Flashpacking: Backpacking with Bucks and Toys

Flashpacking is in the news this week with an AP story featuring freelance writer Lee Gimpel, who's been flashpacking it across India. Gimpel, who's got some valuable student travel type insights on his website, wrote to About's Student Travel with a recommendation for flashpacking toy AlphaSmart Neo, a portable laptop which he says was great for writing on the road.

What is flashpacking? It's the way more and more young and young-at-heart backpackers with a little extra flash in the money belt are traveling these days: carrying a backpack full of tech gadgets, usually to single hostel rooms or even hoity hotels (where we want wifi). Student Travel reported last winter on a Hostelworld.com survey which revealed that 21% of backpackers are lugging a laptop, and cell phones are more common than ramen among international budget travelers these days.

The flashpacker gear

Gimpel's recommendation of the AlphaSmart Neo portable laptop: "It has a full keyboard, is light, small, durable, stores hundreds of pages of text, can transfer content to almost any computer with a simple USB connection … and the best part is it runs for about 700 hours on one set of three plain old AA batteries without recharging them." I haven't played with one, but it looks like a cool tool.

• Alphasmart Neo

My own flashpacking gear elbowing out the clothes in my backpack (a High Sierra Transport) these days:

• International plug adaptor with surge protector
• Portable wifi finder
• Apple 12" ibook
• Borrowed iPod (check out the top five iPod travel downloads)
• Noisebuster headphones (cheaper and as good as the Bose version)
• Water bottle and purifier
• Mini GPS (flashpacking is not just an urban sport, either)

And more cords than I probably need, plus an extra digital camera in case the one in my shoulder bag goes bad, extra memory chips for said cameras, and two AA battery chargers and an extra laptop battery, lest I be unplugged.

Check out some gadget-grabbing duds from Scottevest, too -- iPod pockets and cord-threaders galore. And if you've got the perfect current international cell phone, tell us all about it; otherwise, check out some international cell phone rental and satellite phone options.

Wifi and hostels: where's the love?

The recent cry heard 'round the well beaten paths and less traveled roads flashpackers take is, "Where's the free wifi?" Twenty four euros per wifi hour for this writer in Lucerne recently; hostels aren't exactly hopping on the free-wifi-as-amenity wagon yet. The recent AP article on flashpacking ("Flashpackers: High-tech backpackers") mentions an NYC hostel offering wifi as if it were a happening hostel thing, but it's not -- on a trip to New York this spring, for instance, I had to prop my laptop on my hostel room's windowsill (photo above) to borrow wifi from a willing neighbor; the hostel had not even pay-to-play wifi. Internet matters were almost as iffy at the popular Wake Up hostel in London the week before, where I had to fork over mega bucks to log on from my single room. When will flashpackers be loved?

If you've spent frustrating hours on fruitless free wifi whereabouts searches worldwide, check out a list of ten European hostels with free wifi in top student travel spots like Rome, Prague and Paris.

• Read a wifi definition and learn about free and paid wifi
• Ten European hostels with free wifi (this list needs an affordable Vienna hostel featuring free wifi -- know one?)
• Learn about a pocket wifi finder
• Find wifi hotspots internationally
• Find international internet cafe lists
• "Wifi takes to UK streets"

Flashpackers seek out single rooms

Flashpacking in hostels -- you bet. It's a challenge to seek the wifi grail in most hostels, but grabbing a single hostel room means electrical plugs aplenty just for you, and single hostel rooms are far cheaper than comparably sized hotel digs. You're not neccessarily settling for half the hotel amenities, either -- hostel desk staff are usually great, bed bugs are rarer than at luxury hotels, and single hostel rooms frequently come with private baths. My recent single room stays at the Wake Up London and NYC Chelsea Hostel were delightful -- street views and plenty of secure and quiet privacy.

Many single hostel rooms are double bunk beds in tradiitonal hostel style (i.e. partially made upon arrival), like the Wake Up London single hostel room at right, but others, like the NYC Chelsea Hostel single room at left above, are a regular double bed with hotel-ish bedspreads. Flashpackers needn't stuff sleepsacks into a backpack when choosing single rooms, either -- hostel bedbugs are just that rare.

Pictures of private hostel rooms:

• San Francisco's Adelaide Hostel
• Melbourne's Nomads Industry
• Brisbane's Bunk
• Guadalajara's Hostal Maria

Read more: What to call backpackers with bucks?

^{Related: Gone Flashpacker | Don't Call 'em Backpackers, Mate | Backpacking Europe 101 | All About Hostels | Gimpel's website: Passing Through India}