Most of my traveling was done using film SLRs, the first big adventure (Amazonia for 4 months) equipment was dictated by cost as much as anything else, so I wound up with a very elderly Nikkormat. Absolutely fantastic expedition camera though - bombproof and will work entirely without batteries (well, other than the light meter, but I can live without that at a press!)
The second trip I bought a camera for was kind of dictated even more so by the conditions - I wanted something a bit more advanced for tricky exposures so went with a Canon EOS 3. Superb camera, and it seems to go reasonably easy on batteries (I don't think I quite managed to drain one in a week - and that was at arctic winter temperatures, and about 10 rolls of film).
The Canon is getting pretty reasonable second hand now, and will be about as robust a camera as you can get. If you really want to go digital I am not sure on your best bet. Probably something that runs on AA batteries! I would think that a DSLR would be the ideal solution for image quality and getting a decent wide angle option... something like a Fuji S2 or S3 Pro, or one of the Sigma's could offer the best compromise... you may even find a second hand one for not too much cash!
The benefit of AAs is that you can pick them up anywhere when you can't get to a power point to recharge your rechargeables (or you can get a solar recharger for the AAs to alleviate any problems!)
Hope that's of some help to you....
