A vacation horror story

If you've ever travelled overseas you'll know there's quite a lot of preparation required; It's not just a matter of hopping on a flight, like James Bond always seems to do, then stepping off, unruffled, simply walking into the finest of hotels to find a set of Aston Martin keys, a Walther PPK and two magazines waiting for you at reception - Along with a suitably attractive young lady with ample bosom shown to great advantage by way of a plunging neckline. No, lamentably it's a little more complicated.

Passports, visa applications, medication certificates from your doctor, vaccinations, airline and tour tickets, boarding passes, money exchange, security scanning, country-entry cards, customs clearance, packing correctly, remembering not to pack tweezers in carry-on, finding transport once at the destination, not getting ripped-off by taxi drivers or scammers...Plus loads more. It's a quagmire at times.

We're pretty experienced travellers and are good at planning so we tend to have everything sorted out quite well; It minimises stress and mitigates risk to the greater degree...Although sometimes we get caught out when travelling, something pops up we didn't expect or we find ourselves up shit-creek without a paddle.

This happened to me on our recent trip to New Zealand - A vacation horror story if ever there was one. I thought I'd share it with you in the hope you may be able to avoid this tragic circumstance.

It was morning and we were getting ready for the day. A glance outside showed me the amazing mountain view we'd become accustomed to - Snow-covered peaks, blue skies and long white clouds hanging half way up the huge mountains. Beautiful.

"Looks like a hat day," I said to no one in particular because I was in the room alone.

I went to the suitcase I shared with my wife - We are fairly light travellers so only had the one case and one carry-on bag between us. I clicked open the four latches on my Pelican Case and began systematically rifling through it, tossing clothing here and there, in a search for my hat.

A word on the hat... It's not just any old hat. It's my favourite hat! An OD-green 5.11 hat that regular followers of my blog will be familiar with as I'm almost always in it...Or its cousin, the sand coloured one. This much-loved hat has been with me through many overseas trips - Through think and thin and has never let me down. It's what I would classify as legit.

OK, back to the rifling.

I went right through the case. No hat. I went through the case again, this time flinging the clothing all over the room in what I can only describe as mild panic. No hat.

That's ok. It's obviously in the carry-on bag. Again clothes flew around the room as if caught in a hurricane...No hat. No fucking hat!

"Faith! I yelled. She was out on the balcony off the lounge room. "Where's my hat?!" There was only a hint of panic in my voice.

The reply came filtering back from the balcony where my wife was enjoying the view whilst chomping on toast and Vegemite...A flatly delivered "I don't know."

"OK, that didn't fucking help me," I muttered to myself - Low enough that she wouldn't hear. I'm not completely stupid after all. No need poking the bear.

More rifling through the case ensued...This time I pretty-much turned everything inside out. It wasn't long before I come to the obvious conclusion. I'd left it home. See? A true vacation horror story!

We had a day of stuff planned that day and whilst I enjoyed it immensely my mind kept pining for my hat. Wishing for it as if I could materialise it through putting the energies out to the universe. Just for the record, just thinking about something doesn't make it so - Action is required. Don't delude yourself, you can't materialise your favourite OD-green 5.11 hat to Queenstown NZ when it's sitting on a hook in Adelaide, Australia any more than you can materialise success and wealth in your life via the same method. It takes action.

No hat appeared and I had to proceed, hatless, through my day. It felt odd, sort of like putting one's underpants on backwards, or not buttering your toast all the way to the edges. Weird.

But there was to be a happy ending to this horror story.

You see, New Zealand has a strong outdoor culture and one doesn't need to go too far to find an adventure-sport or outdoor-sports outlet literally brimming with cool outdoorsy stuff.

We are not much for shopping when we travel however I am not one to walk past an outdoorsy/hunting/gun shop without going in and this time I had a perfectly legit reason for dragging Faith with me. I needed her opinion on my new hat. The one I was going to temporarily replace my OD-green 5.11 fave with. [Didn't really need her opinion, that's just how I got her in there.]

You can see it pictured here. It's a legit hat guys. I mean it's pretty cool, performs as intended and fits in all the right places.

Yes I know it's just a hat and pretty-much simply sits on ones' noggin but as any self-respecting hat-connoisseur will know, there's hats, and then there's hats. You don't get it? James Bond would. You know, there's suits and then there's suits!

I purchased this hat for $39.50NZD and happily told the cash-register-guy to "cut the tags off bru, I'm wearing' it!"

I sashayed out of the store...After spending an hour looking at guns and hunting equipment, feeling like a boss. I was hatted, said hat was cammo and said hunt on it...Could the day have worked out any better? I think not. [Didn't really sashay - Don't really know how...I strutted though for sure.]

Life is full of adversity. Things go wrong, tragically wrong, or just mildly frustratingly wrong. In my case, leaving my best-hat-friend home when I went on vacation is categorised in the tragically wrong zone of course...It was indeed a vacation horror story.

Facing life's challenges, seeing them as opportunities and not challenges I guess, is only one way to deal with them. We can capitulate of course, or simply ignore them, which is a capitulation of sorts in any case. But facing them, evaluating, determining a plan and acting is my way of dealing with adversity of any nature. Sure, it doesn't always work out as fortuitously as my recent hat-horror-story did however acting is preferable to not acting. But that's just me. Many prefer the other way.

This horror story worked out for the best. I mean I got to buy another hat - As if I need another to add to the burgeoning collection. I also got to spend an hour perusing outdoorsy stuff - Always time well-spent. Have I learned any lessons? Well obviously I have learned many. You may recall I muttered under my breath when commenting on my wife's reply - That's a lesson learned. The repercussions of such a comment, had she heard it, could have been tragic - For me. I also learned not to forget my hat among other things.

I like my new hat. A lot. It raises another conundrum though. Do I wear it, or do I wear my OD-green 5.11 best-friend-hat? Hmm, could be another horror story in the making.

The moral of the story? Well, it's quite simple really.

Don't forget to pack your hat when you go on vacation.

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Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default

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