I don't Enjoy Writing About Travel

My title for this blog post might be a little confusing, especially to anyone who knows me. I think most of my friends would assume that since I love reading about other people's adventures, and love travelling, therefore I would also enjoy writing about my own trips. In truth though, I find it incredibly tedious and difficult writing about my own escapades, and that's why I'll probably never be a travel writer. That's not to say that I don't jot down my thoughts when I'm on the road - I do, usually in a private notebook. However, the thoughts I tend to jot down on the road are scatty and unstructured and wouldn't be of much interest to anyone but me. Or they might be interesting to other people if something a bit saucy happened whilst I was travelling, in which case I wouldn't want to share the details anyway.

Another reason I don't like writing about my own travel experiences is because it's incredibly hard not gush if I really like a place, which makes for really boring reading. Conversely, if I don't like a place, it's even harder to be objective, and I don't want to offend people when I'm writing -  I never want it seem like I'm slagging off a country or a particular group of people, because that would not sit well with me. The final reason I don't enjoy travel writing on a personal level is because it calls for a high degree of accuracy - if you misspell a place name or give false information about a place, people tend to get really annoyed, and I'd rather not have to contend with that. I also feel that good travel writing requires a great deal of research, and to me doing research is the least enjoyable part of any kind of writing. which is why this blog consists mainly of opinion pieces like this one, or information about things that I already know something about. I do like learning about new things, and I have done research for articles on this blog, but if I'm honest, I always try to keep the level of research to a minimum, which is why I like novel and play writing best, as you can basically just make things up, and you simply can't do that with travel writing. The reason I'm telling you all this is to say that I won't be posting a proper travel diary on here whilst I'm away, as that simply doesn't sound like fun to me. I will however let you know briefly each week what I'm up to [just not in that much detail] and there will be pictures if any of you like armchair travelling, [though my Mum thinks other people's holiday pictures can be a bit dull] but I promise I will try to keep them interesting....

 

Au Revoir!