So You Want to Become a
Travel Writer?

It's not particularly difficult to become a travel writer - the harder part is getting paid for it!

There is style, content, voice, color, texture... there's the travel... and then there are the mechanics around the travel article - research, interviews, sales, distribution, promotion...

In a way becoming a travel journalist is like having two jobs - the writing part, and the marketing that allows your piece to be published.

Travel writing, like any writing, can be learned - either on your own or by taking some travel writing courses.

But lets be realistic: few writers find travel writing jobs or make a full-time living at it. What you can expect if you're good is to make enough money on the road or after your trip to either travel better or travel longer - and to cash in on the occasional freebie flight or hotel room along the way.

Entire books and websites are dedicated to the art (or science) of writing a travel article for magazines or newspapers and if you're serious about this, you should spend quite a bit of time browsing through them.

I can give you a taster - just enough for you to decide whether travel journalism is something you want to know more about.

Travel Writing Resources and Inspiration

My own inspiration comes from some wonderful women's travel writing, but also from dozens of books in my own travel library. Here are just a few:
Falling Off the Map by Pico Iyer
The Quiet American (and nearly everything else) by Graham Greene
The Old Patagonian Express by Paul Theroux
The Drifters by James A. Michener
Travel Writing by L. Peat O'Neil

The following websites are useful for the aspiring writer - you'll find more than enough to set you on your way.

Transitions Abroad: travel writer portal for some of the most comprehensive tips around
WrittenRoad: for information on travel publishing
Bootsnall: for a great travel writing forum

And get started finding writers' guidelines here.

A word of caution

Once you start writing for publication, you may be tempted to identify yourself as a journalist. Try not to. While a journalist can be a travel writer, it takes some time and training for the reverse to be true. In many parts of the world, being a journalist is a regulated profession and entering a country as a journalist is subject to a strict procedure.

I remember walking across the border from Mozambique to Zimbabwe with my backpack and, exhausted and dirty, wasn't thinking clearly when asked my profession (journalist, of course, which - as a roving foreign correspondent for a newspaper - was exactly what I was). No sooner said than a special paper was stapled into my passport and stamped with the ominous words 'Journalist, report to Ministry of the Interior within 48 hours.' So much for taking my time traveling down to Harare.

In some countries you would be turned back if you showed up claiming to be any kind of journalist or writer - you'll recognize those countries when you keep running into backpackers who carry laptops and blush, answering 'English teacher' whenever you ask them what they do for a living.