For the past three days i have been on a short trip to Canberra. Which i originally thought would be a fantastic time to try out my mobile office. I mean what better way to try it out then put it in a bag and take it 1200km from home. Well this was I thought a great idea, except for a couple of small problems i found which not having actually traveled with my portable office on a plane before, i had not thought of.
- The Carrybag – It seems that the carry bag which I own, that will fit pretty much all my gear in, is actually to large for carry on luggage. However all i really needed was my newest laptop (Samsung NC20) Which is no issue to fit in as carry on. However i also needed to take my Camera (Canon DSLR EOS 450D). Had to find something to fit them both into for next time, i made use of a half measure this time. More so to keep them together and minimize the chance of either getting moved around to much. But very much a to do item, to find a good in between bag which will fit both.
- Security Checks – This sort of goes along with the need for a better solution for a carry bag for traveling. As it seems that getting a laptop out of it’s carry bag, which is inside another bag, and has a camera bag on top of it inside that, is not that easy. Getting it back in means almost repacking this bag entirely. Which I have no problem with, security is the top priority, just something you learn from.
- Connectivity – Of course with maintaining blogs, having internet connectivity is important. I had thought going to the Capital of Australia, would have had better mobile reception. However I was a little wrong. While, there may be good reception in the City Center, the purpose of my trip did not bring me to the city center except for one morning. The hotel I stayed in Hawker, i was lucky to get a connection, on GPRS, and this was slow, Additionally the connections I achieved at Nicholls, was similar. While I was able to connect at 3G speeds at Latham, however this was still slower then i was used to achieving in Brisbane’s outer suburbs. Maybe I was in a bad area or who knows, not something though that it is easy to find out about before hand though. As Coverage maps can only go so far.
There were some good points however in this experience, I have a better understanding of what i personally need to make travel and a portable office work now. Additionally, I was glad to have made my acquisition of this smaller and lighter laptop (Samsung NC20) as even this with my Camera, felt a lot heavier by the time i boarded the plane. The longer battery life was also a good bonus, it meant charging was only required at night and one time during the day (on Monday when i used it a lot more).
All in all I can see that traveling and working with a mobile office is something much more then doable, it is a habit for many people (you just need to look at the number of people using their laptop sitting in the airport. But more then this it is going to be something that i will do a lot more of.