12 Days of Holiday Specials Day 3: Three Days of Personalized Travel Writing Retreat
Today’s holiday trivia: As part of the Feast of the Holy Innocents, December 28 is a day for pranks (similar to April Fools Day in North America) in Spain and Latin American countries. Pranksters or “inocentes” trick their friends and family; even newspapers, radio and TV stations have been known to participate by providing false stories.
The town of Ibi in Alicante, Spain, celebrates the festival of Els Enfarinats each year, as well, with participants in the day-long festival dressing in mock military uniforms and staging a mock coup while a band of street musicians tour the city. The “military” exercise their authority under a blaze of fireworks, flour bombs and eggs, surrendering at the end of the day with a traditional dance.
How to Pitch Five Magazines Looking for Restaurant Profiles
Welcome to the Friday Freebie Five, a new weekly feature on Dream of Travel Writing’s Six Figure Travel Writer blog.
Each week, we comb our Travel Magazine Database to bring you five magazine sections open to freelancers around a theme–front-of-book trend pieces, long-form first-person features, short narrative postcards–to inspire your pitches.
Rhapsody
“Fine Dining” is a 300-to-500-word section that gives the reader an insight into a restaurant, such as Noma in Copenhagen or Parador La Huella in Miami. It is written in the third person and takes the form of a review or commentary on the dining scene in the city. The cities are places that United Airlines fly to and are not limited to a specific region or country.
12 Days of Holiday Specials Day 2: Two Private One-on-One Coaching Sessions
Today’s holiday trivia: Continuing our look at holiday traditions around the world, we travel east for a very different type of holiday. As a secular, communist country, North Korea has a different take on holidays than many societies. Its 71 official holidays include Sundays, for instance, and many holidays are based on birthdays of the party leaders and founders. Today North Korea celebrates its Constitution Day, for which the state provides rations explicitly for the holiday feasts.
When we surveyed you guys to see what you’d most like to see in our holiday specials, one of the things that came up again and again was opportunities for one-on-one coaching!
Since I’ve finished my coaching certification this year–which was a very eye-opening experience that I wish more people who offer business “coaching” would do–I’m even more excited than ever to work with you one-on-one to move your career forward.
Welcome to our 12 Days of Holiday Specials! Spread the Holiday Cheer
Today’s holiday trivia: A secular holiday, December 26 is celebrated as Boxing Day in a number of countries that previously formed part of the British Empire. For the U.K., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Trinidad and Tobago, Boxing Day is primarily known as a shopping holiday similar to Black Friday in the U.S.–the perfect start to our holiday specials!
In Ireland, however, the holiday combines both the religious feast of St. Stephen and an older pagan tradition of a purge day into something called Wren Day, when bands of young men dress in cloaks of straw and parade through the town “hunting” a (usually fake and stuffed these days) wren bird atop a decorative pole, stopping in at homes along the way in a trick-or-treating fashion with coins rather than candy as the treats.
If you’ve been itching for an opportunity to pop off questions to me when you need help–our new program will give you a way to do that too!
It includes the opportunity to have small-group calls with me to get your questions answered live nearly every week, include exclusive live access to all of our new webinars and a members-only monthly ask-me-anything call.
You’ll also have access to every question and answer we’ve ever handled for other clients, so you can find even what you need on the spot.
Daily Free Travel Writing Webinars for January
You can now stream all of our past webinars–one each weekday–for free.
These webinars are only available at the times listed, live, but you can catch the replay in video, audio, and transcript form, along with the webinar slides, at any time in our on-demand webinar library.
Check out the full schedule of January’s webinars and register for your favorites below.
Join Us This Week for Free Travel Writing Lessons on Creating Salable Photography and Writing for Travel Trade Magazines
In the two years since we began running regular one-hour travel writing classes, we’ve covered more than 80 topics, including:
- how to land free trips
- how to get paid really, really well for your writing
- how to get on magazine editors’ good sides
- how to navigate every step of the process to land travel content marketing work, including phone calls and proposals
- how to keep your hourly rate down so your bank account goes up
- how to get work done on the road
- how to write, step-by-step, 15 different types of travel articles
- how to land guidebook and other traditional publishing deals
You can grab access to all of our past webinars (and a ton of other resources you can’t find anywhere else) with a subscription to our Dream Buffet or grab them one-by-one when you need them in our On-Demand Webinar Library for a set with the video, audio, transcript, and slides.
But we also air a free replay of one of our travel writing classes each and every weekday.
How to Pitch Five Magazines Looking for Activity Profiles
Welcome to the Friday Freebie Five, a new weekly feature on Dream of Travel Writing’s Six Figure Travel Writer blog.
Each week, we comb our Travel Magazine Database to bring you five magazine sections open to freelancers around a theme–front-of-book trend pieces, long-form first-person features, short narrative postcards–to inspire your pitches.
Sunset
“The View” highlights a particular attraction in a destination. There’s a 150-word description giving more information such as the history, the entry price and the website. This is followed by a 200-word sidebar which gives more information on things to do in the surrounding area. An example from a recent issue includes “Botanical Beverly Hills,” which covers the Virginia Robinson Gardens. After the description of the gardens there is a sidebar called “90210’s Natural Side” which outlines a bar, a park, a tea room, and a garden tour with prices and websites for each.
Join Us This Week for Free Travel Writing Lessons on the Art of the Followup and Crafting the Perfect Travel Article Pitch
In the two years since we began running regular one-hour travel writing classes, we’ve covered more than 80 topics, including:
- how to land free trips
- how to get paid really, really well for your writing
- how to get on magazine editors’ good sides
- how to navigate every step of the process to land travel content marketing work, including phone calls and proposals
- how to keep your hourly rate down so your bank account goes up
- how to get work done on the road
- how to write, step-by-step, 15 different types of travel articles
- how to land guidebook and other traditional publishing deals
You can grab access to all of our past webinars (and a ton of other resources you can’t find anywhere else) with a subscription to our Dream Buffet or grab them one-by-one when you need them in our On-Demand Webinar Library for a set with the video, audio, transcript, and slides.
But we also air a free replay of one of our travel writing classes each and every weekday.
How to Pitch Five Magazines Looking for Neighborhood Profiles
Welcome to the Friday Freebie Five, a new weekly feature on Dream of Travel Writing’s Six Figure Travel Writer blog.
Each week, we comb our Travel Magazine Database to bring you five magazine sections open to freelancers around a theme–front-of-book trend pieces, long-form first-person features, short narrative postcards–to inspire your pitches.
National Geographic Traveller (UK)
“Neighbourhood” is a 1,500-word article covering a different city each issue. In third person, the writer covers three neighborhoods in the city covering some interesting points on the history, trends, and what the reader can expect to see in each. Quotes are sometimes used from locals. There are two sidebars to accompany the article. The first is called “When in [city name]” which rounds up six things to do in the city. Rather than specific places, these cover broader suggestions such as eat dim sum, rather than naming a particular restaurant. Further suggestions could be visit a park, play a local sport, or try a well-known drink from the area. The second sidebar is called “More Information” and it lists practical information such as useful websites, how to get there, and the cost of hotels and tours for example. Destinations recently covered include Venice, Madrid, and Hong Kong.
Join Us This Week for Free Travel Writing Lessons on Increasing Your Pitch Success Rate and Generating Sure-Fire Saleable Ideas
In the two years since we began running regular one-hour travel writing classes, we’ve covered more than 80 topics, including:
- how to land free trips
- how to get paid really, really well for your writing
- how to get on magazine editors’ good sides
- how to navigate every step of the process to land travel content marketing work, including phone calls and proposals
- how to keep your hourly rate down so your bank account goes up
- how to get work done on the road
- how to write, step-by-step, 15 different types of travel articles
- how to land guidebook and other traditional publishing deals
You can grab access to all of our past webinars (and a ton of other resources you can’t find anywhere else) with a subscription to our Dream Buffet or grab them one-by-one when you need them in our On-Demand Webinar Library for a set with the video, audio, transcript, and slides.
But we also air a free replay of one of our travel writing classes each and every weekday.