What To Pack For A California Road Trip

When life throws you lemonade – hop on the next flight to see your bestie in California! Okay, I know we don’t all have that luxury, but you best believe when Boho Nouveau told me she had been accepted into FIDM a few months back this was my thought process. I am so lucky to be blessed with such an amazing soul sister – we met in Canada, but have actually spent more time travelling throughout the US! We are both true wanderlusts at heart and hope to travel the world together. For now, I am beyond content crashing in her guest bedroom in California. Every visit to California we plan fun girls only road trip and explore all the beauty California has to offer. A few months ago, we spontaneously decided to plan a day trip exploring the stunning Laguna hills. I thought it would be fun to share what we brought along with us for the ride/ what we have been obsessing over this summer. Keep reading for more details!

Our California Roadtrip Essentials:

Acai Bowls

Meghan and I are huge foodies, and we eat a lot. Road trips call for some intense sustenance, so we made sure to make a pit stop at Jamba Juice for some Acai Bowls! We have both been on an acai bowl kick, and Jamba Juice has some surprisingly delicious acai bowl which are great when on-the-go! After devouring our bowls, we headed to Whole Foods for Larabars (chocolate chip cookie dough, blueberry and coconut cream are our favs) and water bottles to keep us in check. I don’t want to embarrass anyone *ahem*, so let’s just say one of us picked up a salad and the other a piece of pizza for later. 🙂

Music Playlists

No successful road trip is complete without an awesome playlist. Luckily, Meghan and I share an eerily similar taste in music. So what was on our Southern California road trip? Plenty of Lana Del Ray (#1 bae), The Weeknd (#2 bae), Drake, Chainsmokers, Calvin Harris and more. We may or may not have busted a move to:

• Drake: “Feel No Ways” & “Controlla”
• Lana Del Ray: “West Coast”
• Chainsmokers: “Don’t Let Me Down” & “Roses”
• The Weeknd “Prisoner”
• Mike Posner “I Took a Pill in Ibiza”
• Beyonce “Sorry”
• Calvin Harris: “This is What You Came For”
• Duke Dumont ” Ocean Drive”
• Justin Beiber “Company”
• Hedley “Hello”

Summer Outfits

Meghan and I are both fashion bloggers, therefore a SoCal road trip isn’t complete without a couple of photoshoots! We love to mix work with pleasure and hey – who wouldn’t want to capture memories exploring California?! As for our outfits, we both packed bohemian inspired looks, including tribal print maxi dresses, palm print midi dresses, bell bottoms, off the shoulder tops, flash tattoos, gladiator sandals, booties and layered jewelry (we love mixing metals).  I am notorious for borrowing Meghan’s jewelry for shoots (her collection is beyond amazing), which usually ends in a tangled mess. Oops!

Beauty Essentials

Along with several outfits, we both packed several beauty essentials for our road trip. First and foremost, my girl knows I don’t wanderlust without sun protection, so she chooses to skip the lecture and lather on the sunscreen. I brought along my current favorite sunscreen (Hawaiian Tropic Silk Hydration Weightless Lotion) and we slathered it on before heading into the summer heat. Inspired with island fragrances, we not only seems like California goddesses, but also were protected from the harmful UV rays. We also packed plenty of lip balm (the desert sun is so drying!) and hand cream. Our makeup obsession at the moment is lipsticks – so we probably had an assortment of 20+ shades between the two of us.

Camera Equipment

During our road trip, we brought along some pretty heavy duty photography equipment. First things first, we used my beloved Canon 6D. I have been so happy with my decision to upgrade my camera body and lens last year. I notice a huge difference in the quality of my photos on my blog from last year (I was previously using a Canon Rebel T3i and the Canon “nifty fifty” lens!). We also brought along Meghan’s tripod to take photos together! In addition to photos taken with my DSLR camera, we also took (far too many) snapchats (I’m mash_elle and Meghan is megcossmann) and boomerangs! If you’re not familiar with Boomerang – it is a fun app which lets you create gifs out of a series of photos. Let’s just say we have plenty of photographic evidence of our California road trip! 

What would be on your California road trip packing list? 

Thanks to Hawaiian Tropic for sponsoring today’s post. As usual, all opinions are my own.