Travel Writing 101

Sicne this is a travel and photography-oriented blog, travel writing surely fits in. As with breaking into any profession, travel writing has its hurdles. A straight-to-the-point yet interesting (good writing always requires the latter) article is found on the Verge Magazine website.


http://www.vergemagazine.com/articles/40/100-6-tips-for-aspiring-travel-writers.html.


By the way, Verge magazine, a Canadian production subtitled "Travel With Purpose," is aimed at a younger (or younger-at-heart) audience looking for adventure, planning a "gap year" journey, or hoping to live and work overseas while on a longer journey. It kind of fills in for "Transitions Abroad," a magazine that I thought was a bit more well rounded but that bit the dust last year, but that still exists in cyberspace: http://www.transitionsabroad.com/.

World Hum - Travel Site of the Day ... or Week

Anyway, I recently returned from a wonderful conference in the Bay Area devoted to Travel Writing and Photography. And during the course of the 4 days I came across a number of travel websites either for the first time or was re-introduced to sites I had once perused. So, I though I would start sharing some of those sites on the blog that I find particularly useful or interesting. Hope you do to.

So, the first site is www.worldhum.com. It contains a wonderful mix of well-written features, a multi-category blog, photo slide shows, videos, etc. And the best part is the specifics of the destination is often not the story - rather its the journey itself which makes it rather refreshing!

A recently posted feature by Sophia Dembling on India is a great intro to the type of articles you;ll find on this site:
http://www.worldhum.com/features/travel-stories/the-bucket-and-the-cup-20090828/

Enjoy!

Wanderings

For those of us who are full of wanderlust, even if bound to home much of the time, I have a book recommendation that may get you on the road sooner than you think. "The Way of the Wanderer: Discover Your True Self through Travel" by David Yeadon, was the perfect book to read WHILE traveling. David discusses those serendipitous moments that I think we all have while traveling that make all of the inconveniences and risks and cost (time and money) worthwhile. A world traveler who lives both in Japan and upstate New York (another dream of mine in concept if not specifics), David in a very conversational style (illustrated with his own sketches) matter-of-factly lays out spiritual or magic moments in his travels, some of which came while walking through the valley of the shadow of death. It brought to mine several that have occurred in my own travels and caused me to start writing those thoughts down which I MAY share at some future time.

If you been blessed with serendipitous moments or wish you had, then get a hold of a copy of Yeadon's book - you won't be disappointed.

Holy Cow Indeed!

As my home library attests, my favorite book genre is the travel narrative. Starting with William Least Heat Moon's Blue Highways, the collection runs the gamut from P.J. O'Rourke's crazy journey from Tierra del Fuego to Prudhole Bay, to Steinbeck's Travels with Charley, to Robin Cook's solo camel journey across the Australian outback. I just completed one the best ever - "Holy Cow: An Indian Adventure" by Sarah Macdonald (2002, Broadway Books, New York). Part travelogue, part spiritual journey (and what better country for spiritual journeys than India - read the book and find out why), and part autobiography, Holy Cow mixes humor, insight and adventure with the realities of ex-pat community, societal conflicts and the pitfalls of newlywed-ism. As close to a page-turner as an travelogue ever gets.

My favorite passage - a quote, from the guru Krishnamurti: "When one loses the deep intimate relationship with nature then temples, mosques and churches become important."

Vacations Ever Onward

Its Saturday and, as usual, in my e-mail in-box is the weekly Travel Dispatch from the NY Times. Some - or most - weeks, the articles are fairly interesting but not necessarily worth saving. But one this week caught my eye - "Making Vacation Last for Months," about folks that work hard at summer jobs (or winter jobs as the case may be) and then travel the rest of the year on what they've earned. Here's the link: http://frugaltraveler.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/03/making-vacation-last-for-months/?8td&emc=tda2

Always worth a thought or two.

Festival Photography - The Tango

The Northwest Folklife Festival, held each Memorial Day Weekend in Seattle, provides numerous, though challenging, opportunities for photographers. With over a dozen indoor and outdoor stages, performers, food and arts and craft vendors, tens of thousands of attendees, plus a few Seattle icons like the Space Needle and International Fountain thrown in for good measure, the photographic potential is great. But the crowds, the intense sunlight (on occasion - like this year!) and equally intense shade, and the general milieu provide a challenge for even the best of photographers in creating a worthy image.

One of my favorite Folklife events is the three-hour long Tango Dance, with both amateur and professional dancers. I stake out my spot well in advance of the first group of professional dancers and wait. And the wait is well worth it. This couple, professional dance instructors, know the ritual of the Tango and exhibit the sensuality of the dance in amazing ways - often subtle, sometimes extravagent and always intense. The combination of ritual and sensuality is what draws me to capture the feel of the dance. Hopefully I've succeeded in some small way.

Girl from Ipanema

"Tall and tan and young and lovely, the girl from Ipanema goes walking, and when she passes, each one she passes goes - ah." The next line goes on to say that when she walks, its like a Samba, ..."

The Tango instructor, between numbers, confidently sashayed along the dance floor. And the only thing that popped into my mind were the lyrics from the 1960's hit, The Girl from Ipanema. OK, so Ipanema is in Brazil, not Argentina. And the Tango's center of the universe in Argentina, whereas the Samba is larger than life in Brazil. But, no matter. The memory creates its own linkages sometimes irrespective of fact!

The image is also clearly reminiscent of the Figment post earlier in May, one of my favorite photographic themes.