Pre vacation check list...don't forget to????

[PA Girl]

I take pictures of any checked luggage- very very handy if it gets lost (from experience!).

Also I second calling the credit card company(I feel for you Mrs. Pete!)-ours seems to be quite on top of purchases outside our home area. I'll be traveling for work and they're calling my husband to see why all these charges are appearing. If they can't get ahold of you to verify what's happening I'm guessing they'd shut the card down.
We also let a relative from both sides of the family know our schedules. We had a parent pass away once several years ago while we were on vacation and unfortunately they were the only one who had our information. Best to have more than one person know all the details.

We were on the other end of the bold.

Husband gets a call from AMEX one day asking if Mrs. PA Girl was in Italy because they noticed a quick succession of large charges.

Turns out someone stole my cc information and was charging up a storm across Europe. AMEX shut the card down but the crooks did manage to charge well inot four figures.

Amazingly enough, they caught the guy in Switzerland a day later.

[ccasebolt]

Make sure your cell phone charger is in your carry-on! I made that mistake one time and barely had enough charge to receive the call letting me know which ferry my luggage was on. Not sure what would have happened if the phone had died...

[KTinTX]

I ALWAYS carry a spare battery for my camera(s). I always buy a spare whenever a buy a new camera and that way you'll never miss a shot due to a dead battery!

And I like the idea of snapping a photo of your checked luggage! That is so easy with today's cell phones. We didn't check bags on our trip to STJ, but have had to do the luggage thing on other trips and that photo would have saved a bunch of time!