Bringing along a speed light (flash)

[Ace_Caliente]

My family of 4 is taking our first holiday to leave North America to visit Europe in a couple weeks. We're very excited. We'll be on a cruise in the Med for 2 weeks and then have 3 weeks in a various parts of Europe. I'm bringing my EOS RP full frame mirrorless camera, a 16mm 2.8, a 50mm 1.8 (the RF mount cheapy lenses, but I really love them), and a circular polarizing filter. I'm also bringing along a very small P+S Nikon AW100 underwater camera that's almost 15 years old but is fun to play with. We are traveling very light (a single "personal item" size backup each to take advantage of cheap RyanAir and EasyJet fares after the cruise). As such I have to leave my film cameras at home 😞

 

Anyway, my question for experienced travelers who enjoy photography is: do you find it useful to bring along a hotshoe flash? Do you use it much? My EOS RP doesn't have a pop up flash to provide fill light. My flash is a fairly small Godox TT350C, but it is still one more thing to pack. Do you think I'd get a lot of odd looks from people with a flash attached to the camera hanging around my neck?

[Heymoe]

If you take mostly outdoor photos, a reflector may be an answer.  The spring loaded ones weigh almost nothing and don't take up much space when folded.  But it takes up a free hand (yours or a friend's).

 

I've taken a metric buttload of photos on cruises and have used the built-in flash maybe 20 times on the older camera (the newer one doesn't have a flash).  The speedlite sounded like a good idea, but its' weight and the extra batteries versus the actual use made me leave it at home after a couple cruises.

 

But everyone is different.  If you do portraits in overhead sun a flash would be really useful.

[Heidi13]

None of my bodies, since I went full-frame almost 15 yrs ago, have a pop-up flash. Therefore, I always carry my Speedlight 580.

 

Some trips, I may never use it, but on most trips I have used it at least once - both for fill flash and indoors.

 

Now with an R6, I will keep bringing the Speedlight.