Travel Essentials

Over the past month I have been traveling up the East Coast of Australia. We flew from Melbourne to Sydney, and from there we traveled through Port Macquarie, Byron Bay, Surfers Paradise, Brisbane, Noosa, Rainbow Beach & Fraser Island, Airlie Beach & Whitsunday, Townsville & Magnetic Island, Cairns & the Great Barrier Reef. We then flew to Tokyo and spent 5 days there before flying back to the UK. If you want to read more about all my travels check out my photography and travel blog!

We were real backpackers, with the huge rucksack on our backs and a smaller one of our fronts. Every place I had to completely unpack my bag and repack.... that combined with the dry air on the Greyhound busses and the water from the beaches wasn't the best combination for my skin and nails... That being said, I only slightly chipped one nail. That was on our flight from Tokyo back to the UK so that doesn't reaaaaally count does it?

These have been my travel essentials, but the spotlight definitely goes to Sally Hansen Miracle Nail Thickener. Alongside that I also used the Maybelline Express Remover, Essie Good to Go, and Crabtree & Evenlyn Ultra-moisturising hand therapy.

I have written about the Sally Hansen Miracle Nail Thickener before on my blog, but it has been so amazing that I had to mention it again. This is the best nail thickener that I've ever used, and I've tried out a fair few. I used OPI Nail Envy for a really long time, but I never noticed a huge difference, same goes for an Essie strengthener. This was worked miracles for my nails. I used to always have very weak and thin nails since I bit my nails until I was about 18! They were in a horrible condition and I could literally bend them. Now they are rock solid, they won't budge! But not only are they the strongest they have ever been, they also grow incredibly fast. During my travels I cut my nails twice and a third time the day after I came home... I only traveled for one month!

In a previous post I wrote that the formula was a bit off, that my bottle was super stringy from the start... that was just a bad bottle. I bought a new one, yes I love it so much I went through a whole bottle, and the formula is much better on this one. It's really easy to apply and dries quick. My bottle is starting to get a bit thick, but nothing to worry about yet. The photo to the right show my naked nails with any edits.

Another very useful product I took with me was the Maybelline Express Remover, an acetone free dip in nail polish remover. This has been so easy to use and I didn't have to worry about bringing a bottle of nail polish remover and cotton pads, and the bottle spilling everywhere etc. It's super easy to use, all you do is dip your fingers in one by one and twist them around a bit. I found that if I used a thick top coat I'd have to dip my fingers in twice, and sometimes bits of my base coat stayed on my nail, despite that it's still super easy and a lot more hassle free. I didn't find that it dried my cuticles like the Bourjois nail polish remover did. Another positive is that it's a small little pot so didn't take up much space!

My top coat was been Essie Good To Go. It's super shiny, easy to apply and dries super quick. I feel like it does end up dragging nail art, but since I wasn't doing any of that while traveling I had no problems with it.

Finally..... another holy grail product that I am hooked on is the Crabtree & Evelyn Ultra-Moisturising Hand Therapies. Oh my god they are amazing. First of all they come in a huge range of scents. My favourite is Pomegranate, but Citron and Pear & Pink Magnolia make a close second. I'm already on my second tube of Pomegranate and the second one and Citron are both almost empty. They all smell amazing, I did go round in the store smelling every single one of them. They come in this super handy purse size of 25g but they also have much larger bottles. I believe these cost around $10 in Australia. The second thing that's so amazing about them is that they are ultra moisturising, like it says on the front. They make my hands feel super soft and really make a huge difference to the texture. It improves the skins barrier function to reduce moisture loss for extraordinary softness and hydration as well as help the condition of nails and cuticles. It's free of paragons, laurel sulfates, mineral oil and propylene glycol.

Like I said, thanks to all these products my nails have been in excellent condition and the only nail that I slightly chipped was on the airplane back to the UK!