Per my earlier post, I’ll going to be heading off to Thailand for a multi-week long motorcycle trip and vacation.  Packing/planning for a activity-diverse trip–equal parts motorcycle riding, trekking and lounging on the beach–has been a challenging adventure in and of itself… ultimately worth of a series of blog posts.

Here is the first installment dealing with the Photography & Navigation equipment that I’ll be bringing

Photography & Navigation Pack List

• Casio Exilim EX-Z85 + 2 Batteries
  
• Always On Camera Wrap-Up
• GiSteq Phototrackr CD1100BT GPS Logger
• Polaroid DVC-00725F High Definition Camcorder + 3 Batteries
• 4 x 4 GB SD Memory Cards (mostly for camcorder)
• 2 x 2 GB SD Memory Card (mostly for camera)
• Tiny USB SD Memory Card Reader
• GPS?

When I was doing mobile marketing for Sony/Intel, they gave me a DSC-U30 ultra, ultra portable camera, which was the best camera I’ve ever owned.  The U30 was excellent except it was limited to just 2 megapixel (although it took great shots), and I was looking for a higher resolution option.  I ended up settling with the Casio Exilim EX-Z85, which is pretty much the smallest point and shoot on the market.  It is quite a bit taller than my old Sony, but much thinner and with more aggressive specifications.  I’ve found that it is hard to take pictures if you don’t have your camera with you–and often the best photos are taken when you weren’t planning on taking photos!  So having a camera I can carry with me at all times was critical.  In my pre-trip testing it has held up, and is not noticeable when carried in cargo pants.  I’m not totally happy with some aspects of the camera, but overall its pretty good.

I’m protecting the Casio with Always On’s Wrap-Up cover–it is a simple neoprene cover that screws into the tripod mount and wraps around the camera, fastened with velcro.  Camera is protected from bumps and jars, but is far lighter and more compact than a bulky camera bag.  Pretty cool bit of kit!

I’m still testing the GiSteq Phototrackr, but basically it just tracks where you’ve been and records it to the built-in memory.  When you get home you can download where you’ve been and load it into Google Earth and create some pretty cool maps.  The software is also used to line up the timestamps in your camera with the ones from the GPS log, and merge the latitude, longitude and altitude into the EXIF metadata of your images.  The new geotagged images can be imported into Google Earth, iPhoto, Flickr or any geotagging capable photo software.  Very cool!

I’ve been wanting a low-cost HD camcorder for some time–ever since I sold my primary camcorder (Sony VX-2000).  When the Polaroid DVC-00725F popped up on Woot.com for about $120, I snagged it.  It is pretty interesting device, but far from perfect.  One of things that lower its value for travel is that it doesn’t have a lens cap.   I’m actually leaning teetering between taking it and leaving it at home because the Casio can take some mediocre video if needed, and I’m not planning on bringing a suction cup camera mount or anything for taking on-bike footage.  I think I’ll wait until the last minute to decide!

My plan is to hopefully back up my photos from Internet Cafes on the trip–which is why I’m bringing the USB reader.  I’m not sure if that plan will work out or not.  We’ll see!

Lastly I’ve been debating about bringing a pocket or portable GPS unit for navigation.  I’ve been trying to get a reliable map of Thailand, and really it will all hinge on weather I’m able to find one.  I did order a complete set of waterproof, foldable motorcycle touring maps from GT-Rider.com, which hasn’t shown up yet.  If I don’t receive the hard maps, I may be forced to bring a GPS mapping system.

Next Up: The motorcycle and general travel gear I’ll be bringing.

Last Minute Update!

I decided to bring a portable GPS–the Garmin Nuvi 265T.  I bought it because it was more portable than my current garmin, and it also has handsfree bluetooth calling and lifetime free traffic updates.  I can’t recommend the unit though because the free traffic subscription has strings attached: you have to put up with advertisements that pop up and various times.  Nowhere on the box or product information website does Garmin make this clear, so I’m seriously considering returning it.

I also bought a i.Trek Garmin GPS Handlebar Mount to keep the GPS in sight while on the bike.

I have also been reconsidering leaving the HD camcorder behind. I think I’ll come down to the final pack-out weight and bulk. If I decide to leave anything I think that will be it.

Tags: motorcycle, photography, thailand, Travel

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 21st, 2009 at 8:04 pm and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.