Travel Tips of the Rich & Famous

Except for the roses in their suites, the chauffeured limousines and the TV news crews that greet them, celebrities travel much as the rest of us do, only more frequently. To find out just what they've learned about getting away to it all, we asked a number of well-known globetrotters, from Famous Amos cookie king Wally Amos to novelist John Updike, to tell us their favorite techniques for making life on the run less than total tedium.

Wally Amos: "I always travel with bags of my Famous Amos cookies for the flight crew. I wear really comfortable jeans. And I give all my (continued on page 129)Travel Tips(continued from page 82) sweaters a little chance to go out on the road, to be a part of my life. I also carry a fruit-paring knife. Thank God I'm Famous Amos, so the security guards know I'm not a hijacker. Sometimes I wear my naval admiral's cap, with scrambled eggs and stuff on it." Disembarking, Amos has stewardesses fill a shopping bag with leftover fruit from the first-class galley. "That'll be my breakfast some morning, or a snack," he says.

R. W. Apple, Jr.: This veteran foreign correspondent for The New York Times has jetted virtually everywhere, becoming a packing maven: "The trick is to find things that pack easily, stand up to the rigors of Third World laundries and serve many purposes."

His bag is a canvas carry-on, so he never arrives in Cairo to find that Egypt-Air has routed his clothes on to Aswan. But his mainstay is The Briefcase.

"For years, I used a plebeian model, until it was stolen in Naples. The insurance payoff was generous, and now I have a fancy one by Porsche. I always keep it with me, packed. If I have to get to the airport fast—as I did when the Pope was shot—I can throw in a clean shirt and survive for a couple of days."

Stowed inside: a calculator, folding sunglasses, a checkbook, an address book, guidebooks, first-aid packets and a miniature toilet kit. Apple carries a Braun travel alarm, with a world time chart and an alarm that gets louder if it's ignored, a Durabeam flashlight, a Sony ICF-7600D radio and spare batteries. Also on board are a miniature leather tool kit ("for repairing hotel plumbing, decrepit rental cars and the like"), traveler's checks, a leather pouch with international coins, a mini-at-las and a Swiss army knife (which guards seized at the Venice summit meeting).

He also carries a portable pepper mill. "It's amazing what a few turns of the machine will do for a meal prepared by the culinary sadists of the Iraqi army."

Airborne, he wears The Uniform: "Corduroy trousers with elastic woven in, making them wrinkle resistant and stretchable, a polo shirt or a turtleneck, depending on the climate, and a jacket." He packs a blazer, a medium-weight suit, a quick-dry bathing suit, a fold-up bag for purchases en route and boots for those rainy days in London, snowy days in Minsk or dusty days in Marrakesh.

Peter Burwash: As president of Peter Burwash International, a company that trains and places tennis pros at 63 sites in 23 countries, Burwash travels 300 days a year. He conducts business in transit with the help of a mini-office that he carries in a Verdi shoulder bag. Inside, he stashes a fold-up briefcase, envelopes and paper in an expandable folder, and two address books, one containing 16,000 names. Also tucked in the bag are a 5" x 7" pencil case that holds a Swingline stapler, a small pencil sharpener, a six-inch ruler, Scotch tape, miniscissors, a two-inch Phillips- and regular-head-screwdriver set, a sewing kit, 20 Avery file labels, four Duracell AA batteries, a calculator and Band-Aids.

City maps go in the bag along with an assortment of felt-tip pens, a 35mm mini-camera, film and a micro dictation machine. Also inside are a document case, a bag of change in various currencies for airport telephones, a zippered bank bag to hold his 20 or so airline tickets and white tape to repair tears in his luggage. Burwash obviously believes in the boy-scout dictum "Be prepared."

Stockard Channing: "It's a point of honor with me to take nothing I won't wear—if you have too much stuff, you get angry at your clothes," the actress says. "But I do pack books. No phones interrupt you on planes. I'd rather omit comfortable shoes than three books."

Channing also checks her luggage through. "If I can't bear to lose it, I don't pack it." Traveling between climates, she carries separate bags for each. "Recently, flying from Italy to Morocco, I stored the Italy bag in Rome and just took the Morocco bag."

Eric Dickerson: "My solution to packing, since I can't fold clothes neatly, is to get a young lady to do it for me," says the running back of the Los Angeles Rams. "And when I can, I avoid connecting flights."

On one trip, Dickerson's prized Louis Vuitton suitcase was stolen from a conveyor belt. His advice: "If you're going to tote fancy luggage, make it a carry-on."

Doug Flutie: "I just go through my drawers and grab my favorite clothes," says the quarterback of the New Jersey Generals. "I don't pay attention to three pairs of pants or three shirts or things like that—I just grab whatever I like and throw it into a Pony bag." Flutie keeps the Army-style bags in different sizes to match trip lengths. "If I need a suit, I just hang it in a garment bag, which I take on the plane."

Walt Frazier: "I don't eat on planes, except chicken—sometimes that's good," says the former center for the New York Knickerbockers, who often takes off on the spur of the moment, either on business or to his Virgin Islands hideaway.

"I used to stay up all night figuring out my packing, but now it takes ten minutes, because I pack only what I need." He coordinates colors so that all his clothes are interchangeable. He keeps a toilet kit permanently packed. Size-13 shoes are hefty, so he takes only one pair, in a neutral color.

When possible, he rents a car instead of flying, reserving it in advance to avoid hassle. "Driving through the countryside can be very relaxing—no phones, just checking out the scenery." To find a new town's hot spots, he asks skycaps and cabbies. Celebrity status helps, he adds, because you're never a stranger. It also helps relieve the tedium of long airport waits: "Just for fun, I'll have myself paged and watch everybody looking around for me."

John Larroquette: At 6'5", the Emmy-winning actor on NBC's Night Court requires a hotel room with a king-size bed. "Small hotels give you more hospitality," he says. But he checks out a new one with someone who has stayed there: "It may be next to a toxic-waste dump, with people with three arms wandering around."

Despising travel, he simplifies by always keeping a bag packed, including two unread books. Upon entering his hotel room, he orders room service, even if he doesn't want anything. "Just ordering a sandwich gives you a clue to the quality of the hotel's restaurant," he says. "Also, I want them to wait on me, so I feel I'm being treated as a guest."

Robin Leach: A 300,000-miles-a-year traveler, the host of TV's Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous packs each garment on its own wire hanger, in a separate plastic bag: "That prevents wrinkles and lets you hang up your things fast when you arrive." He packs a carry-on garment bag and an under-the-seater, with a shoulder strap. "A bag over each shoulder is important for balance." He keeps his traveling clothes in a special section of the closet, ready to grab. He has three identical traveling wardrobes: "One is packed, one is at the cleaners and one is en route from the cleaners.

"Fine hotels have advantages. In Bangkok, I once discovered that I'd left all my clothes in Hong Kong, but the hotel there forwarded everything to Bangkok. And never check luggage. In Jordan for the king's engagement party, I discovered that the airline had lost my suitcases. You can't just go around the corner in Amman and buy a tux. I wound up going in a caftan."

LeRoy Neiman: Neiman's packing centers on his artist's supplies, which always accompany him in a briefcase. He also takes a travel iron, using a towel atop a dresser as an ironing board. Since he tends to leave his reading glasses on planes, he carries a spare pair.

For big jobs, such as the Super Bowl, he carries bulky portfolios. "In first class, you can carry almost anything on." His fees include first-class tickets and hotel suites: Arriving in Las Vegas to cover a fight, or in Palm Springs for a golf tournament, he must be relaxed, ready to begin sketching immediately. He favors such hotels as The Mansion in Dallas, the Beverly Hills Hotel, the Dorchester in London and the Ritz in Paris. "The determining factors are small ones, such as providing a robe, so you don't have to carry one," he says. "A hotel's view is crucial, too—a splendid view is liberating when you're working."

He also packs a dark business suit. With a cummerbund and a bow tie, he can make it formal.

George Plimpton: "Everything I need goes into a soft-sided bag I can squash under the seat," says author Plimpton, who refuses to check bags through.

His devotion to minimal packing may be genetic. His grandfather circled the world, discarding things en route, and arrived home with a large trunk containing one last pair of socks. "I knew a well-traveled Cuban who stored trunks in cities such as Madrid, Paris, Lisbon," Plimpton says. "He'd arrive carrying only an attaché case, pick up his trunk and have all he needed."

Plimpton himself travels sans pajamas and bathrobe, figuring that anything he really needs, he can buy. In the air, he works. "It's a wonderful time to write. About half my bag is taken up with yellow legal pads and pencils."

Pompeo Posar: "I tell my wife where I'm going and she packs everything for me," says Playboy's Senior Staff Photographer, the leading producer of this magazine's centerfold and cover photographs. "When I fly, I always sit on the left side of the plane going east and on the right going west, to avoid the sun. I get an aisle seat, so I can stretch out and walk around the plane without disturbing people.

"If I'm checking into a hotel early, I always call in advance—often, they bill you only half a day or they don't charge at all," he adds. "I tip the chambermaid every morning, instead of waiting until I leave, to ensure good service."

Posar guards his film zealously against airport X rays. "I always pack fresh film with my clothes," he says. "I carry a Polaroid for test shots when I get to the site—if it's Ok, I know that the film in my luggage is also Ok. Coming back, I hand-carry the exposed film in plastic bags that I've taken with me—you have to insist, in a nice way, that airport security officers hand-check your exposed film. If they argue, ask to see their supervisor. In Mexico, recently, I spent two weeks shooting nine girls who had flown in from nine countries and four continents—imagine if airport X rays had fogged my film!"

Posar carries his camera equipment in a pilot-style carry-on bag. "I never use a camera bag. I don't want to advertise myself as a photographer, which makes you vulnerable to thieves and extra customs inspections." For off hours, he says, "I take a small automatic camera, just to take shots for fun of flowers, boats, scenery."

Deborah Raffin: Raffin travels frequently to China on film-industry business. "I always pack a small set of stereo headphones, because the plane's earphones are terrible," she says. "Plus a Walkman, books on tape, dried food and an electric pot for preparing soup or tea in my hotel room. And I always use inexpensive luggage on wheels; even my carry-on bag is cheap." Raffin has stopped buying expensive luggage, because it was inevitably destroyed in transit.

For some situations, she says, only a sense of humor helps. In Inner Mongolia, she reluctantly boarded a tiny, rickety prop plane. The crew sealed the doors. "Suddenly, the stewardess rushed down the aisle; they'd locked out the pilot."

Wally Schirra: "In the old Apollo days, I traveled with only a change of underwear and one suit, a space suit—we weren't frequent fliers, but we got in a lot of mileage," says the pioneer astronaut. Now he uses a T-shaped handle, designed for carrying ski boots, to sling a garment bag over his shoulder. Schirra keeps an airline-schedule guide handy. "I build my flight plan with the travel agent, rather than just saying, 'Launch me.'" He also belongs to several VIP airline clubs. "Blow your connections and, instead of standing in line, you have the club rearrange your schedule." If his travel agent can't do it, he gets his seat assigned at the club, too. He checks his bags with the skycap at the curb. "The only line I haven't figured out how to avoid is security."

Deke Slayton: Another of the original seven Mercury astronauts, Slayton still has the "right stuff" for flying. He minimizes his pay load: "I list what I need and then halve it," he says. He opts for drip-dry polyester, fashion be damned—"I don't like carrying a travel iron.

"A former NASA flight surgeon told me how to handle jet lag. Get into sync with the day, wherever you are. Also, your first night abroad, take a sleeping pill. I'm usually death on sleeping pills, but I've found it works like a charm."

Slayton carries nothing electrical. "In Moscow, my wife once plugged in the boiler for her contact lenses, using an appropriate electrical converter, but the thing popped anyway, a small explosion—the Russians had to rewire the room."

Calvin Trillin: "My only rules for travel are, if you want to go, then go, and keep an eye on your luggage," says author and New Yorker staff writer Trillin, who travels as light as a feather. "I'm not a lawyer, and reporters are known to be rumpled and shabby-looking, so I just take the sports coat I'm wearing. Actually, I don't even own a suit." Rather than haul clothes with him, Trillin lives off the land. "You're in a pretty remote spot if you can't find a one-day laundry service," he says.

John Updike: "I have found over the years that the plastic bags that clean shirts come in make excellent impromptu toilet kits for tooth paste and the like," says the novelist. "And, before leaving the hotel room, always look under the pillow in case you left a handkerchief or earplugs there."

"Walt Frazier: 'Just for fun, I'll have myself paged and watch everybody looking around for me.'"