Looking to buy yourself (or your loved ones) a gift? These weird and wonderful travel inventions can make trips a whole lot more fun and comfortable.
1. Scooter Luggage
This bag has a foot platform which acts as a scooter when lowered, bringing an end to baggage-bearing woes.
2. Metal Detector Sandals
Now that you’ve spent your savings on that dream holiday, you may want to start combing the beach for loose change. Slipping on a pair of metal-detector sandals will help you find buried treasure on the beach, the sandals buzzing and lighting up when they detect metal.
3. Nubrella
This handy item is not a new flavour of Nutella; but rather, as the name actually suggests, a new umbrella. The best thing about the nubrella is that it’s handy without needing the use of hands. It functions like a hoody and is worn like a back-pack, so that your hands are free to carry luggage with ease through the rain, while making rainy-day camping and hiking a whole lot easier.
4. Boyfriend Pillow
Travelling alone doesn’t mean you need to feel lonely. While some pillows help you get comfy, others keep you company – like the dream man arm pillow, designed to give you a good snuggle before bedtime.
5. Ostrich Pillow
You can now take a nap comfortably with the Ostrich Pillow which engulfs your head in soft and warm cosiness, blocking out light and noise while you doze in dreamland.
6. Beardski
If company is the last thing you want, you can ward off unwelcome advances with a Beardski – a large, bearded scarf or face mask that will keep you warm and make people turn the other way.
7. Green Grass Flip Flops
Once you’re back at work and find yourself missing your outdoor holiday, try taking your mind back to those times with Green Grass Flips Glops. It’s not real grass, but it’s more comfortable than closed shoes and will make you feel like you’re still taking a walk through the park.
8. Wi-Fi Detector T-Shirt
You’re in a new city or country and want to get hooked up to the Net to contact loved ones and let them know you’re safe – or just boast about all your amazing holiday adventures. Instead of traipsing from one place to the next, inquiring whether they have Wi-Fi or looking for that obscure sign pasted high up where everyone will miss it, just wear a Wi-Fi Network Detector T-shirt, which will indicate that you are in a Wi-Fi hot spot.
9. USB Air-Conditioned Shirt
All you need is a laptop to charge your shirt, keeping you cool on sweltering hikes or in airless airports. Should the shirt power out, it can run on batteries as well.
10. Rufus Roo Luggage Jacket
It’s not a dog and it’s not a kangaroo. Rufus Roo is a jacket that solves your excess luggage problem with pockets galore for stuffing in all kinds of items, including chargers and cellphones. However, you’ll need to have no sense of style, or not care at all what people think, when wearing this bulky fashion blight.
11. Traveller’s Phrasebook T-Shirt
Being lost in translation is a thing of the past, as the Traveller’s Phrasebook T-shirt is adorned with global signs that you merely need to point at for assistance. But beware – nothing screams tourist more than using this shirt.
12. Bluetooth Gloves
These might make you look a little crazy, because you have to use your hand as a phone and talk into it; but it’ll keep your fingers nice and toasty. Bluetooth Gloves are wirelessly synched to your phone, so that you don’t have to pull it out your pocket, which is also a great way of making yourself a less likely mugging target when having a mobile chat.
13. Banana Guard
Got the munchies on board or on foot? A good energy-booster is a banana, but there’s the squash factor to keep in mind when it comes to packing this soft, yellow fruit. Banish your blackened banana blues by purchasing a Banana Guard, which will keep your snack intact.
14. Tomato Soup SafeCan
If you’re paranoid about getting mugged or robbed in a foreign place, then stash your valuables in a SafeCan of tomato soup. With a screw-in base or top it’s the most unsuspecting object in which you can hide money, jewellery and other precious items.
15. Customised Airline Seat Cover
Should hygiene be your top concern, then you’ll want to get yourself a customised airline seat cover. Available in an array of bright and bold patterns, these covers allow you to protect yourself from whatever previous passengers left behind.
16. Flying Pasties
Another concern might be modesty. If you don’t enjoy the idea of what’s being seen on those airports scanners, you can hide your birthday suit bits with Flying Pasties – stickers which you strategically paste on your body. However, they’ve been brought under fire as not actually concealing anything, in addition to the reality of airport scanners not being quite that penetrating.
17. Portable Toilet
Campers will love to hear about personal disposable toilets like the Biffy Bag. It is leak and puncture-proof and contains a special powder which engulfs your number ones and twos. It even comes with accessories like toilet paper and wet wipes.
18. SheWee
Thought you’d heard it all when it came to outdoor ablutions? Then you haven’t heard of the SheWee. Like the Biffy Bag, it allows you to urinate in public – but discreetly, of course. It’s not just a great novelty for campers and festival-goers, but also for those moments when you find yourself in a far-from-clean latrine.
19. Portable Shower
If you’re a big outdoors’ person, or have a major aversion to public bathrooms, then you need a portable shower – allowing you to rinse off and clean up anywhere, at any time. It’s private, convenient and easy to assemble – everything you need to make travelling light and hassle-free.
20. King of Swiss Army Knives
When people ask what one item you would want to have with you on a deserted island, it should be a Swiss Army Knife – the kind that comes with 87 tools and can perform 141 functions. With various blades, a screwdriver and even a fish scaler, you’ll be able to survive better than Robinson Crusoe ever did.
Swiss Army Knife. Photo by Wengerna
21. Portable Bonfire Log
All these new-fangled inventions seem designed for you to put together the perfect party. The bonfire log makes your party fires quick and easy to ignite, and are also a whole lot safer. Once you’ve got the fire going, get other fires kindling with the romantic firelight.
22. Bug-Proof Socks
If you’re scared of the wriggly wigglies and creepy crawlies nibbling at your feet when you’ve gone camping, pull on a pair of bug-proof socks for extra protection, as well as added warmth in winter.
23. Sleep and Walk Suit
Another winter warmer comes in the form of the SelkBag Sleep and Walk Suit, which you can sleep in, eat in, walk in – do pretty much anything in. There’s no more need to lug around sleeping bags and warm clothes, because this suit gives it to you all-in-one. The feet and hands are even detachable.
24. Lighted Eyeglasses
Bookworms will love the idea of lighted eyeglasses which shine a light exactly where you’re reading. When the lights dim on your flight, you can continue reading undisturbed. Reading by the flickering firelight while camping is a thing of the past, now that you can use the eyeglasses’ steady light instead.
25. One-Inch Camera
No holiday is complete without a camera to take pictures of all the good times; but if you’re strapped for space then get yourself a one-inch camera. The Chobi Cam One HD is the smallest digital camera in the world and has a simple, one-button functionality. The quality is as good as any other camera, qualifying the statement that dynamite really does come in small packages.
26. Portable Cocktail Tool
Get mixing on your holiday and become the most popular member of the party with a portable cocktail tool. Replete with items such as a muddler, knife, stirrer, jigger, corkscrew and bottle opener, you can whip together just about anything. Remember not to pack it in your hand luggage, as this multi-tool can be viewed as more than just a party-starter. Choose between a Margarita, Martini or Mojito Master.
Whether shopping for yourself or others you can be sure of finding something you’ve never seen, felt, heard of or tasted before. Should they fail to impress, at least you’ll be left with a great conversation starter.
Featured image by grassflipflops.com
