Travel Nursing Essentials
After finding housing, the most difficult part of travel nursing for us is downsizing our things. So I thought I’d write a post about what we’ve deemed essential versus things we bring if we have extra space versus things that are a definite no.
When travel nursing, it’s absolutely necessary to find furnished housing. I guess someone probably does it, but I can’t imagine packing up a Uhaul with all of our things and furniture every three to nine months and moving somewhere else in the country. We got married not long before Dan started travel nursing, so unfortunately most of our beautiful wedding gifts and furniture are in storage or at Dan’s mom’s house (where we rent a room as our permanent address/tax home). We look forward to establishing a home base and using/setting them all up again, but for now we’re minimalists.
Even if you’ve found a great furnished apartment, you need to find out exactly how furnished it is. Does it have a washer and dryer? Are all linens included? Is the kitchen fully stocked with a coffee maker, cutting boards, bakeware, silverware and plates, tupperware? These things make a HUGE difference when it comes to packing for a travel nursing contract. Dan, our two cats, and I fit in our little Ford Fiesta hatchback with ALL of our things…just barely every time. Thankfully we have a roof rack box that holds a lot, but it’s super tight so we have to really limit what we bring.
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essentials
- clothes: pass on the big bulky sweaters and bring light layers instead, limit yourself to one suitcase each and try to fit other things in the suitcase too – we’ve found these packing cubes to be really helpful when it comes to packing our clothes
- shoes: same idea, be stingy and limit yourself!
- one nicer outfit each
- laptops
- Dan’s oculus & chromecast
- cat toys and scratching post (to help ensure they are happy, entertained, and don’t scratch the furniture at our new apartment!)
- books: we try to limit ourselves here, but it’s been a struggle!
- my DSLR camera
- cat food & litter (we try to limit this to what we need on the road)
- toiletries mostly limited to what we’ll need on the road
- a few little extras that make us happy: a small candle, an extra book, cards & foldable cribbage board, an extra pair of shoes, a couple facemasks etc.
- plastic wine glasses (we broke a nice champagne glass at our first place the first night)
if we can fit it
- essential oils & diffuser
- the cat’s favourite chunky blanket
- my Polaroid camera
- coffee grinder
- extra toiletries
- extra shampoo, conditioner, etc.
- makeup other than the basics and hair straightener
- my spice collection
- cooler and/or cooler bag
- some small kitchen supplies
- laundry basket
leave behind
- food/pantry items other than a couple nice things
- extra litter box and scratching post for the cats
- excess clothes
- linens & pillows
- any kind of furniture or appliance: waffle maker, fans, TV, mixer, blender, etc.
This time around, Dan and I really cut back to help make the car a little less tight for our sake, but especially for the cats. We’ll be doing a six day road trip to Arizona from New Hampshire, so it’s going to be a lot on them. The biggest thing we cut back on was our clothes, but also little things here and there like Dan’s first aid kit, my makeup, both of our toiletries, and some kitchen things like my spices. We’ll have to spend more money up front to buy some spices, shampoo & conditioner, other bathroom supplies, cat food & litter, etc. but it’s saving us a lot of space for the road trip which I’m sure all four of us will be glad for.
Unfortunately, chances are every furnished place you stay will be missing some you wish you had or are used to having. The good news is, you can do anything for three months and you’ll become more flexible and less attached to things as you go. If need be (like our last housing situation), you can always go to Walmart to pick up a cheap version of whatever you need/want or buy something second hand to leave/throw away when you leave.
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