How to keep a travel journal without carrying a notebook

What photos don't keep

Your camera roll shows where you were. A journal remembers what it was like.

• Names of streets, cafes and people you met
• Sounds, smells and the weather
• What you ate and what it tasted like
• What went wrong and how you sorted it out
• What surprised you about the place, or about yourself

A routine for each day of the trip

1. Morning: one sentence about the plan and how you feel about it
2. During the day: a 30 second note right after something you want to keep
3. Evening: two or three minutes on the whole day
4. Before bed: add a photo or two to the evening entry

Travel prompts to say out loud

On a day when nothing comes to mind, pick one.

• Describe the first ten minutes after you arrived
• Tell the story of one meal, from ordering to the last bite
• Describe a stranger you spoke with and what they said
• Talk through something that went wrong today and how it turned out
• Describe the sounds outside your window right now
• Say what you'd tell a friend to skip here, and what not to miss

Recording abroad and offline

Talk quietly on a bench, in your room or on a walk. If transcription happens on the phone, you won't need data roaming to keep your journal. Make one short recording at home before you leave, so anything that needs downloading is already done.

Looking back after the trip

A week after you get home, read the trip from start to finish. Record one closing entry about what you'd remember if you could keep only three things. A year later, the same dates bring the trip back.

A travel journal in Dawn Light

Tap the sun and talk, then use Add photo to put a picture in the entry. Give each trip its own tag, so the Journal tab can show one trip at a time. Search finds the name of that cafe months later, and On this day brings the trip back next year. The first recording in a language downloads Apple's speech model once, and after that Dawn Light writes down what you say with no connection.