Travel Trends :: Bed Bug Proofing Your Hotel Room

[trip style = any]

One unfortunate travel trend that never seems to go away is bed bugs. They are everywhere, from campsite yurts to hostels, and 3-stars to ritzy retreats. Bed bugs are travelers too, spreading on birds, bats, humans and suitcases to name a few culprits. They also travel well given their ability to live for 6-12 months without food.

The Nature of the Beast Though bed bugs are everywhere, and their infestation levels go in ebbs and flows, being in Australia's Whitsundays {think multiple backpackers on party boats with bunks} and NYC recently reminded me it was still a big problem, and will forever be a problem. It's the nature of the beast. Like Lauren mentioned yesterday in her Travel Beauty feature, I too saw big groups of protesters outside hotels. These people weren't kidding around, they even had a Macy's Day parade-sized bed bug prop. As the scene was intended, it made my mind wander and my body itchy just thinking about it.

About two years ago I got serious about the prevention and detection of bed bugs, going through a routine every time I check into a hotel room, stay in a yurt, etc... Here are some precautions I use based on the wisdom of others who have experienced the bugs and written about them before me:

Bed Bug Proofing Your Hotel Room

• Before you even book, check to see if the hotel you're thinking about reserving has been listed in the Bed Bug Registry {a user-generated site noting bed bug detection areas in Canada and the US}.
• When you enter your hotel room, lock the door and place your luggage on a stand in or near the bathroom---not near the bed, furniture or curtains.
• Even if you're tired, don't throw your belongings---even an innocent little scarf---on the bed or a chair.
• Immediately conduct a 2-minute investigation of the room to look for reddish brown bugs the size of a small apple seed and droppings the size and appearance of pepper flakes. Note that bed bugs like to hang in groups.
• Check: on and behind the bed's headboard {I always start with this, and get eye level with it in order to see critters more accurately}, foundation, box spring and dark crevices as well as the furniture.
• If you think you spot bed bugs, smell the area. They are known to have a musky sweet scent like almonds.

Dealing With Bed Bugs

• If you think you see bed bugs, speak the hotel immediately, and DO NOT accept a room near the potential infestation site.
• Get the BedbugLogic Protection & Treatment Spray like Lauren talked about yesterday in her Travel Beauty post to remove any bugs you think may have got near your gear or clothing.
• Once you get home, if you still suspect bed bugs, vacuum and steam clean your suitcase {not in your house} and wash clothes and dry on the dryer's hottest setting to kill all stages of bugs.

Finally, I will leave you with this: when you travel with a carry-on, there is less chance for it to come in contact with other bags {and bugs!!!} if it is always with you.

[photo by Medill DC]

Travel Trends :: Fold It!

[trip style = any]

I'm as good as sold on any travel product that scrunches, shrinks or folds. With overhead bin space shrinking and carry-on weight requirements on a permanent diet, packing light, compact and folding pieces for travel is not just a trend-du-moment, but a necessity.

During my recent trip to NYC, I went shopping {quelle surprise!} and came across five compact items I purchased for my future travels. Though none are hot off the runway, some are surprisingly stylish. Now if someone would only invent a pair of folding Jimmy Choos! Tamara Mellon, are you listening?

Folding Water Bottle When I saw this anti water bottle it was love at first sight. It shrinks, folds and doesn't have the extra weight of traditional plastic, metal or glass bottles. Does it get any better? I took it for a test drive this weekend while walking around Seattle. It's small enough to pop in your purse and doesn't weigh you down.

Folding Matte Rain Coat I hate packing a raincoat---maybe it's the bulkiness or the assertion it might rain. I've seen a few travel raincoats in my day, and most are ugly, but I recently found this one from the Japanese retailer Muji. Folding to the size of a small t-shirt, this coat is functional and cute. PS - it's under $15!

Folding Shoes I wish I'd thought of this idea. Foldable shoes? Hello! How many girls long for flats after a night in heels? Moi et toi. I featured this type of shoe in January, but I wanted to feature them again because I found a brand that looks like an actual shoe that you'd wear day-to-day. They are called CitySlips and came in handy this weekend when I wore highish heels to a concert and slipped these babies on for the walk home!

Pill-Sized Towels I have to admit, I bought these super shrunken towels inside a pill container because they were cute. Cuteness aside, they're handy for those times you need to wipe your face or hands with something more girthy than a flimsy disinfectant cloth. With a few drops of water, they expand into a 9 x 11" multipurpose towel and are biodegradable.

Credit Card Cutlery How many times have you stopped for to-go food on a road trip and gotten plastic cutlery with your order? If I counted all the plastic cutlery I threw out or recycled in the past year, it would stack up like a grocery store display. In the spirit of reduce, reuse and recycle, I love this simple credit card cutlery. Perfect for keeping with you at all times, and easy to wash after use. The planet thanks you.

Trip Styler Tip: If you're in a city with a Museum of Modern Art {MoMA}, make time to visit the store. Each MoMA store I've visited is the type of place in which you could get lost and dazzled by design-savvy finds.

Travel Trends :: Mini Guidebooks

[trip style = multiple]

We've all read the Lonely Planets, Rick Steeves, Frommers and Moon travel guidebooks of the world. Heck, we might even have a wack of old editions, circa 1997, collecting dust on a bookshelf. Not surprisingly, guidebooks are going compact, like Smart Cars. Following the trend of minifying everything from airline meals to gadgets, guidebooks have shrunk too. Maybe the classic 1989 Disney movie, Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, was ahead of its time?

Paperbacks There's still a time and a place for larger format paperback guidebooks, after all, with every new year comes an updated edition. Almost every time I've traipsed onto foreign soil, I've read a guidebook before departing. Why? Because I want to be educated on the destination's customs, history, neighbourhoods, hotels, must-sees and restaurants, to hit the ground running and avoid being a tacky tourist. I just wish some of these guidebooks had pull-out sections that I could bring abroad rather than the whole book!

Mini Guides People seem to want smaller, low-profile guides they can bring with them on holidays that can slipped in and out of their cross-body bag or backpack without drawing too much attention. Something light and functional, versus big and bulky. Something concise and concrete, versus longwinded and wordy. With this in mind, here are two mini travel guides leading the charge:

LUXE City Guides: LUXE isn't for everyone. Its penmanship is sassy and its suggestions are saucy. All in all, it's a fun gen-X and Y-targeted guidebook about the size of 3 credit cards stacked on top of each other, telling the who's who, where to go. I've used LUXE's guides for Sydney and NYC, and have been impressed with the fantastic and frank stay, eat and do suggestions. > Books from $9.99 usd, and 12-book box sets from $110 usd. > There's an app for that: free for 'lite' version, $5.99 for full version.

Louis Vuitton City Guides: Even if Louis' monogrammed brand of luxury isn't your thing, don't dismiss the guides, even if it's just for their well known illustrations alone. With 30 European guides, the Fashion House has also come out with editions for NYC, LA, Miami, Tokyo, Kyoto and Mumbai. > 9-Book, 30-city box set from $150 usd.

And don't forget, if you're really set on traveling light, there's always an app for that with most guidebook publishers joining the app craze.

More Travel Trends Ultimate Urban Adventures Curated Luxury Hotel Lists Choose Your Own Adventure Your Extended Backyard

Travel Trends :: Ultimate Urban Adventures & Sydney BridgeClimb

[trip style = urban + adventure]

While in Sydney earlier this month one of the literal highlights of my time in Australia's biggest city was climbing the famed Harbour Bridge {more on this below}. Talking at length with my guide about its inception, the mandatory safety suit and if climbers ever get petrified part way up, I learned that Sydney's BridgeClimb, the first adventure of its kind, has influenced cities like Brisbane and San Francisco {pending} to follow suit.

If your next trip style = urban and you want to spice up the usual <eat, shop, walk, eat, visit cultural attraction, eat> itinerary, why not try:

• Sydney's BridgeClimb - Wind your way through the Harbour Bridge's massive steel archways, scale your way to the top, take in the best views of Sydney's iconic harbour, salute the Aussie Flag and descend.
• Auckland's SkyJump - Jump 192 meters at 82km/h off of Auckland's Sky Tower. Watching this video literally made me almost cry with an equal dose of excitement and fear, and I haven't even done the jump yet!
• Toronto's CN Tower EdgeWalk - Walk 'the plank' of this landmark's narrow ledge, 365 meters above the ground. Opening soon.

The BridgeClimb Go Go Gadget.... When I got to the BridgeClimb's industrial-mod HQ, I knew I was going to be required to wear a grey adult 'onesie' that would make fashion lovers run for the hills. I soon learned function over fashion was for good reason: the suit was custom developed to both match the colour of the working mega-structure, as well as handle significant safety precautions with its doodads and attachments. Case in point, the hat I was provided had a plastic hook which latched onto the back of the suit, and my sunglasses were given a special string to secure them around my neck, and again, to my suit. Essentially, anything you bring onto the bridge has to be attached to the suit, as if you were Inspector Gadget. Everything had to reel back into your person.

Underwear and Fanny Packs My husband Nathan even got to wear a fanny pack, which I learned was a taboo phrase Down Under because it refers to something, well, down under... The Bridge allowed him to bring a camera {only because we did a private "media" climb for Trip Styler}, but there were two conditions: it HAD to be attached to his suit with a retractable string and housed in, as the Australians would say, a bum bag. And speaking of that area, even on the sunny, late-fall day when we did the climb, temperatures were getting into the mid 20's, so I followed the advice of my savvy suit concierge and climbed with shoes, the lightweight grey suit provided and only my undergarments below. Needless to say it was a perfectly breezy climb.

Top Design After an exhilarating ascent, winding our way along lengthy catwalks, narrow passageways, keycard-access security doors and stairs with perforated steel steps---the kind where you can see boats speeding past you below---we reached the top. The space was roomier than I expected. There was even a path cutting through the Bridge's centre, opening up into a diamond-like shape at the arch's mid-point. This gathering place, approximately 134 meters above the sea level, made me want to sit back, relax and toast the world with a bottle of bubbly. But alas, there were no loungers and champagne is not kosher when thousands of cars are crossing below, unless of course the BridgeClimb could figure out a way to attach a plastic bottle and flute to the suit, but I think that could be asking a tad too much.

Urban Adventure After the climb, I changed back into my 'civilian' clothes, threw my suit, belt and accoutrements into futuristic-like funnels for washing, and took in the moment, realizing I had the great privilege of joining the likes of Matt Damon, Cameron Diaz, Will Ferrell, Prince Harry and 2.6 million others who've beat the bridge to complete one of the world's ultimate urban adventures!

Photos {Starting the climb.}

{The stairs and yellow safety tubing directly above.}

{The inside structure.}

{A group climbing the bridge, up, up and away...}

{The safety line is attached to you and the bridge at all times. Aside from when you start and finish, you never have to hook and/or unhook the line---it's continuous.}

{View of Opera House and Bridge's upper walkway.}

{BridgeClimb onesies and the summit.}

{Australian flag at the top.}

{Looking straight down from the top.}

{What we saw as we were descending the stairs.}

{A group on their way down.}

{BridgeClimb's HQ.}

{Some perspective at the end.}

What to know

• Prices start at $188 for adult climbers in off-peak season...
• Kids 10+ can can climb.
• There are 3 types of climbs:
  • The Express Climb - 2 hours 15 mins. The quickie.
  • The Discovery Climb - 3 hours 30 mins. The inner workings.
  • The Bridge Climb - 3 hours 30 mins. The outer arch.
• Each person must perform a breathalyzer test prior to climbing, so don't get too crazy the night before...

PS - the closest comparison to BridgeClimb Sydney in Vancouver is Capilano Suspension Bridge's Cliffwalk, opening soon.

[images taken by @nate_fri + 1 by our trusty BridgeClimb guide]

Travel Trends :: Curated Lists

[trip style = luxury]

Recently I've noticed a slight obsession in the luxury travel market for websites that bring together curated, hand-picked hotels and resorts worldwide and promote them to haute holiday-hoppers who think W Hotels aren't that stylish and Sofitel properties are for sissies. These people are in search of unique properties in both commonplace and abstract destinations. Here are some curated hotel collections that will narrow your luxe boutique search when a vacation comes knocking at your door.

Boutique Hotel Collectives Tablet Hotels Tablet is a group of hand-picked, tightly edited hotels in destinations all over the world. The list is created and maintained by anonymous visits from travel experts, reviews by a team with “a low tolerance for boredom" and reviews by guests. There's no room for error either. If a hotel's rating falls below a 15 out of 20, the hotel is no longer part of Tablet.

Kiwi Collection Kiwi Collection hotels is a curated list of properties aimed at 'people who care where they stay' with options that veer more towards luxe than boutique hotels, with properties like Shanghai's recently redone Fairmont Peace Hotel or the Viceroy Anguilla Resort. Similar to Tablet, if a hotel's rating falls below a pre-determined threshold, the hotel is out, a perk I appreciate given a terrible hotel stay I just had in Sydney {not part of the collection}. With 2,200 hotels in 128 countries, I'm sure you'll find something to suit your fancy and trip style!

Mr and Mrs Smith For this selection, I need to give credit where credit it due: while I was in Australia, my third stop took me to Wilson {my review here}, an island at the base of the Great Barrier Reef with only 6 tents, gourmet food, secluded beaches, baby turtles and friendly reef sharks {more on this May 20th}. While there, I had the pleasure of meeting two couples from the UK who both mentioned a boutique hotel finder they'd used to find the stylish shipwrecked island.

Mr and Mrs Smith is a boutique and luxury hotel finder with a particular focus on Australia and Euro properties. They say it was created for romantic and swanky couples escapes, but I think anyone can be inspired by its hundreds of listings worldwide. For those of you who are most interested in the North American options, there are 85 with well known indi-popular properties like the Ace Palm Springs and Portland, Clift San Francisco, Chateau Marmont LA, Calistoga Ranch Napa Valley, Delano South Beach, and so on.

Join one of their three membership tiers to take full advantage of what a relationship with Mr and Mrs Smith has to offer!

An App For That StayHip is a boutique hotel finder that mixes budget conscious and luxe boutique options in 400 destinations worldwide. Perfect for when you're lying in bed staring at your iPhone or you're on the go.

{Note that I've put this trip style as 'luxury' because unless you're staying at the reasonably priced Ace in Palm Springs, boutique properties are usually on the more expensive side of travel.}

Related Content Shh It's {Semi} Private :: Private Travel Sale Sites Big or Boutique Hotels? Get a Room :: The World's First Hotel Room Search

[photo by @tripstyler taken of Qualia at sunset. Qualia is part of Mr and Mrs Smith's listings for Austraila.]