It wasn't that long ago that backpacking and hosteling were synonymous with wholesome youths trekking between Alpine villages, porting external frame packs with large rolled sleeping bags strapped on top, using sleeping bags in hostels. Looking at old travel guides makes me think that every traveler was an aspiring mountain climber!

Times have certainly changed, both for budget travelers and for the sleeping bag, once a ubiquitous travel staple! The sleeping bag's role in travel isn't quite as clear cut anymore. Readers have been asking sleeping bag related questions and I'm happy to help. 

Most travelers to Myanmar make Yangon their first stop, not their last, but we've been bucking the norm for a lot of our trip. With more and moretransportation options opening up in other cities, we were able to make the most of our limited time and not double back on our tracks. Yangon has plenty to offer visitors and, while you could easily spend a week or more exploring the city at a leisurely pace, it is compact enough to see a lot of the major sites in two days, which is exactly what we plan to do!

I'm thrilled to be heading to Chicago this spring for the inaugural Women in Travel Summit,  March 14-16 at the Palmer House Hilton.  I'll be leading a presentation all about editing and also participating in a panel about budget travel - but more than anything I'm thrilled to meet so many inspiring travelers and writers! Hosted by the Go Girl Travel Network (the same team who brings the #girlstravel Twitter chat to life each Monday!), I can't imagine anyone who is more dedicated to sharing women's travel stories and experiences. I've been a a passionate fan of Go Girls' work ever since I first started writing and I'm always proud to work with them, be it through #girlstravel or contributing to their website. I can't wait to see what they plan for WITS!

Many people have asked me if female travelers and travel writers really need their own conference - and my answer is a resounding YES.  One of my recent experiences illustrates how women face such unique travel conditions.

Welcome to the latest installment of the  "Save, Splurge, Steal" interview series.  Getting great value when I travel is always such a fun challenge for me and I love to learn how other people get the best possible experience for their available time and money. I'm asking top travel bloggers to share their expertise and I hope you enjoy their responses as much as I do!

Meet Justin from The Art of Scuba Diving! 

In 2011, Justin went on a university trip to South Africa. By the end of that trip he knew that he couldn't return home. He watched my classmate fly away and leave him in Africa alone. Justin found work in Mozambique at a dive shop, and soon realized that he could sustain his travels this way forever. That was 3 years, 59 countries and 6 continents ago, and he hasn't slowed down yet! He started his own travel blog called The Art of Scuba Diving, hoping to inspire others to see the world and live the life of freedom! 

Less than 12 hours after enjoying the BEST travel experience of our lives, we were off to catch the overnight train from Bagan to Yangon. An overnight train seemed to an efficient and economical way to get across the country without losing a precious day of sightseeing to transit and we were excited to try something new.

Our expectations for the train were very modest. We had done considerable research, learning a lot from The Man in Seat 61 and Lesley Leep Phoography  We had watched Anthony Bourdain’s Burmese train trip on the Parts Unknown series and had taken to heart a passage from Lonely Planet, in which a local resident advises that the train is “not as bad as you think, not as good as you hope”.