Hello E-clutter

A pile of wires, 2012

The flip side of not having to carry film, books, maps, itineraries, etc. is having to carry electronics. Or more importantly, is having to carry chargers and connecting cables for all the gadgets. Here's a list of the wires, cables, batteries and chargers I'll be bringing on this trip.

1. Camera charger - fortunately and unbelievably, my two Nikon cameras - the D7000 DSLR and smaller Nikon 1 V1 mirrorless interchangeable lens camera - use the same battery and charger. So three batteries gives me one in each camera and a spare being charged for tomorrow.

(Note to self: do I need a backup charger, or is my OCD showing? What if I loose mine? How fast can Amazon deliver to Yellowstone?)

2. Apple i-Devices - between us we will have two iPhones and two iPads. Because we charge all of them every night, we will have four charging sets for them. Obviously they can back each other up.

3. TomTom GPS - charging cable for the car, and a backup that has a USB plug at the other end. This falls under the rule of bringing plenty of something with is hard to replace. It has a weird connector you can only buy from TomTom at an exorbitant price.

4. A Belkin multi-tap plug for the room - I've found that electrical outlets in most hotel rooms are scarce, and there are sometimes just enough for the lamps, phones and clocks they supply. This gizmo lets me plug in three AC plugs and two USB cables at once.

5. An auto cigarette lighter thingee that lets me charge two USB devices at the same time while in the car.

6. Another auto cigarette lighter thingee that gives me two outlets from one in the car.

7. Some hotel rooms have TVs or radios with an audio input jack. So I bring a stereo cable which lets me play music from my i-Device. The same cable will let me jack into the Aux input in the car, if it has one.

So if I'm counting accurately, three batteries, eight plugs and eight cables.