A holiday isn’t a holiday if I haven’t taken nearly 30 indistinguishable photos of the same clump of leaves until my phone sends me a storage almost full warning every hour. But not being on Instagram (where one of those 30 photos would eventually end up) led me to think of other ways to mark a holiday I don’t want to be forgetting anytime soon.

1. A tan:  A deep golden-brown tan evenly spread across your skin, preferably, with bikini lines embellished onto your shoulders. Best for staring at wistfully on dreary Monday mornings once you are back.
2. Maps: Folded and re-folded to the point of being torn, ink-blotched with rain drops and waterfall mist to mark all the trails and hikes you aimlessly wandered on.
3. Shells: tiny turquoise-blue pieces of corals, a bead that looks like an eye on drugs, sand coloured scallop shells, and prettily patterned sundial ones. Make sure they aren’t still inhabited before you pick them.
4. Goodreads update: The five regency romance novels you read in quick succession to while away the 24 hours travel time (each way). Rhetorical question: How many times can you read the story of a quick-witted bluestocking besting a rakish rogue only to fall in love with him, without getting bored?

5. Lists: The list of over 50 birds, mammals, insects, and amphibians you saw and identified (thank you naturalists, everywhere!).
6. Bruises and bites: The ant bite from where you sat right atop the leaf-cutter ant (it survived), the prickly chafed skin on your belly from where you spent an hour bougie boarding without any sunscreen.
7. Sand: The grains of beach-sand you’ll inexplicably find in your clothes days and weeks and multiple rounds of laundry after being back.
8. Arts and Prints: Kooky anthropomorphic art featuring birds in breeches and another one that can only be described as sexy jaguar art.