Advice and suggestions, please!

[Tanuki]

I am going on a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Sichuan, China next month. Years ago I took a lot of pictures with a Canon Rebel slr (non-digital) and felt very comfortable with using it and happy with the results. I now have one of their digital models but haven't used it very much as I have been preoccupied with my work and caring for my elderly mother, who recently passed away. I will not have my laptop with me on this trip so I am interested in advice on what others here would recommend for backup storage of the pictures I take and anything else you would recommend. I will be in some remote areas without internet access so I can't rely on uploading to a cloud-based other remote storage. Any advice on other subjects will be most appreciated, as I really don't want to screw this up!

[Major Nikon]

1. I've been to China, although not where you are going

In my experience your options for this are not very good unless you want to pay lots of $$$. I have a Digital Foci Photo Safe II OTG which is now only available on the used market. It works fine for SD cards, but doesn't do micro-SD so I can't use it with my action cam. As far as I know, the next cheapest complete option costs $259.

Some digital SLR cameras that have two memory card slots have the option of copying one to the other. I'm not sure if yours has this capability. If it does, you could backup with just more memory cards.

If none of these options work for you, I suggest using only high quality cards such as the SanDisk Extreme PRO series and buying enough to cover your whole trip.

[ManiacJoe]

2. Major has you pointed in the right direction.

I was originally going to get one of these hyperdrives
https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperdrive-colorspace-udma3

But I just opted to get more high quality memory cards instead (Lexar or SanDisk).

[alfredo]

3. Take several batteries and adaptor for your charger

[Tanuki]

5. What do you think of this (or similar) external dual card reader?

It looks as if I could use it to back up the card I am using to a blank card so I will have the originals and a back-up set, for a relatively inexpensive price.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/867611-REG/Lexar_lrw025urbna_Multi_Card_25_in_1_USB_3_0.html/prm/alsVwDtl

[Major Nikon]

6. It works in conjunction with a computer

So as long as you have access to a computer, you could use it for that.

[Tanuki]

7. So when it says that it "Enables Easy Card-To-Card File Transfers", a computer interface is needed?

In that case, I'm back to square 1, since I won't have my laptop.

[Major Nikon]

8. It's just a USB card reader

It's nice to have one like that since it does all sorts of different cards and it's USB 3.0, but without a computer it won't do anything. You could do the same thing with the data cord that came with your camera, but it would be slower and would use your camera's battery.

If you are staying in a western style hotel, they may have a business center with computers, but they don't always allow the connection of USB devices. It's more reliable if you know someone who will have a computer that you can use, and then all you would need is a USB drive of sufficient size.

[Tanuki]

9. Probably the only place I will be staying that would have a business center would be the hotel

in Chengdu that I will stay in the first night I arrive. After that, I will be in small towns and villages in and around the Tibetan Plateau.

[Tanuki]

4. Thanks for the tips!

I was hoping someone knew of a less expensive means of external storage so that I could have a back-up copy of my pics, in case the cards were lost or damaged along the way. I guess I will just go with the option of making sure I have plenty of cards and try to be really careful with them. And thanks for the reminder about batteries and an adaptor.
I will be sure to post some pics here when I get back.

[qnr]

10. I'm an Olympus user, so I'm not sure if your Canon

uses CF or SD cards. If it's SD, you might want to look into this, it's only $119 for 1TB (500GB and 2TB models available too). As long as you leave it off when you're not actively transferring files, the battery should last a long time.

(From another site)

When a memory card is inserted into the drive it can be set back up your photos or automatically ingest all images, then wipe the card clean afterwards. To view your images you can either connect the drive to a computer using USB3, or you can connect to it wirelessly using the free WD My Cloud mobile app. For photographers looking to travel light, this could be an excellent way to manage your photos on the road without needing to bring a laptop.

WD - My Passport 1TB External USB 3.0 Wireless Portable Hard Drive - Black

[postatomic]

11. Bring plenty of Imodium and Water Purification Tablets

I can go over a week on one charge using attached battery pack. 'course I don't take thousands of pictures. Use smaller Flash Cards. It's nice to have a 16 or 32 gig card, but if you lose one.....

China isn't on my list of 'out of borders' countries to visit, but I've seen some great photos.

Have fun and don't sweat the small stuff.