Carry-on Must-haves

The 23 Carry-on Must-haves. Every Time. No Matter Where.

With these travel essentials on hand, you’ll be ready to go at a moment’s notice.

By Mark Orwoll

Need me to rush out on a last-minute travel assignment? No sweat. I always keep a few hundred bucks in ready money handy, an up-to-date passport with extra visa pages, and a carry-on kit with these essential items I never leave behind. Ever.

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Eye Mask and Ear Plugs

I sleep on planes. Or try to. Sometimes, though, I need a little help. In my experience, nothing works better than an old-fashioned eye mask and foam ear plugs. Optional: Add a shot of Johnny Walker on the rocks just before you’re ready for dreamland.

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Extra Ear Buds

Your ear buds are crap. My ear buds are crap. Even the best ear buds, which are crap, last about as long as your average drummer for Spinal Tap. So go to the local dollar store and buy the cheapest set you can find and throw ‘em in your carry-on for future trips. Then, when your current crappy ear buds break, you’ll have an extra set ready to go.

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Photocopy of your passport

Never lose your passport, especially in a foreign country. It will be the end of any vacation fun you hoped for, and you will feel like throwing up for the next 18 hours. The solution: Don’t lose your passport! However, if you ever lose your passport (advice: don’t), you will vastly improve your chances of getting a quick(ish) replacement from the local U.S. embassy or consulate if you have a color photocopy of the first two pages — the ones with your personal details and photo — and another piece of government-issued ID, like a state driver’s license. (Read the State Department FAQ on the subject here.)

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Universal Adapter Plug

When you travel as much as I do, you often find yourself considering such cosmic imponderables as, How can we, the human race, ever achieve world peace if we can’t even agree on freakin’ standardized electrical outlets?!  My solution? This All-in-One Universal Travel Adapter — a single, compact unit with a USB adapter that you can use almost anywhere in the world. And it’s under $20.

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Rain Poncho

Eminently packable and practical, a rain poncho, unlike an umbrella, leaves both of your hands free to do whatever it is you were doing before the skies let loose and the local fauna started marching down the autobahn in pairs. I like ones with drawstrings to help the hood stay on when the wind is blowing. You will look like a dork, most assuredly, but a dry dork.

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Bottle Opener

I know all the tricks to open a bottle cap. I can do it with a house key. I can do it on a table edge — sometimes without even damaging the table. I can even do it on the strike plate of a door latch, but since that requires turning the bottle sideways I usually lose half the contents before I can get it in my mouth. Better than all these methods: A good ol’ church key like this TSA-compliant corkscrew. You can buy one for a couple of bucks and keep it in your kit bag.

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Travel Document Holder

I am insanely organized. You would hate traveling with me. I always have to have everything in its place. (Please don’t touch that; it’s just where I want it, thanks.) And I like to keep all my travel documents together — passport, boarding pass, hotel confirmation, itinerary, oversized foreign currency that won’t fit in my wallet (yeah, that’s right, I’m looking at you, Pounds Sterling!), and the like. I have a leather travel document holder, but almost anything like it will do the trick.

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Resealable Plastic Bags

You need a quart-size baggie for your liquids when you’re going through airport security, right? So just put another one or two in your carry-on. They’re good for organizing, as well as when you have to pack anything damp, like a bathing suit that didn’t quite dry all the way while hanging on the hotel shower-curtain rod overnight.

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Snacks

Ever wake up in the middle of a red-eye flight hungry? Or it’s near midnight in your hotel room and you’re starving, but you don’t want to pay the preposterous charges for room service or the minibar? I’m telling you, a pack of peanuts or an energy bar in your luggage will seem like a godsend. My favorite snack to bring with me for when I’m feeling peckish is an Oreo six-pack.

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Pain Reliever

Too much sun at the beach. Too much wine with dinner. Too much stress from rushing to the airport. Whatever the cause, a headache can be misery — especially if you’re on a plane, in a hotel room at night, or otherwise far from a pharmacy. Talk to your doc, but in my case I always — always — pack a bottle of no-name, no-nonsense, 500 mg aspirin.

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Travel-Size Toothpaste

This might sound like a no-brainer, but after exhaustive research (asking some editors over after-work drinks) I’ve concluded that toothpaste is the single most forgotten item to pack. And most hotel amenity baskets don’t have toothpaste, for some reason. Exotic hand lotion that you’ll never use and with a name you can’t pronounce, almost certainly. Tiny little soap bars that look like some sort of Turkish candy, yep. But no toothpaste. I go to the dentist twice a year, and he always gives me a little plastic bag with a new toothbrush, some dental floss, and a small tube of toothpaste — just the right size to meet TSA requirements for liquids and gels. If you can't find that one, Marvis is a go-to for several editors at T+L.

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A Magazine

How quaint. How 1990s. How deliciously analog. We at T+L love magazines, not least of all when our iPhone dies and there’s no place to recharge it. Suggestion: Throw the latest copy of T+L in your bag (better yet, get a subscription!) for those times when Wi-Fi goes bye-bye or your battery bites the dust. You might even find you like the occasional magazine better than a nonstop diet of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

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Footwear for the Plane

In a recent installment of our Travel Non-Essentials column, my colleague and I reviewed Snoozies, hybrid slipper-socks that are ideal for avoiding the dirty, filthy, putrid bathroom and aisle floors of an airplane. You need a pair, trust me. Plastic flip-flops will also do the trick. Just don’t walk around a plane in your regular socks. It’s really…gross.

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A (Working) Pen

When you are at home or in the office you never think twice about a pen, because there’s always one available. That’s not necessarily the case when you’re on the road. So throw a couple of inexpensive Bic ballpoints in your baggage, as I do, if only for filling out your customs and arrival forms without bothering your fellow passengers. And when your gorgeous seatmate asks, “Does anyone have a pen?” you can flash a winning smile and say, “Please, use mine.”

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Legal-Size Envelope

A simple envelope is perfect for holding receipts, so bring one along in your carry-on. It used to be you could snag one from the stationery folder in the hotel desk drawer, but you might be surprised how few hotels have those anymore. An iPod dock, no prob, but an envelope? Forget about it. By the way, if you don’t save receipts on your travels, how do you expect to challenge that supposed $275 restaurant charge with your credit card company?

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Antibacterial Wipes

A few years back I was on the CBS Early Show to talk about hidden germs in hotel rooms. E. coli on the remote control, rhinoviruses on the light switch, things you don’t even want to know about on the thing you’re probably thinking about. Antibacterial wipes, to the rescue! Clorox and other companies make convenient travel packs.

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Sewing Kit

Yes, I take sewing kits from hotel bathroom amenity baskets. If that’s wrong, then I don’t want to be right. Besides, there’s no better way to carry around emergency needle and thread than these nifty mending sets with a variety of colored threads, several buttons, and, oftentimes, a safety pin. And if you don’t know how to sew on a button, sit down for 90 seconds and figure it out, Einstein. It’s not that hard.

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Emery Board or Nail Clipper

Why bring one of these? If you’re expecting a MacGyver scenario where I teach you to repair a busted car engine with an emery board, forget it. It’s just that I’ve torn a fingernail on the road, and as small a deal as that may seem, it can take away from the joys of traveling. So throw a nail clipper and a couple of disposable filing boards in your toiletry kit, and you’ll be glad you did.

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Diarrhea Medicine

Imagine, if you will, being in a far and distant land, one in which you don’t habla the patois and the locals don’t understand a word you’re saying. Hey, that sounds like grand adventure, right? That is, until your stomach clenches and your intestines start to tingle, thanks to last night’s “lamb” stew. Ask your physician to recommend the right medicine for you (or do as I do and go to WebMD). If you bring your own medicine with you in your carry-on, you won’t have to use tragically embarrassing gestures to tell a non-English-speaking Croatian assistant pharmacist what you’re searching for, as I once unfortunately had to do.

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Luggage Strap

The brasher and bolder, the better. Sure, your carry-on zipper is secure. Maybe. But even so, a colorful strap gives you peace of mind that your bag won’t unexpectedly crack open as you’re rushing to catch the Tube. Plus, a strap discourages the roaming hands of felonious baggage handlers on those woeful occasions when you’re asked to check your carry-on, and also lets you readily identify your bag among the dozens of others on the conveyor belt that look exactly like yours.

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Business Cards

Always have a calling card in a pocket of your carry-on and in your checked luggage, in case your outer baggage tag is torn off and the airline tries to reunite you with your lost luggage. Also, handing someone a business card before making a complaint or a request puts you one leg up in the negotiation game. It makes you look smart, professional, like someone who knows what’s what. And don’t forget to practice saying this, with authority: “Sir, my card.”

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Eyeglasses Prescription

You don’t have one of these, do you? Sure, I know you can drive to the local optician and get one. But I mean right now, as you’re heading to the airport on your next trip. Look, people lose (or break) eyeglasses all the time. Keep a copy of your optical prescription in the same document holder you use for your passport. Or at least bring a second pair of eyeglasses.

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Binder Clips

You know the clips I mean. Industrial strength. The ones large enough to hold an annual report together. The kind that you sometimes put on your index finger as you say to yourself, I wonder if this would hurt? (Answer: Yes, it does. It really hurts.) I use them to clip over the end of my shaving razor so I don’t accidentally cut myself while reaching inside my kit bag. They’re also great for holding together the rolled-up wires of a pair of crappy ear buds. Keep a couple in your carry-on. Just in case.