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June 25 – Train to Switzerland

Heading to Gimmelwald — our train from Paris Gare de l’Est to Interlake OST, Switzerland (via Basel SBB) was schedule for an 8:24 departure. We woke up really tired because of lack of sleep (didn’t get back to hotel until midnight). We showered, finished packing and went down the restaurant for breakfast buffet. We stuffed as much as we could down our throats in 15 minutes before catching a metro to the train station. Arriving at the station a bit early gave us time to rest. We got on a TGV train and found ourselves sitting cross a young American couple. Don’t remember if I have already mentioned this, but throughout the entire trip we saw, heard and ran into Americans everywhere. Recession? What recession? Right? I would say a lot of them were exchange students and family with kids. Anyway, we were so glad that our seats faced the direction that the train was heading. We absolute hate facing the opposite direction.

The train was almost full but the ride was smooth and comfortable. We changed trains at Basel SBB and only had to wait a few minutes before the next train took off to Interlaken. The train arrived at Interlaken OST at around 14:00. Interlaken is the gateway to the Berner Oberland. We spent a few minutes getting our tickets to Gimmelwald as well as the ones that would get us to Italy. Since we ate so much for breakfast, 14:00 was just the right time for lunch. We lunched at a food court in a supermarket called COOP because we didn’t want to put our bags in lockers (about €5 per locker, which is still way cheaper than £8 per bag at the bag-check facility in St Pancras station in England). COOP is similar to Safeway or Giant over here. The food at the food court is like Ikea food. They look so good in the photos but taste the opposite. I’ll just leave it as that.

Before getting on another train to our destination, we bought some drinks and food from the supermarket because they were a lot cheaper than getting from regular stores or restaurants. For instance, as far as I remember, a bottle of water was 2-3 CHF (Swiss francs. 1 CHF ~ $1) and a bottle of Coke was 3.50+ CHF. COOP sold one for about 0.60 CHF. Anyway, to get to Gimmelwald from Interlaken OST, we had to take a local train to Lauterbrunnen, then walk to a bus stop, take a bus to Stechelberg, and then take a cable car to Gimmelwald. The whole shabang took about an hour.

As soon as we got off the cable car at Gimmelwald station, we were greeted by this calm, relaxing, sleepy feeling. I think we juset felt in love with the village and its surroundings at first sight. We walked uphill a little and literally the third house on the right was Esther’s Guest House where we stayed for two nights. Esther was there expecting our arrival. She gave us room #5 with a private bathroom. However, the bathroom wasn’t in the bed room; it was down the hallway. So we got two keys and were told to lock the bathroom after every use. The room seemed smaller than it looked on her website. Nevertheless, it was really cozy and big enough for both of us. It had a roof window that we could stick our heads out and look around.

That afternoon we just passed out for a few hours after traveling all day and woke up in time for dinner at Mountain Hostel, which was a 30 second walk from Esther’s. Mountain Hostel is the ultimate backpacker’s hostel in the area. Most of the people we saw there were American and Canadian. How to spot Canadians? One simple way; almost 100% of them will have Canadian flags on their packs. It’s their way for showing patriotism and saying “We are not Americans”. Anyway, we met this guy from Colorado and we talked for a bit. He was traveling alone as his wife wasn’t into this kind of things. He mentioned that he kept coming back to Gimmelwald every now and then because of his love for its surroundings and atmosphere. Later on in the trip, we met another couple from LA and they mentioned they once stayed at Mountain Hostel 20/30 years ago when there wasn’t even hot water yet. Now there is an Internet-connected computer, free WiFi connection, and, of course, hot water.

June 26 – Gimmelwald, Mürren, Schilthorn

On the previous day, I asked around what the best strategy would be to get up to Schilthorn considering that the stormy weather we were going to be having for the next few days. Everybody we talked to recommended the same thing; wake up early and if you see a tiny bit of blue skies, just go. So I took their advice, woke up at 7:00 and felt so refreshed as we went to bed at around 22:00 instead of 02:00 like we did on the previous days.

Woke my wife up, got dressed and took a cable car up to Schilthorn via Mürren and Birg. We got combo tickets, which included breakfast at Schilthorn Piz Gloria and round trip tickets for 85 CHF per person. Some people actually buy one-way tickets to the top and hike 5000 ft down to Gimmelwald. In any case, the ride took about 30 minutes and while we were in the cable car, it was so foggy and started snowing/raining. So we didn’t get to see much of the scenery. The only thing that was cool was a bunch of goats climbing the mountain.

One thing I haven’t mentioned is that for this trip we decided to test our luck by only packing rain jackets and long sleeves base layers. We figured that it’d been sunny the temperature would have been in the 50s at the top and 70s in Gimmelwald. Bad idea, I’ll tell you. The next time I go to the Swiss Alps in the summer, at least a fleece is going with me. Schilthorn 8:30 in the morning in June wasn’t very warm. In fact, it was hovering around 30-34 °F and all we had on was a couple layers of t-shirts, base layer and rain jacket. Since the weather was awful at the time, we decided to enjoy breakfast buffet in the revolving restaurant.

I hate to complain, but the food (scrambled eggs, sausage, bacon, etc.) there was terrible. It was like leftovers cooked by little kids. Anyhow, we sat there for two hours waiting for the weather to calm down and clouds to clear out but they never did. So we left the restaurant and walked around the cable car station looking at souvenirs and stuff for a while. Suddenly out of nowhere, we started to see tiny bits of blue skies so we decided to go out on one of the trails. After on 5 minutes on the trail, there was some sunshine and the cloud and fog had cleared out. We were able to enjoy the scenery from the top for about 10 minutes before another big cloud came in with rain. As the Rick Steves and the locals say, it’s impossible to predict the weather condition in the mountains way ahead of time. The best you can do is to spend more days in the area or just wing it and hope for the best. In our case, no matter how crappy the weather was we still enjoyed it very much.

We headed down from Schilthorn to Mürren for lunch and some hiking in the afternoon. We stopped by a COOP and grabbed some sandwiches, drinks and strawberries. Before heading to Allmendhubel, which was 650 ft uphill from Mürren, we probably spent an hour walking to different trails because we kind of got lost . Anyway, originally we planned to have our lunch when we got to the destination, but just after 15 minutes of hiking my wife got really tired and demanded her lunch right away. Luckily, there was a hut with a little bench on the side of the trail where we could sit and eat.

After we finished forcing hard sandwiches and warm strawberries down our throats, we continued our journey by taking an off-trail path (shortcut?). It took us another 75-90 minutes before we reached Allmendhubel. There wasn’t much there apart from a playground, restaurant and funicular station. We sat there, ate more food, and just enjoyed the nature. Hiking down was so much simpler since we took the properly paved trail. The view from the trail was breathtaking and finally saw some Swiss cows that we thought we might never see on our trip. Once we had reached Mürren, we took a cable car back to Gimmelwald.

We hiked around Gimmelwald a little before having a pizza at Mountain Hostel. I’ve got to admin that they make pretty good pizzas. That night we went to bed early again because of Esther’s 9:30 check-out policy.

June 27 – Interlaken, Spiez, Train to Italy

Woke up early, checked out at 9:30, paid 240 CHF (ouch..!) for two nights. Oh, I forgot to mention that Esther’s place had a public Internet-ready computer and free WiFi. Every room gets 15 minutes of free Internet per day on the computer. After that you will need to pay (forgot the rate). I was able to connect my iPhone to the free WiFi to check e-mails, catch up with things, and read Federer’s interview where I found out about Michael Jackson’s death from one of the questions asked by a reporter.

After we’d checked out, we took a cable car back down to Stechelberg, then a bus to Lauterbrunnen, a train to Interlaken OST, and another train to Interlaken West. We put our bags in a huge locker so that we could spend the afternoon walking around and hiking easily. Because we didn’t buy a map of Interlaken, we were initially lost. I know… how can you get lost in Interlaken right? Anyway, we found Unterseen, which is a district in Interlaken. There wasn’t much there so we made an educated guess and walked along the canal that cut through the town in the hope that we would end up at either Thun or Brienz lake. After over an hour, we found Thun lake and it was huge. We just chilled by the lake before walking back to the train station in the rain.

Once we got back to the station, we took a walk in one of the directions that we never did and finally found the town center. There were a bunch souvenir shops, Mickey D’s, watch dealers, casino, hotels and Hooters. Yes, there is a Hooters in Interlaken. Who would have thought?! Apart from those mentioned, a few museums, and Metro-Bar on the 18th floor of the ugliest building in town, there wasn’t much to Interlaken. Before we left Interlaken for Spiez, we grabbed a quick bite to eat at Interlaken’s flagship Mickey D’s restaurant. A chicken burger, fries, a large Coke (looked like a small in the US), and six chicken wings (nice!) cost me about 20 CHF. That’s almost $19. Insane! I also tried to the free WiFi but it required registration with a valid Swiss cell phone number.

After finishing every piece of the fries, we took a train to Spiez. Spiez is a neat town and located at the south bank of Thun lake. We didn’t put our bags in a locker this time because we literally had no more Swiss money left and didn’t want cash out from an ATM because in just a few hours we wouldn’t be needing anymore CHF. Having said that, we lugged our bags downhill, walked around a bit, and came back to wait for our night train.

At night the station was a bit frightening because there were a bunch of wannabe gangstas around the station. Not only they were around, they were running, cycling around half drunk with scissors. This kind of shocked me because in my perception there wasn’t anything like this for Switzerland, let alone Spiez. I was really hoping that it was a rare exception. Anyway, as soon as our train arrived we got on and made our way to the assigned compartment. Since our tickets were for a 4-couchette compartment, we were daydreaming that there wouldn’t be any roommates. And as expected, our wish didn’t come true. There were two (Guess what?) Americans sleeping on the lower beds. We quickly climbed up to our beds and tried not to disturb them. Just before I lay down on the bed, the car attendant stopped by and asked for our tickets and passports. I was a bit skeptical about handing over my passports but I guessed it was ok since Rick mentions it in his books.

It took a while for me to fall asleep because 1) the train was going through a mountainous area so it was maneuvering left and right, which gave me motion sickness 2) I was woken up a few times just before getting in the zone by people in neighboring compartments arguing with the car attendant (?) in Italian.

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After 3 days in London, we spent 2 days and 3 nights in Paris staying at Hilton Arc de Triomphe, which is a block an a half from the Courcelles metro stop. Hilton Arc de Triomphe really deserves the name Hilton unlike the dirty ghetto rundown Hilton Valley Forge in King of Prussia, PA (now Dolce Hotel). It’s clean, nicely decorated, and located in a good neighborhood. It also has a great executive lounge with an open-air seating area. Our room was nice, roomy and clean.

Paris has very efficient metro/subway and train systems. In my opinion, the French are keen on speaking English to you if you are polite and at least greet them in French. During our stay, we spent all day everyday out and about. At the end of the day, we felt like our feet were going to explode and legs were going to fall apart.

June 23 – Versailles, Montmartre, and Seine River Cruise

Versailles – Versailles is a 30 minute train ride from the downtown Paris. We took the metro from Courcelles to Porte Dauphine, then a C train to Versailles-Rive Gauche changing at Champ de Mars. We arrived at 11:00 and kind of knew the lines were going to be long. However, because it was a Tuesday and a lot of museums close on Tuesdays, both the ticketing and entrance lines were awfully long. Luckily we already had museum passes, which include admission to Versailles, so we were able to skip the ticketing line. Waiting in the entrance line took about 90 minutes but the awesome weather on that day made it enjoyable.

The palace, Château, is huge. But with the amount of crowds, it was packed in every room we went and the whole place was steamy. Sorry no A/C for you! Anyway, my impression was that it was mesmerizing at first but after a while, with the exception of the mirror room, every room looked similar to rooms from any Britain’s historic palaces like Hampton Court, Windsor Castle, etc. We didn’t get a chance to visit the massive garden but from glancing around it looked like Blenheim Palace garden. In my opinion, to skip long lines and crowds try going there really early or in the afternoon (14:00+). Also, spending an hour or two in the palace should give you sufficient enjoyment unless you are really into palaces and castles.

Montmartre – We went to the Montmartre neighborhood, which is known as an artsy as well as night life district, in the late afternoon. There were already tons of dressed-up party-ready young people walking around the area. We walked around a bit before heading up the hill to the Sacré Cœur Basilica. In the lawn areas of the hill, couples were picnicking, cuddling and having good times. Climbing up the steps wasn’t too bad but if you don’t want to walk, there is a mini train that will take you from the foot to the top in just a few minutes. At the top, which is the highest point of the city, you get this spectacular panoramic view of the core of paris. But because of some huge trees on the right side of the hill, you can hardly see the Eiffel tower. There are also people playing music, painting and performing in front of Sacré Cœur, which is a white-domed church.

Along the way up and down, there were quite a lot of people trying to scam you into buying something or giving them money like the infamous friendship bracelet or rose scam. Be careful and try to avoid interacting when those people.

Seine River Cruise Tour – I was debating whether to take a Seine river cruise or Paris illumination bus tour. We decided to do the river tour. The one we took is by the Eiffel tower and, I believe, leaves every hour. The boat leaves from the Eiffel tower, goes all the way passed the historic core island, where Notre Dame is located, and makes a U-turn. The whole trip takes about one hour and is very relaxing. We planned to take this ride during the sunset but unfortunately mistimed it by an hour. The sunset started just before we got off the boat.

June 24 – Louvre, Arc de Triomphe, Champs-Élysées, Historic Core, Orsay Museum, and Eiffel Tower

Louvre Museum – Luckily, everyday we spent in Paris was very nice (see what’s it like right now). Temperature in the 70s, low humidity, scattered clouds provide shades from time to time. Since the Louvre, included in the Paris Museum pass, is one of the most visited museums in the world, it surprised me a bit that there were literally no lines when I got there at 10:00. Don’t let it fool you though. In our case, it was packed, hot and stuffy inside especially in the zone that housed the Mona Lisa painting. Throughout the museum we saw art students (?) with canvases, easels and gear practicing their skills by reproducing exhibited paintings. The Mona Lisa room, which also housed a bunch of other great paintings, was the most crowded room of all. There were many rows of people trying to get a glimpse. The painting is displayed behind a security glass so there will be harsh reflections when viewing from the sides. I think it would take about 15 minutes to fight your way through the crowd to the front row for the best viewing angle possible. For the best viewing experience though, try to be the first in the room when it is opened or the last to leave before it is closed.

Arc de Triomphe - There is much to Arc de Triomphe apart from being in the middle of Paris traffic chaos (1, 2) and having a superb from at the top. The admission to the top is also included in the museum pass. As you can see, the museum pass is really worth it and importantly helps you avoid ticketing lines. Anyway, climbing the stairs to the top is quite retiring. My wife ran out of breath at about halfway. People with walking concerns should provide avoid stairs. I believe there are elevators. I saw one but it was out of service (as always).

At the top, you get this 360° view of Paris from the center of it. It is a different view from what you get at Montmartre. It must get really hot in the summer because I noticed there were small glass rooms, each with a chair and A/C unit. Walking down is a breeze. At the bottom, you can sit back and enjoy the crazy traffic of Paris before heading off to Champs-Élysées avenue.

Champs-Élysées offers a great walk because of its ultra-wide sidewalks, shades from big trees, shops and restaurants. We went into the flagship Louis Vuitton showroom. It is more like a showroom than a store to me because of its size. In there, you will find sales reps speaking whatever language you do. After walking around and observing, From what I have heard, LV products sold in France is generally cheaper than anywhere else in the world (true?). I found that most customers that walked out with purchases were Asian. FYI – there is a Mickey D’s across the street from the LV store and it has free WiFi without requiring registration.

Notre Dame – Notre Dame de Paris is cathedral located in the historic core where Paris originally started. In my opinion, what stands out most about it is the Gothic architecture it possesses. The interior, to me, looks similar to any other big churches I have been to. In the back side of it, there is a garden/park where people chill and have picnics. Food in this area is more expensive than usual because it is a famous tourist attraction.

On the previous day when we were on the tour boat, I noticed a lot people hanging out by the river bank after work especially on this historic core island.

Orsay Museum - The Orsay museum, also included in the Paris Museum pass, used to be a train station so it has this really open structure like Grand Central or Union Station in America. We got to the museum just about an hour before the closing time so it was almost like a ghost town. This made our visit much more relaxing and enjoyable. The art collection, however, is not as interesting as as the Louvre’s.

Eiffel Tower – Oh the Eiffel Tower… Rick Steves mentions in his books that to avoid the lines you either have to get there early in the morning (before 9:00) or later in the day (after 20:00). I think he may be slightly wrong about this because we got there around 20:00 and still had to wait almost 2 hours before getting up there. The lines are long and move very slowly. If you plan to visit after 9 or 10:00, prepare to be in line for while. My best advice is to get there as early as possible, buy group tickets (20+ I think), or find something fun to do while you wait in line.

We only went up to the second level but the view from there is breathtaking especially during sunset. You pretty much see everything in Paris 360°. Every night at 23:00 or so the sparkling lights on the tower come on for an hour. For this, you’d probably want to view it from a distance. To get down from the tower, you have two options 1) take the same elevator down 2) take a 30 minute walk down the stairs.

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June 19 – Plane to London

We flew a morning flight into London Heathrow and arrived in the evening so that we could get a good night sleep. The plane landed at almost 22:00 and after we were done with immigration we had to get some money exchanged, took a long walk to the Tube station, and lined up to get Oyster cards. We didn’t leave the airport area until 23:30. After having a late dinner, that night we ended up going to bed at around 2:30 or so.

First lesson learned – always have some money in the currency used by the first country you will be visiting. We tried to get some British Pounds from a local Bank of America two days prior to our departure date but the bank said it would take a few days. So we were going to just exchange we got there. As it turned out and we both knew it, the rate in the UK was so terrible. For the rest of the trip we got our money from ATMs. The daily rate was so much better than at foreign exchange courters. Plus Bank of America is part of Global ATM Alliance, which means it allows you to get money from member banks’ ATMs with no transaction fees.

June 20 – Portobello Market, Tower Bridge, St Paul’s, Piccadilly, London Eye and Westminster

On the first day in London, we went to Portobello Market with some friends to chill and grab some lunch at this place called Banger Bros. For someone who never heard of the place before, the name just cracked me up at first – Google for it. After that we went to Tower Bridge and walked along the river bank (called London Riverside?), which didn’t exist 8 years ago. Tower Bridge was apparently under construction (when was the last time it wasn’t?) because a few weeks prior to my visit something fell off one of the towers.

Next we went to St Paul’s Cathedral and hung out at Paul next church. Paul is kind of like Starbucks but specializes in French bakery. I don’t know if because it was a Saturday or they were a French cafe, it took almost half an hour to make two Frappuccino like drinks and one cafe latte. Anyway, after that we crossed the Millennium bridge, walked some more to Waterloo and took the Tube to Piccadilly Circus. Walked from Piccadilly Circus to Trafalgar Square then Leicester Squire, China town, and dinner at Tottenham Court road.

After dinner, two other friends showed up and we decided to head to the London Eye/Westminister area. When we got to London Eye, it was already closed. So we walked around instead and enjoyed the night scene of River Thames, Big Ben and the Westminster area. We had a second dinner in China town before calling it a day around 23:00 or so. The first day was tough. We were so beat after spending 10+ hours of walking, dealing with jet lag and time difference, dealing with typical British weather changes.

June 21 – Buckingham Palace, Good food, Convent Garden, and London Eye

The next day we started off with the changing guard at Buckingham Palace. We got there at 11:15 but the march was already over. Hung around longer to see what was going to happen next. The band (guards?) in the side palace’s fence started playing songs. They did that for about 30 minutes or so before marching out back to their quarter. One thing that really surprised me was how polite British police was. Some people may not agree but hear me out. It was packed in front of Buckingham Palace and they had setup spectator areas. While I was moving from one area to another, this guy in front stepped out of the walk way and stood in front of a gate to take photos. When a policewoman saw him, she quickly approach the guy and said “Sir, that’s enough. Please move along.”. US cops would probably yell at him or a few cops would surround and intimidate the guy. At least, that’s what usually happens in front for the White House. In any case, there isn’t much to Buckingham Palace unless you get to go inside (August – September).

After Buckingham, we lunched at one of my favorite Chinese restaurants in London called Four Seasons. It probably has the best roast duck in town. Next we headed to Harrods for some exercise and air conditioning. Harrods is always a zoo. Their luxury washrooms are not that luxurious. I thought they would have gold plated toilet seats but instead they had washroom attendants. Covent Garden was our next destination where we met up with two friends. I always love Covert Garden. It still has the same atmosphere and coming back again was refreshing for me.

Next we took a bus to London Eye. London Eye costs £17 person for a 30 minute ride. Although the view is awesome, the ticket is a bit pricey. The ticketing line was pretty long. There were a couple of ticket dispensing machines for online order pickups but not sure why they didn’t have ones that people could buy with credit cards. The view of Westminster is best in the morning. We were there in the late afternoon so we were looking directly at the sun. That night we had Chinese for dinner again .

June 22 – Wimbledon disappointment and EuroStar to Paris

For the last day in London, we originally planned to go see Wimbledon on its first day. However, when we got there Wimbledon staff told us to go line up in Wimbledon park. We couldn’t see the end of the line. While we were looking for the end of the line, I overheard somebody saying it would take 5 hours to get to the ticketing booths. I confirmed that with a couple nearby. Given that, we were pretty disappointed that we didn’t get to see and also didn’t understand why the line was that long on the first day of the event. Anyhow, next time buy £40 centre court tickets from TicketMaster UK (probably £50 after all the fees). Also the Wimbledon bus that takes people from the tube station to Wimbledon park, which is a 10 minute walk, charges £2 per person. What a rip-off.

We spend lunch at a nearby pub watching Wimbledon before heading back to the city for more touristy activities. Our EuroStar train from St Pancras to Paris Gare du Nord was at around 18:00. The ride was really smooth and not crowded. We arrived in Paris on time and was able to check in at Hilton Arc de Triomphe just after 22:00.

Stay tuned for my next post.

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A few weeks ago my wife and I spent two weeks in Europe visiting London, Paris, Berner Oberland/Gimmelwald in Switzerland, Cinque Terra and Rome in Italy. Although it was pretty expensive, considering the dollar fell to a six-month low against the euro during that period, the trip was worth every penny. Anyway, I want to share my experience about the planning process and specifically what camera gear I took and how I managed to shoot almost 80 GB of RAW images without taking a laptop on the trip.

We started planning the trip around end of January. I have been to the UK, Paris and some parts of Switzerland before but since my wife had never been to Europe at that time, I thought we should do something different this year for our summer vacation. So I went on Amazon, searched for a guide book and came across Rick Steves’ Europe Through the Back Door (Amazon, Google Books). I went ahead and bought it because after reading the excerpt I liked his travel philosophy.

After spending a week reading the book and checking out Rick Steves’ website, I realized that he had a ton of followers. It is actually a cult. Anyway, I came up with a preliminary itinerary, which I then posted on a Rick Steves message board for feedback and found that it was too intensive for a 16-day trip. After a few refinements, my final itinerary was the following:

London – 3 days
Paris – 2.5 days
Berner Oberland (Gimmelwald), Switzerland –  2.5 days
Cinque Terre, Italy – 3 days
Rome – 3 days
Transatlantic flights – 1 day

Initially I was trying to decide whether we could get hotels by winging it when got there. However, since we knew where we wanted to go, I just went ahead and book our hotels and B&B’s well in advanced. I stayed with some friends in London and used Hilton points for four nights in Paris and Rome, which saved us quite a bit of money.

For transportation, our main mean of transportation between European cities was train. The European train system is far better than what exists in the USA. We decided to buy point-to-point tickets when we got there because it would be cheaper than buying Europe Rail passes in our situation.

Packing was actually fun and challenging at first. The photo below tells you how much stuff I took on the trip. I think I had 5 T’s, 2 shorts, 2 pants, bunch of socks and undies, some maps and Rick’s book, electronics stuff, a D300 without the vertical grip, a 50mm f/1.4, a 12-24mm f/4, a flash, and a gorillapod. I learned to pack this way from OneBag.com and Rick’s book.

I chose to go with one backpack because I wanted to be able to swift through airports, train stations and towns quickly given that we would be on the move every few days. If I were to go on a beach resort vacation, I would probably choose a rolling bag. Fortunately, for this trip I was able to convince my wife to use a Samsonite wheeled backpack, which is smaller than mine.

The camera bag that I used on the trip is a Think Thank Photo Urban Disguise 20. Seriously Think Tank makes godsend products. This particular bag fit my needs really well. It was light enough that I could carry it all day. It was also big enough to stuff all my gear and some maps in. It might be a bit too bulky to use with a Think Tank speedbelt.

On the trip I had four 8 GB Sandisk Extreme III compact flash cards. Since I shoot raw (lossless compressed about 12 MB on D300), I knew that 32 GB would be enough for the entire trip. So I bought an Epson P-3000. It is a portable multimedia photo viewer that has a 40 GB 2.5″ hard drive inside, which means that you can crack it open and upgrade the drive to 500 GB if you want. I didn’t do it for the trip but might spend $50 getting a 200 GB upgrade for wedding shoots. OK, so for the trip I had about 72 GB to work with and it turned out that I came pretty close, about 65 GB I think. A little bit about my on the go backup strategy, at the end of everyday I backed up all shots from that day to the device. I didn’t wait for the CFs to be full. Doing this gave me a clean CF at beginning of everyday. Also I never kept the CFs and P-3000 in the same bag due to security concerns.

As previously mentioned, I took a D300 without the vertical grip (so much lighter without it but felt weird initially when taking portrait shots), a 50mm f/1.4, and a 12-24mm f/4. I chose these two lenses because they are super light. Thought about 18-200mm VR but didn’t go there because I would have to buy it and I was in love so much with my 50 and ultra-wide lenses.

In the next post, I am going to share some photos we took in London as well as some stories. Stay tuned. You can subscribe to my blog here.