a second passport in a hurry

We probably shouldn't have waited until the month before we left to decide we should each get a second passport, but we did.  Based on a tip from The World Effect we thought it would be helpful when trying to get some of our African countries and Brazil visas while on the road. It would allow us to send off one passport and keeping one with us. We were also concerned that we were going to run out of pages in our current passport, it only has a few countries in it right now, but based on the fact that visas take up a page and most require you to have 2 blank pages we didn't want to take any chances of not being allowed into a country.  However like I said we were about a month away from leaving and didn't have one.  So after some research we found that we could apply in person at a Passport Agency and luckily there was one in Denver.

After making an appointment, proving we needed to apply for visas in the next 4 weeks and had a need for a second passport we were issued one. We went in on a Friday and were able to pick up our passports the next Wednesday.  The fee was the same as if we did an expedited passport service, $170 ($110 + $60 for the rush) however we had our passport in about 3 business days rather than the normal 2-3 weeks it takes to mail it in.

So now we are all set and just completed our India visa application using our new passports.

keeping in touch

Since we are hoping to meet some great people along our travels we decided it would be fun to get some contact cards printed up so people could get a hold of us. From a great suggestion from a friend we used moo.com who have some mini cards (1/2 the size of regular cards) which are perfect for our needs.  The cards turned out really well, they are a great size and the quality is awesome.  Now let's just hope we meet some cool people to hand them out to!

Googleized

As we are planning we realize how much we are investing into Google for this trip.  For better (a great set of apps and great features) or worse (they have a lot of our info) Google has become a huge resource for this trip.  Here's the breakdown:

• Gmail - has become both of our primary email application, it's labeling and search has been great for finding all those confirmation emails and receipts
• Blogger - the site you're viewing now
• Google Docs - hosting spreadsheets of expenses and documents we might need on the road, shared between both of us
• Google Calendar - our trip schedule, shared between both of us
• Google Voice - we'll have to see how this works, but we'll be using Google Voice as our main contact number as well forwarding our phones to this number. This will allow a single place to check voicemails and the best part is Google Voice transcribes voicemails into text allowing us to either listen to them online or read the message without having to call stateside or miss important calls.  It also has great international calling rates for making calls overseas.
• Google - need some info, have a question, Google it!

So with all that I'd say Google knows more about us than our parents. 

visa photos on the cheap

Between taking the time to get a visa (or passport) photo taken and paying the $3-$4 per photo (the usually come in sets of 2 for around $8) we decided to handle the task ourselves.
Here's the list of supplies:

1. digital camera (we used a D90 with an SB400 for better lighting)
2. tripod
3. white foam core board (had some from other photo projects)

After reading up on the guidelines on travel.state.gov and using epassportphoto.com's handy sizing and alignment tool we've got a set of 6 (it was 5, but I photoshopped the page to 6) passport photos each, and we just have to spend ~$.20 to print off some 4x6s at Walgreens. Net result: $.03 per photo, not bad considering we're going to need 2 for several of the visas we need.

another shot and malaria stuff

After another trip to Passport Health (and another $224) we received our second shot (of three) for hepatitis A/B. This is our last shot before we leave in September. Our final shot will be when we return home in the spring of next year.

As mentioned earlier we were a little worried about our malaria medication, doxycycline, and it's side affect of increased sun sensitivity. After some awesome help from some of our medical friends we were informed about an alternative prophylaxis (a fancy term I learned, basically meaning 'preventative medication') called Malarone. It's said to have fewer side affects than doxycycline and is just as effective. However it's one side affect is it's cost. I called up our local pharmacy and was quoted about $25 for our supply of doxycycline and $880 for a comparable dosage of Malarone. No, I didn't misplace any decimal places, it's basically 35 times as much...that's a lot of sunscreen. Needless to say we'll be having our doxycycline prescription filled. We've also heard the increased sensitivity to sun doesn't affect everyone, but only time will tell.

Wikitravel has a pretty good post on malaria: http://wikitravel.org/en/Malaria.