Things I’ve Learnt While Travelling.

This is an excerpt from a list I kept at the back of my travel diary of all the silly and sometimes helpful things you learn as you go. Welcome to the secret world of backpacking! Love Bella.

• It becomes normal to wash your clothes in the shower
• Wearing the same outfit 3 - 4 + days in a row (with an undergarment change of course) is OK!
• Food that doesn't come out of a packet / tin / microwace is a luxury.
• Earplugs are a magical and ingenious invention and only fools travel without them.
• Carrying around a backpack that is bigger than you probably means you have packed too much.
• Always say yes.
• Take the scenic route.
• You can have the most interesting conversations with fellow travellers in hostels, learn so much about them yet never exchange names.
• Paprika flavoured chips taste as bad as they sound.
• If a 14 hour bus ride on horrendous roads is the cheapest option, take it!
• There should be seperate dorms for snorers and non snorers.
• A beany hides any bad hair day (and 5cm of roots).
• ALWAYS keep your hands in your pockets around Sacre Cure otherwise you will end up with a 'good jiggy jiggy bracelet' from a pesky Jamacian scammer for 2 euro.
• Getting matted dreadlocks in your hair that you have to cut out is a good sign it's time to brush your hair.
• Having a choclate croissant every morning for breaky is totally acceptable if you are in Paris.
• If you don't have butter to cook with beer is a suitable replacement.
• You will become a defualt vego only because you cannot read what meat it is at the supermarket and the one time you took the risk with a Polish sausage that you were suppose to boil but instead fried you spent the whole night hoping not to be sick.
• Deoderant becomes a thing of the past and your layers will hide the backpacker pong.
• An early train /plane/bus to catch justifies Maccas breakfast.
• Bed bugs favourite dish is the face and neck - they always devour the most visible parts.
• Shampoo works just as well as soap.
• Snow can make a porta loo look pretty.
• Try to think in Pounds and Euro, converting back to the Aussie $ will only give you an instant rage attack.
• Months of un-shaved leg hairs = extra insulation and warmth.
• Dutch stairs are a broken leg waiting to happen.
• Inevitably the first people you meet when you walk into a hostel will be Aussie.
• A pastry based diet with little to no fruit for 5 months results in constant, huge purple bags under your eyes so big you could carry the shopping with them.
• Never underestimate the kindness of strangers. Meeting generous, friendly locals restores your faith in humainty.
• Arriving at every new city even after 5 months of being on the go still gives you a rush of excitement and curiosity.