Great reads from January 2011

At risk of giving myself a task that I have to stick to, (always a concern) I’m going to do my best at publishing a monthly look back at some great writing that has amused, inspired or interested me from the online travel blogging world. These could be articles that tell a great story, share useful information, or have some great photos.

This month, I’m starting off the series with a range of writings, from tales of bribery, to ponderings on meditation, to saving money: Chiang Mai style. There’s a mix of well known sites through to smaller, newer blogs, and hopefully, something here to tickle every fancy. Enjoy, and see the text at the end for how to get your article considered for next months roundup!

When to bribe, how to bribe, do you bribe: Todd’s Wanderings

The sticky topic of corruption and bribery is the subject of this post from Todd, and he manages to take a contentious issue and turn it into a genuinely amusing read, as well as featuring one of the more amusing lines in travel blogging that I have read for a while. I won’t spoil the surprise, head on over and give it a read for yourself!

What is meditation?: Ross Roams

I’ve only recently come across Ross’s site as a result an interview he did with Amanda over at A Dangerous Business. This article might not be for everyone, but it is a pretty interesting read looking at what Ross gets out of meditation, and how it has helped him both in his travels and his life. I’m looking forward to reading more of his travels.

Budget travel in Africa: yTravelblog

I have spent some time travelling in Africa, but it has either been with family or friends, so I’d never seen Africa as an easy budget place to travel. Caz disavows me of this notion, with an excellent article on how her and Craig achieved seven months of travel on what could be described as a seriously economical budget. This article is one of a series, the others are excellent too! 

Making money with your travel blog: Travel blog challenge

There are various strategies for making money out of a travel blog, ranging from selling expertise in the form of an ebook, to selling text ads, to sponsored posts, and more. These can be complicated and confusing waters for the novice travel blogger to start swimming in – luckily Amar Hussain has come to the rescue with a three part series detailing the sorts of options out there, the pricing, and how to deal with and attract advertisers.

As well as the actual articles, the comments from other bloggers are a goldmine of information. If you run any kind of blog and are wondering what this monetization thing is all about – this is a must read!

Chiang Mai on the Cheap: Unbrave Girl

If you ever read advice on how to write a successful travel blog, it will list all sorts of things you need to do. These involve being concise, adding lots of photos, and the mystical world of SEO. When you visit Sally’s site, on the other hand, you will see that it is entirely possible to run a great travel blog by happily ignoring all of the rules, and waffling on endlessly about cookies and pants.

This entry focuses on how to experience an Asian city on the cheap, and comes with some slightly disturbing imagery of the pink leather kind. I did warn you. So does she.

Well, those were some of my favourite reads for January 2011. I’m planning on doing something like this near the end of every month – if you spot (or write!) something that you think I should be including for February, either post it in the comments, let me know on the Facebook page, or head over to the contact page. The only criteria is that it needs to have been published during the month of February.

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Highlights of Kakadu

If there is one place you must visit when in Australia’s Northern Territory, it is the Kakadu National Park.

Here you will find stunning outback scenery, gigantic waterfalls, 5,000 year old aboriginal rock art and all manner of wildlife, in a park spanning an area the size of Slovenia.

Given that Kakadu is so big, and not everyone has huge amounts of time on their hands, here I have highlighted some of my favourite parts of this incredible, world heritage listed, park.

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Travel blogging tips from the experts: yTravelBlog

This weeks travel blogging tips interview features two awesome travellers: Caroline and Craig Makepeace, authors of travel site yTravelBlog.

Craig and Caz, originally from Australia, have spent oodles of time travelling, between them covering over 35 countries in ten years on the road.

Now they have returned to Australia, where they have a daughter, and are focusing their efforts on sharing their travelling experiences with the world, as well as providing great advice and tips to fledgling (and not so fledgling!) travellers.

As well as their main site, Caz and Craig have a very active and engaged community on their facebook page. Today I ask them for their travel blogging tips, including why they blog, what social media means to them, and what they think about monetizing their site.

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Caves and glow-worms

New Zealand is well known for its caves. Perhaps the best known of these are the Waitomo Caves, where you can abseil, black water raft and peer at mystically glowing glow worms until your head explodes with contentment. These caves are where most visitors to New Zealand get their caving fix.

Me being me however, the simple option of going somewhere like the Waitomo cave network and having someone guide me round with useful things like safety equipment, maps, waterproof torches and helmets is not what I opted for.

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Photo theme - clouds

Ah, clouds. Giant fluffy bits of candy floss floating leisurely in a perfect sky. Or rain filled destroyers of beach holidays. However you feel about clouds, they pretty much always manage to provide ample opportunity for photography, from sunny days to sunsets, thunderstorms to odd shapes.

Here are a few of my more favourite cloud photos, taken over the last couple of years, featuring sunsets, cloud patterns, giant fluffy clouds and, well, you get the idea.

Don’t forget, if you like these photos, you can now share them with friends via the new “share” option under each shot, and even buy prints or canvas versions from the high resolution originals, via the toolbar under each image. Enjoy!

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Photography tips – An SLR primer

For many people, the decision to move up to an SLR camera is the point where they start to take their photography a little bit more seriously. Certainly, many point and shoot cameras are capable of taking excellent shots, but for the best results, an SLR is usually the way to go.

In this article I will be providing an overview of the things you should know before committing to purchasing an SLR camera. I will take you through some of the jargon you are likely to encounter as well as the advantages (and disadvantages) of one of these cameras.

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Travel blogging tips from the experts: foXnoMad

This weeks travel blogging tips article features Anil, author of tech-centric travel blog foXnoMad.com. As well as providing excellent travel advice, Anil publishes all sorts of information about travelling with technology.

On top of running foXnoMad Anil also finds the time to run three other sites of a travel themed nature, including one focusing on travelling with pets.

Today Anil provides his thoughts on running a successful travel blog, with thoughts on establishing a niche, why variety is important, and his strategy for generating an income.

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Why you should travel with the WHV

Let’s face it, travelling can be expensive. Travel in developed countries even more so. Once you’ve added up the transport, the insurance, the food, the accommodation – well, the number at the end can be pretty scary. Even when travelling on a serious budget, if you want to see everything, you’re still going to end up spending a fair bit. As my recent article on the costs of travelling around Australia demonstrated.

And the thing is, we aren’t all in a position where our savings accounts happen to let us give everything up for a while and head off into the wide blue yonder. But that shouldn’t stop you from doing so. How, you ask? Why, with the wondrous working holiday visa scheme of course!

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The awesomeness of people

It doesn’t take a tremendous deal to make me happy. Some would say in fact, that I am easily pleased. Which is, I think, a rather good thing. The little things in life are often the best. Although the big things are good too. I am clearly waffling already. I will get to the point, via a roundabout tale of cake and eggs.

Working as I do, in a holiday park, has a myriad of benefits. One of the minor benefits is that from time to time, people leave things behind. I’m not talking big things here, like wallets or phones, as obviously we go through a process of attempting to re-unite those with their owners, no, rather I am talking about perishables and consumables.

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Travel blogging tips from the experts: The Planet D

Sharing their travel blogging tips today are Dave and Deb, co-authors of adventure travel blog theplanetd.com.

Dave and Deb are a Canadian blogging couple who have been married for 13 years. In that time they have managed to hike, bike, paddle and climb their way across 5 continents and 45 countries.

They are always looking for unique ways to explore the world while sharing their experiences through words and pictures - experiences which have made their site into one of the most successful couple adventure travel blogs out there. Today I ask them what drove them to do what they do and the challenges they’ve met on the way.

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Photo theme - fire

Ah, fire. What a wonderful element. (I know, it’s not an element. Actually, i have no idea what it is. Do enlighten me if you know. Anyway.) You can set stuff on it, you can peer at it, you can warm yourself near it. Coals can be heated up, and food can be cooked over it. It’s about the most primitive way to entertain yourself (well, ok, there are probably a few others that I won’t go into here, this being, thus far, a family friendly site), and it’s a great subject for photography.

Today’s photo theme post, therefore, is all on the theme of fire. Fire being twirled around, fire consuming parts of Australia, fire providing warmth and fire being, well, firey. Is there anything fire can’t do? I have no idea. Enjoy the photos as always, and don’t forget, you can always keep up to date with more posts like this either via the RSS feed or on the Facebook page!

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The “authentic” travel myth

Today, I’m going to tackle the idea of “authentic” travel. The forms that this take vary, from attempting to see things that no-one else has, to getting some kind of cultural insight, to braving hardships in the name of a more “real” experience. And I’m going to explain why I don’t think it exists.

This is because I believe, for something to have an authentic version, there must be a “fake” version, and travel, from what I can tell, is all real. Unless you are reading this post in the future and virtual travel has been invented. Do let me know how that is.

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Getting to grips with Kiwi beer

Regular readers (well, two of them at least) have been badgering me for some time to get onto the serious subject of New Zealand’s beer situation. For them, tales of walks and photos of bubbling mud pools hold little interest. No, they read the site with the vain hope that I might get round to actually talking about a subject which they hold dearly to their hearts, that being beer.

It took me over a year of research in Australia to come up with my definitive guide to Australian beer and beer drinking habits. I’ve only been in New Zealand for three months now, but, well, I’ve been researching hard, and here are the fruits of my labour.

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Travel blogging tips from the experts: Matt Kepnes

Today in my ongoing series of travel blogging articles I am interviewing Matt Kepnes - better known as Nomadic Matt - author of the hugely popular nomadicmatt.com.

Matt has achieved the goal towards which many travel bloggers aspire – that of turning his travel blogging from a hobby into a full time profession.

Today I ask Matt his thoughts on what defines a successful travel blog, the issue of site design, and what key advice he gives to up and coming travel bloggers. Let’s see what he has to say.

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The quest for Middle Earth: Emyn Muil & Isildur

There is a gigantic mountain just nearby, which I have probably mentioned once or twice before. It featured rather prominently in the film version of The Lord of the Rings as the brooding Mount Doom, the ultimate destination of the hobbits and where the ring was to be taken to be destroyed. That mountain is Mount Ngauruhoe, and I have a whole post about climbing it for your enjoyment.

However, that is not the end of the story when it comes to parts of Middle Earth and the surrounding locale, even if Mount Doom is the key drawcard.

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