I am currently traveling in Thailand and i took a boat to a small Island called Ko Sichang, which is a two hour drive South from Bangkok, and a 45 minute ferry ride. I left my guitar at a house of a friend and brought my little Ukulele with me. My Bio picture has me with it, I bought it 2 years ago and i take it with me when ever i travel. It is a Baritone Ukulele, the biggest of the Ukulele family. What i love about it is, it's the same tuning as a regular Guitar, but it is only the first 4 strings. So all of the chord shapes are the same as you are used to playing. When Traveling, it's easy to carry and once you get a few songs down you can practice it anywhere. Last week the Bus i was traveling on broke down and we all had to get out and wait on the highway for them to send another Bus, I just pulled out the Ukulele and nailed down "Eric Clapton's" "Layla". "The Beatles", "Here comes the sun" and a few others, before the Bus came to pick us up. I have been getting a set list together over the past few trips. I carry a little Songbook around with it. It's also great for Airports, i have had some long layovers where i got a few Songs down. With the Baritone Ukulele, if you put a Capo on the 5th fret, it becomes a Tenor Ukulele. Which is the smaller more popular one. The Chord shapes are the same but the names are different. The Songbook shows the shapes with the new chord names. Once you get a few Songs down it is really quite addicting. I have a couple of Mandolin's as well and i have done the same thing traveling with them over the years. Learning a new Instrument is really good for the Brain and if you get a few songs down, it can make for a more diverse set. The Mandolin is a Violin with frets, the same tuning and neck scale. So if you learned to sight read with it you could read Violin notation. Lugging a Guitar around traveling is a bit of work, I will do it if i am not going to too many places, but for the Backpacker, a Ukulele or a Mandolin is great.
