Travel tips from Adventure Girl, Ashley Welton

Please welcome Ashley Welton, chief adventure copywriter and brand anthropologist at Miniskirt Ninja.

We're a community-based travel blog and we welcome submissions from everyone. Whether you're a budget-baller or a first class only kinda traveler, we'd love to hear from you. Visit our Writer's Guidelines and learn how you can share your travel advice, stories and adventures!

Preparing for travel while maintaining your sanity

Preparing to leave home for a period of time is stressful. There seem to be five-hundred-THOUSAND things to take care of and just when you think you're done, another struts over with a smug look on its face and adds itself to the list. Cheeky fellow.

packing travel adviceThe days leading up to departure can be a monster-faced, head-spinning, blood pressure spiking experience, or they can be busy but not exorcism worthy. A while back I was getting ready to travel for an undetermined length of time to different geographic locales, one with quickly dropping temperatures and another where it was so hot the thermometers threatened to go on strike due to sustained levels of mercury exposure. On the trip I'd be visiting cities, countryside's, and beaches. It was a veritable packing nightmare, but packing was the least of my concerns.

The preparation to leave threatened to kill me.

Between last minute client meetings, a needy house with issues, a mournful one-eyed cat, and a basketful of other odds and ends, not including my deep need to surf in order to maintain physical and mental balance, I had my share of headless chicken moments.

Having done the pre-travel mamba a few zillion times before, I've accrued some tips to keep the demons at bay and the blood-pressure levels in the safe zone.

Make a list: Some of you may be born list-makers and pieces of paper with stacked words litter your house. Generally, I am not one for traditional to-do tallies, but when all the small pre-departure tasks get to be too much and my brain threatens to take a vacation of its own, I make a list and work through the items one by one.

Only write down the VERY LARGE AND IMPORTANT tasks. Do those first. You can always make another list. This way you won't overwhelm yourself with a pad full of unchecked items or spend time on the unimportant stuff in order to avoid what you really need to be doing.

how to pack with sanityForgo the unnecessary to-do's: The silver probably does not need polishing before you leave on your trip to the Sudan and I'm sure the photo albums don't need to be rearranged in chronological order. Your pets, however, will appreciate having enough food and the plants, enough water. Do what's necessary first; then re-arrange the furniture. Which leads me to the next tip.

Stay focused: Leaving is not brain surgery. Nobody's life is at risk (except maybe your own, and your spouse's and your children's). But, if you stay focused, and calmly pick your way through the necessary tasks (re-read above!) then you can avoid both mean mommy syndrome and the insane asylum.

Give yourself 2 hours more than you think you'll need: On the last preparation day before your departure, if you think you'll need 4 hours to accomplish everything, allow for 6. It's an attainable luxury to have a moment of calm before heading to the airport and everything will run that much smoother if you're not doing the fruit fly dash minutes before it's time to leave the house.

Lastly remember, everything will get done: And if it doesn't, it will be okay. Promise.

What are your pre-travel preparation trips? How do you best stay sane during the days leading up to a journey? Tell us in the comments! Find us on Twitter or Facebook and let's start talking!

About Ashley Welton

Ashley Welton ~ @miniskirtninjaAshley Welton is the chief adventure copywriter and brand anthropologist at Miniskirt Ninja. She hails from Hawaii and delights in working with businesses to uncover and translate their brand through action inducing copy that inspires, converts, and ignites a sense of adventure in all who come across it.

Ashley is an expert story-teller, connection creator, and exalts in helping companies succeed. When she's not having an intimate dinner with her thesaurus, she dedicates time to surfing, traveling, exploring and the general outdoors.

Catch up with Ashley online

• Twitter - @miniskirtninja
• Facebook - www.facebook.com/miniskirtninja
• Website - www.ashleywelton.com