The Australia Letter is a weekly newsletter from our Australia bureau. Sign up to get it by email. This week’s issue is written by Tacey Rychter, the bureau’s audience editor.

“What are your ways of staying present and more deeply observant when you travel?”

I asked that question in last week’s Australia Letter, when I wrote about a coastal hike that led me to wonder what I was missing by delegating memories to my camera, not my brain.

It resonated with many of you. Dozens of readers wrote to us with thoughtful suggestions.

So I’m turning the newsletter over to you. Here are some of our favorite responses, edited lightly for length:

Take photos, but mindfully

“I give myself a quota of no more than 20 photos per travel. That way I think about each and every photo I take.”

— Michelle Baltazar

“I stay present when I travel by bringing only a film camera for photos. Digital cameras (even your iPhone camera roll) are the devil, you will never look back on hundreds (even a few tens) of digital photos. But you’re sure to treasure those precious few rolls of 36 exposures when you develop them after arriving back home.”

— Greer Clarke

“Ten-minute rule. Look. Don’t touch the phone or camera for at least 10 minutes before snapping. Let impressions sink in. Contemplate, then capture.”

— Tom Neal Tacker