As I mentioned in my last post, I recently got back from a two week holiday in China (there's a long article coming on that once I have time to write it).  I took a minimum of tech toys with me - a phone (Sony Ericsson T68i, but not the charger, which was a mistake), an iPod (and the charger) and assorted camera gear (Canon 10D, Canon 17-40 L series lens, Canon Speedlight, Canon 75-300 IS lens and a mini tripod).  I carry my camera gear around in a Lowepro backpack which fully loaded with that gear becomes rather heavy, it also attracts the attention of security screeners at airports.  However, even when "randomly" selected on half of my flights for extra security nobody actually looked at my camera - in the first case at Sea-Tac they didn't even open the bottom portion of the bag once I told them there was fragile camera equipment in there and in Beijing the screeners touched the camera but when I said it was fragile and offered to remove it for them they just zipped up the bag and let me go. 

I wish I'd taken a charger for my phone as I used it more than I expected to.  China has an excellent GSM network with very good coverage and I was able to use my phone everywhere, mostly for recieving text messages, but I did have to make a few calls when I managed to drop and lose my keys.  My keys had a Maglite Solitaire on them which I was using on the train between Yichang and Beijing.  The lights in the bathroom weren't working and so I was using the Maglite to see what I was doing, however the train jolted as they have a habit of doing and the Maglite and thus my keys fell to the ground directly into the hole in the floor of the train that was serving as a toilet.  Thankfully I'd unlocked all of my bags earlier so the only real problem was not having my house keys anymore.  This is where the phone came in handy - the next morning I turned the phone on and made a couple of calls to secure someone meeting me at the airport and a place to stay.  It was great to know that even in the middle of China on a hard-class sleeper train I could make a call. 

I took a lot of photos with my camera - mostly using the 17-40 lens which is in a word superb.  It's the first and only L series lens I own and I love it.  It really put the old lens I was using before to shame.  Having the Hitachi 4GB Microdrive in the camera worked really well, I had no problems with the speed of the drive - it's slower than flash, but in use this didn't matter as the camera can buffer about 9 shots before writing to the drive.  It did take a slight toll on battery life, but as I always carry a spare fully charged battery with me it was never actually a problem - I easily took 200 shots in one session without the battery reaching the half way mark.  I did recharge the batteries several times, so if I was going somewhere where I wouldn't have regular access to a power outlet I'd probably take another one or two batteries with me.

The iPod was great to have with me and got charged up regularly - the battery life just isn't that long, but it was wonderfull to be able to sit on a boat cruising down the Yangtze river listening to my favourite music.

The one thing I didn't take with me that surprised my travelling companions was a computer of any sort.  I really didn't need one, in fact I only checked my email once during the entire trip.  I used an internet cafe in Yichang that was dimly lit and running what I suspect was a pirated copy of Windows 98, the internet access was fast and cheap, I paid roughly 6 US cents for 10 minutes of use and I confirmed that the BBC's news website was unavailable, but MSNBC was fine.

Here's a few photos I took - click the thumbnail for larger versions: