Advice needed for care of camera in Europe trip

[samtcy]

I'm planning to go for a month long holiday in March next year in various places in europe - paris, swiss alps, austria...etc..

However, I'm concerned about what should I prepare/purchase for this trip.

I'm planning to bring my panasonic fx-8, 2 batteries, a 1gb memory card & charger. However, am very much concerned that the battery life and memory space may not be enough for me to take the many pictures which I intend to take. Should I buy additional battery and memory card or portable harddisk? Any recommendations? Is there anything I can do to prevent my camera from failing me in those close to zero degrees environment? I've heard that battery life will be shorter in cold conditions...can anyone advise as to how drastic is this change in battery life? Is there any portable electricity generator that operates on normal AA alkaline batteries? Cos I worry that I might not have access to electricity on certain places to charge my camera batteries...

Thanks.

 

[AReality]

get a portable HDD casing and 1 more card, more than enough. Just leave it in your hotel/hostel and bring your cam & cards out. 2 batteries may not be enough.

As long as u're not living in a tent, there'll be electricity. It's Europe...

If u intend to stay in a tent, the 1 at Florence, Italy is excellent!


.

 

[samtcy]

Which portable HDD casing do u recommend? I hope to get 1 that's small (cos very very limited luggage space), able to run on AA batt preferably and not to mention not to expensive (since have not much money to spare after spending on the trip)

For my trip, since it's a 21day tour to many countries (France, Amsterdam, Swiss, Munich, Florence..) thus there may be times when I may not have enough time to charge all my stuffs (video camera battery, digital camera battery...etc) in just 1 nite in the hotel (cos will be currently on the go..and only staying at each hotel for only 1 or 2 nites each)...therefore hope that the harddisk will not need to use AC power.

 

[sk.images]

Battery life in near 0 temperatures is VERY short (compared to say 25 degrees), depending on usage and actual temperature this can be significantly less then 1/2 of what you would normally expect. So take spare batteries and alternate the charging, i.e. one night digital cam, then next video.

As for storage, you will need an external drive which has a built in card drive, otherwise you will need a PC to interface, in which case you don't need another drive. In terms of $/Mb external storage will be much cheaper then more cards, i.e. a 40Gb external drive will cost the same as 4GB of CF (approximately).

And as already stated, unless your in a tent you shouldn't have trouble finding an outlet - make sure you bring a plug adaptor.