidelines in a clear plastic bag will be useful in a dry cabin.

Bonus Points: Large pockets!!! Ladies, I know that on the rare occasion your jeans actually have pockets (Who invented fake-pockets? Why?) the pockets are usually too small or the jeans too tight to use. This is why purses exist, but when flying, a purse may or may not count as one of your carry-on bags (depending on the company) and besides, you’ve got enough bags to keep track of as it is. I wore a loose jacket that has four enormous pockets that close with buttons to solve the pocket problem.

Hope that helps you with any travelling you may be doing these holidays! Tuesdays like today would normally have an Arts+Crafts post, but it’s looking like I’ll have to skip that one for this week in order to get back on schedule. Come back tomorrow to see what I have planned for Wednesdays!