We are sorry to say that Mac is not very well, but he is still e-mailing strong and recently sent the Beetle a collection of travel tips based on several trawls of travel websites. Here are some of the tips Mac has garnered:

• 1. Put wallet in breast pocket of shirt and then put another shirt over it. Me: might want to have a second more accessible wallet to hand to any potential robber
• 2. One traveller wrote that he kept two thirds of his cash in a pouch by his underwear
• 3. Another person wrote in to suggest this: you get old white undies, create a fake crap stain in the appropriate place and lay over your valuables

And here are some items that travellers have listed as being most glad they took: Gortex jacket, universal sink plug, nalgene bottle, toilet bag, pocket knife and camera, hiking type boots, backpack with pull-up handles and wheels, travel pillow, toothfloss, Pitzi headlight (a couple mentioned this), Ortlied folding bucket (a laundry bucket, bearing service bucket, and hat all in one).

Nick O Neill writes in BootsNall.com some good advice. Mac says that he stole his name Travel Nutter from Nick. He evidently has travelled for years. Some ideas I gained from Nick: when you shower pin your money belt with a safety pin to your towel. (I don’t know about that, I am so forgetful, I would probably leave the shower room without my towel or the money belt attached to it!)

On the subject of backpacks, Nick says he prefers a simple pack without 75 pockets and straps. He takes a medium sized pack that doesn’t encourage me to pack too much. Beetle: I have a side zipped Lowe Alpine pack that doubles up as a holdall that looks a bit less back packer-ish for those odd occasions when checking into somewhere a little more up market. Whatever backpack you use, try to get one with a zip cover that hides away all of the handles as these can get stuck in airport conveyor belts etc.

Nick says he has used an extra long North Face sleeping bag for over a decade. Mac asks, does he own stock? Mac says he uses a hollow filled bag while heavier than a down bag, it will retain heat when wet.

Nick says that he carries three $l00 bills in his money belt (the one fastened to a towel). He says he has even been able to use them in a shack in the Himalayas.

Back to Mac: travellers who have had some military service might want to check out the overseas military clubs that are equivalent to the American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars etc. In Australia and New Zealand and Western Samoa they are RSL Clubs. I checked in at Cairns, told them a little bit about myself, where I had travelled etc and asked if they knew where the Catholic Church was, the time of Mass etc. and if they knew any reasonable place to stay and eat, asked about local bus transportation, what I should see etc. They made me an honorary member of their organization for the time of my stay in Australia.

In South Africa they are MOTH clubs (military order of tin hats which started in WWI) and Comrade Clubs (British oriented.) Again, I was made an honorary member and even invited to some of the members’ homes. They like to learn about you and you like to learn about them. In the MOTH clubs the commander is always called Old Bill no matter what his actual name is.

In Western Samoa, the commander of their RSL was an American working in Western Samoa. I asked how he got to be commander of this foreign club. He laughed and said he was about the only one of its members that had been in the service, the rest were associate members. Sometimes these clubs in some places to keep them going take associate members without any military service. Most of them are very hospitable and good sources of information and kind of a security blanket. Mac

The Athletic Clubs and other clubs in some of the countries when you show them your passport will let you eat there and use their facilities.

If you would like to contact Mac, he is happy to answer e-mails: macsan400@yahoo.com