Packing??

It's late morning on Saturday, three days before we depart on our around-the-world journey and I'm setting up this blog, instead of packing my suitcase. My rationalization is simple: doing this will help Amy and me stay in touch with family and friends while we travel. Photos, snippets of observations, musings, travel tips, travel crises, all these we can log. And, as long as we can manage to update it frequently enough, perhaps some folks will take time to comment on the journey and stay connected with us while we are on the road.

We leave San Diego late on Tuesday night, May 29, and fly to LAX and then Qantas will be our wings to Sydney, Australia and the first stop on this trip-of-a-lifetime. Our itinerary includes two weeks in Australia, for lectures and workshops we are giving--mine at Universities of Sydney and Melbourne; Amy's at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology--and then a week's luxurious rest and recreation in Bali (!!). Then it will be on to Hong Kong for two days and another long flight to Stockholm via London. In Stockholm Amy has a conference and I will spend time working with my colleague Anna Jónasdóttir and finally visit her summer home in Jämtland (pictured here). From Sweden we travel to UK, for visits with friends and consultations on writing and research. After two weeks in London, we will skip over to Ireland, to Donnegal and a week or so with friends there. All in all, we will be gone for nearly two months....

Now, how will I fit all those clothes and shoes into this small bag??