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Travel Practice advice
Hi. I’m feeling a bit frustrated now. I started TOC a couple months ago, made it through 30 days to play, 5 day challenge, and about 4 weeks of daily challenge. Now the problem. I am retired and besides guitar my wife and I love to travel. I have a traver guitar that is ok but no where near as much fun to play as my new Taylor. Travel makes it hard to stick with playing but I always try to find some time. Consistent good internet also makes it difficult. Anyway, I am on a trip in Bangladesh now and my plan was to go back and continue working on past lessons but I’m not sure where to start as it’s not like I felt like I perfected anything and I marked all of them as favorites as Tony suggested so what to play. I guess bottom line is are there suggestions for sticking with some kind of routine to keep progressing while I am traveling? Thanks
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4 Replies
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Good and relevant question. I just got back from a trip and cruise to New England and Canada. Last month we were in South Padre Island. Earlier we were in Honduras and Mexico. (My wife has pent up travel demand after selling our business.) I’ve tried taking my Taylor Mini. It got crunched once on an RV trip with friends and airlines struggle with it in the cabin. I have taken my Martin Backpacker on the last few trips. It’s not the same as a real guitar but is fun with its unique sound. (Especially with drone notes. I like the dulcimer sound it implies). But the internet connection thing is often an insurmountable issue. I’ve snapped multiple streaks while traveling including this last trip. I carry several printed out tabs of lessons I’ve liked or benchmark weeks. It is an effort to stay with a habit while traveling but worth it. I’ve also had opportunity to meet other guitar playing travelers who have been attracted by the Backpacker or Mini and wanted to listen or okay it with me. And some entertainers on cruises or excursions have connected and share some playing. So thanks for starting this thread and encouraging others to share your travel dilemmas.
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I have a D’addario finger exerciser thing that I use when I travel and can’t bring a guitar. I have a smaller bodied Taylor GS-Mini and for road-trips I’ll try to bring that along which has been nice. Also, when traveling I’ll try to visit guitar stores and try out guitars and use that time to do some fingering exercises or chord transitions or practice a song I’m working on a few times, etc.
Another thing I’ll do is use the Fretonomy app on my phone to do fretboard memorization or scale drills.
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I’m on a practice streak of 393 days and have been trying to keep it alive. I have been on 16 trips during the period. For road trips I take my electric guitar (so I can wear headphones when around my wife in the hotel) and I ended up building a travel guitar that fits in my carry-on for airplane trips.
It can be hard to find the time and fit in the practice. Most places I’ve been this year have had good internet, for those that don’t I have binder of exercises that I take with me and just practice them.
As for what to do when you get back just jump into whatever Daily Challenge is going on that week (maybe start on the Monday lesson). All of the Daily Challenge weeks are stand-alone so it’s not a problem if you miss a few weeks,
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there was a time i was without my gitbox, on vacation, so i rented one, or visualization can be a powerful tool. clearing your head in a crowded place imagining you are playing for all of them is OSM!!
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