Don’t assume that your hotel room will have writing paper and pens for you to write down information you need to remember.

At the very least you should take a pen and some paper because there are bound to be times when you will need to record some information during your travels.

It might be instructions on how to get to another destination, phone numbers or even the names of restaurants that other travelers recommend you dine at.

A diary is a good idea because you can enter the information in the appropriate days you are away and you might even like to take notes for a return visit or for the benefit of other people who you know might want to travel to the same places.

If you do take a diary make sure it is small enough to be conveniently carried most of the time you are away otherwise you won’t tend to use it. You should look for one that you can carry in your pocket along with the pen or pencil.

You might even decide to keep your checklist written in the pages of the diary so that everything is in the one place at all times.

The tidier and more organized you can keep everything when you are away the less time you will spend rummaging around trying to find things.

Some people even keep a running budget of their expenses in their diary and this is something that might be necessary if you are on a tight budget.

It is very easy to overspend when you are away on holiday, when everything looks different and new, but it’s not very pleasant to find that you have run out of money and the holiday is only half over.

Anything that you write in your travel diary will make planning for subsequent trips a lot easier.