Writing Travel

Niche blogging and neglect

Image by WritingTravel.com via Flickr

Yes, I've neglected this blog for the last month, and the fifth anniversary of publishing at WritingTravel.com has since passed, unmarked. In all that time, Writing Travel has refused to focus on its niche, which, I guess, is writing about travel or writing about travel writing. Instead, it's become the vehicle for whatever I wanted to say at the moment.

Yesterday, I launched a actual, honest-to-gosh niche blog, Traveling Pains, as a platform for a topic about which I can say, without pride, I am an expert. Content is still sketchy, and the design is spare, but I did finally use my license for Thesis on a start-from-scratch Wordpress site. I've had the idea kicking around for some years, but it wasn't until I discovered Liz Hamill Scott's blog on the same topic, Travels With Pain, that I overcame my fear of outing myself as an expert on coping with hidden disability and chronic pain.

In other matters, I've taken over cost and responsibility for National Travel Writing Month from Christine Gilbert of AlmostFearless.com. Christine has embarked on some exciting new travel projects with her infant in tow and decided she would have to let the site lapse when Ning.com began charging for their community sites. Impulsively, I jumped into the fray.

The next 30-day NaTraWriMo (say that five times) challenge begins in just two short weeks, on October 1, so please head over to the site and join in if you think you might enjoy an exercise in marketing and self-promotion for travel writers. 

There has been some interesting scuttlebutt about the folly of asking travel writers to send out 30 pitches in 30 days, and I'll be telling you more about that soon, as I review Tim Leffel's recent book Travel Writing 2.0.

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Mid-America road trips for wimps, part 2

First of all, dear reader, I want you to know I am home again safely after spending more than two weeks with my extended family in southern Illinois.

I had intended to stay a week or less, just long enough to recover from the solo drive south and make the rounds to see as many cousins as possible.

And yes, I intended to blog from the road, but I'm a wimp. Besides that, real life happened.

The 10-plus things I learned at TBEX '10

Here's my very personal list, in no set order, of the idiosyncratic things I learned at Travel Blog Exchange '10 hosted by Kim Mance and her Galavanting team in New York City this past weekend. (Forgive me, Spud Hilton. This story is about my trip, not my reader's vacation.)

In part, it's a list of "shoulds." Yes, I know all about the evil of should. I've succumbed to it before and certainly will again.

1. I should get out of the house more. Especially if I want to continue calling myself a travel blogger. 

2. I should post more often, for the same reason.

3. I need to converse in person with other intelligent adult humans more often. (See point 1.) I do this best in small groups or one-on-one. I'm happy enough in a large group, but I tend to drift to the perimeter of the crowd to become an observer.

4. Two cocktails in one evening is my absolute limit when indulging in a public venue. Thanks to Sean Keener of @Bootsnall and Pete Meyers of @Eurocheapo for helping me (finally) figure that out. That's not to say I won't have to relearn my lesson.

5. Travel blogging isn't just a young person's sport, but one should recognize one's limits. (See point 4.) One should also stay in training.

6. It's okay to be weird in the company of other travel bloggers.

7. I can live without my laptop and digital SLRs for a weekend, but I can't live without some way to connect to the Internet. 

8. AT&T 3G service in Manhattan isn't as groovy there as it is in other parts of the country. (See point 7.)

9. It is entirely possible to cultivate real human relationships sight unseen via social media and blogs. Proof: the joy of meeting Zach Everson, Meryl Pearlstein, Renee King, Doug Anweiler, Lola Akinmade, Kara Williams, Todd Lucier, Jennifer Miner, Mara Gorman, Craig Martin, Christine Cantera, Jennifer Huber, Robin Locker Lacey, Trisha Miller, and countless others for the first time in the flesh after long acquaintance online.

10. I'm still capable of hero(ine) worship. Cases in point: Pam Mandel (I hope you don't think I'm stalking you on Twitter), Evelyn Hannon (I read and reread your Journeywoman travel tips before every trip to a new place), Gary Arndt (Your travel porn feeds my fantasies, and I have to agree with your camera advice, although I'd much rather travel with the camera I don't yet have).

11. It will take me a bit of time to get used to referring to people by their real names when I know them so well by their Twitter handles. (See point 9. If I didn't call you out by name, it's because I'm still in the process of rebuilding my internal contact database.)

12. Going out on a limb to write in one's naturally quirky voice is good practice for a persnickety grammarian.

13. I received no compensation or sponsorship for this post or for attending TBEX. I have only myself to thank or blame. I would, however, consider help getting to Vancouver next year.

Most popular posts of 2009: a map for travel blogging in 2010

Yes, this blog has been stagnant over the last few weeks. Like its author, it never really decided what it wanted to become when it grew up.

I'm letting my readers help decide where I should take this blog in 2010. How? By reviewing the posts that garnered most attention during the last year.

Here are last year's top ten posts:

1. Navigo like the natives through the Paris Métro: Navigo Découverte pass a must for bargain-seeking travelers
2. To Schmap or not to Schmap, a strategic question for travel photographers
3. Eight places where you can eat for free in Paris
4. Wednesday Window ~ Hotel Baker 1928 stained glass peacock fanlight, St. Charles, IL
5. Wednesday Window ~ View of Union Station from Frist Center, Nashville
   
6. Corpse Bride and Victor Van Dort figures in the window of Album, Boulevard Saint-Germain, Paris
   
7. Rare sight in Paris: snow!
8. "Grits is good" and other useful facts about Alabama
9. New Year's Day on the town in Paris and onward: jazz, gravity, and an exposé
10. Photo Friday ~ Find your marbles at Moon Marble Company, Bonner Springs, Kansas

You may notice a good half of these are content driven rather than simply photographs. Perhaps that should serve as a clue for the blog's fresh direction and a hint for ramping up activity on my photography sites, Lanora Mueller Photography and Photographing Travel.

Gifts for people who have everything made easy with Kiva and Passports with Purpose

  

This morning I received a couple of emails from a long-time friend who has just started a new job with Catholic Relief Services in the Congo. One of them contained a link to the website of the micro-loan project Kiva, with a note: "This is an idea for a Christmas present for someone who has everything. It was given to me and I love it."

Last week, I celebrated my 4000th Twitter follower with a promise to award a prize "suitable only to that person."

This was a bit risky, as my follower number 4000 could easily have been a spambot pushing whiter teeth. Luckily, that wasn't a problem. I was overjoyed when I saw that my 4000th follower was @JoeDiazAFAR, co-founder of AFAR Media and experiential travel expert. I can't think of a more suitable prize to award Joe than a contribution to Kiva in his honor.

Thanks for the follow, Joe! I enjoy reading AFAR and love that it takes me places I can only dream of experiencing.

As you finish your holiday shopping, don't forget Passports with Purpose as another end-of-year gift idea. They have met the initial target of $13,000 toward building a school in rural Cambodia with American Assistance for Cambodia and have doubled that target to include health services for the school. So far, there's enough money to build the school and hire a nurse. Additional funds are needed to create a garden and hire a gardener and cook to improve the students' nutrition.

Please consider donating. It's easy, in increments of $10 through Paypal, and every $10 buys a chance to win a great prize. See the list of donated prizes here.