If you're on the road to get away from it all, the last thing you might think of is keeping in touch. Cutting ties, throwing out the phone and shutting down your email account may be part of your journey.

Some of the most wonderful memories I have are of stillness and solitude, of freedom and of inability to reach out, dependent only on myself and on my environment.

But if, on the contrary, it is important to you to stay in touch with the rest of the world, how best to do it?

Each year, new technologies make it not only easy, but almost instantaneous to reach out to your friends and family.

Changing Times

When I first started backpacking, most keeping in touch was done by postcards and letters.

Alternatives were writing a journal to share once back home, or a scrapbook, to do the same. But it was difficult to share things as they happened.

Polaroid cameras allowed you to take a few shots instantaneously and mail them home, but cameras were bulky and expensive. You could always carry an 'instamatic', get films developed as you traveled, and either mail them home or find someone to hand carry them.

On the beach in Zanzibar one day I met a Swiss pharmacist who happened to live right next door to a friend of mine. After helping me remove a rather nasty needle from my foot, he was kind enough to take a bag of rolls back home for me. These days, with terrorist scares and security checks, I don't think he would have offered.

A few years later communications became simple as long distance phoning became more common. Phone booths in developing countries began accepting credit and phone cards, and to keep in touch you could buy pre-paid cards, either in your own country or abroad.

Email was born, although you pretty much had to carry your own laptop. On my three-year trip across Africa and Asia, I carried an early generation (mid-1990s) laptop in my backpack. In some countries, this caused a commotion and I would have several dozen (usually young) people crowded around to look at my screen.

Sending email required a bulky attachment you wrapped around a phone, and receiving and sending anything more than a few lines was time-consuming and expensive. We didn't even have email names then - we had numbers. Remember Compuserve?

Email became easier and Internet cafes appeared on nearly every street corner. They're still everywhere in poorer countries - although in wealthier countries they're scarcer as most people now have computers at home.

To keep in touch you can now even take your own phone along. If you have a special roaming capability or the right phone system, many countries are now within reach. Or you can buy a local SIM card. Send a text message rather than phone, if you want to cut down costs.

You can take your portable email device with you - your Blackberry or your PC Mobile - and sit in your tent, tapping out messages to your loved ones. You can even take your own satellite phone, if you're really heading off the beaten path and won't be able to get a signal for your cell.

Today, keeping in touch is easy with a range of choices we could never have even imagined just a few years ago!

We can create a travel blog and post information about our trip as we go.

We can be in immediate contact through webcams and Skype - just plug in and speak. You can see and hear your loved ones and all of it for free.

Social networking sites allow you not only to share your trip, but your interests as well. Keep in touch by posting your itinerary, photos and favorite sights, and share interesting sites with your friends as well.

Take photos with an inexpensive digital camera, and simply download your pics directly. You can publish them instantly on your blog, or you can email them so your friends and family can pass them on. This is becoming increasingly unnecessary - they can simply pass on your blog link to others - no more messy attachments!

This nearly instant technology isn't without its detractors, though.

What if you don't like technology?

For many travelers, old-fashioned communications still works best - especially when it comes to taking memories back home.

You may consider keeping in touch with a blog - but you may also want to keep a travel journal. There's something comforting about putting pen to paper, something a little more permanent and personal. I've always loved the notebook approach and have shelves filled with cramped (and sometimes waterlogged) handwriting and doodles.

As a journalist my notebooks are more like scrapbooks - and even scrap booking is back in style, now a fast growing form of expression. Scrapbooks kept the 'mood' alive for me. I always carry a glue stick and glue things into my notebook-scrapbook - business cards from people I interview, scraps of bills and menus, newspaper articles, pieces of material, leaves and dried flowers, locally bought postcards and stamps... anything and everything that reminds me of my trip!

However you choose to keep in touch, it's easy, it's fun, and you have a variety of choices. Ultimately it will depend on how private you want your trip to be, or how public. The choice is up to you!

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