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Travelers: Submit your most inspired images and stories of travel, culture, and adventure, and you may win an all-expenses paid trip to Queensland, Australia this summer.

“The #travelstoke: Queensland contest is about writers, photographers, journalists, and filmmakers who love to travel, and produce media that shares this stoke. The winner will be chosen as Matador’s correspondent on the ground for a week’s journalistic mission in Queensland, building his or her itinerary around the elements, places, and cultures they find most interesting. From exploration in the Outback to surfing and diving some of the world’s most epic spots, this is an opportunity for travel journalists to take their work to the next level.  Read more... (212 words, 2 images, estimated 51 secs reading time)

June 30, 2013

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“Submit your best travel photos and you could win amazing prizes, including a National Geographic Expedition to the Galápagos and an opportunity to be published in Traveler magazine. Plus, check in every week to see recent entries and our editors’ favorites, and vote for your top picks!”

All entries must be received by June 30, 2013.

October 6, 2013

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October 11, 2013

“Breathe Life Into Your Book is a retreat for writers who have a book in progress. Writer and trained breath facilitator Robin Sparks will lead you in daily breath sessions to help access the core message of what you want to say. Conscious breath is jet fuel to authentic writing—writing that functions beyond the mind and is intuitive.”

The October 6 – 11, 2013, retreat is at ONEWORLD in Kumara, Ubud, Bali, and precedes the annual Bali Writers and Readers Festival. More info and registration at oneworldretreats.com.

Ok, so this isn’t exactly a travel tip, but we do need to be aware of what’s coming: the 3-D printer, “your all-in-one solution to lunar habitat-building, gun-making and space pizza preparation! Now, the latter has grabbed the attention of NASA, which has approved a $125,000 grant for a mechanical engineer to develop a prototype of his universal food synthesizer based on 3-D printing technology.

“Long distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life,” he said. “The way we are working on it is, all the carbs, proteins and macro and micro nutrients are in powder form. We take moisture out, and in that form it will last maybe 30 years.”  Read more... (126 words, 1 image, estimated 30 secs reading time)

“Every year around this time, we find that many travelers are still looking to plan last-minute trips for the Spring and Summer seasons. To help narrow the options, we reached out to our network of top partners and highlighted special deals exclusively for the Indagare community.”

Resorts with offers include: Mii amo (Sedona, Arizona), Maroma (Riviera Maya, Mexico), Four Seasons (Costa Rica), Parrot Cay (Turks & Caicos), Le Royal Monceau (Raffles Paris), Shutters (Santa Monica, California), El Encanto (Santa Barbara), La Samanna (St. Martin), Laucala (Fiji), Claridge’s (London).

For more information, click here: Special Offers.

“If HuffPostTravel can declare that the ‘Old Travel Show is Dead, Long Live the New York Travel Festival,’ then we might be right in declaring that ‘Travel Destination Articles Are Dying, Long Live Social Media Travel Content.’ So, when a senior editor at Technorati  told me that, going forward, all travel-related content had to have a Social Media spin, had to be presented via a Social/New Media filter, I knew the travel content game had changed.” Read the rest of the article on Technorati.com

Thanks to Carolyn Koenig for this link.

April 7, 2013

The open letter below from Connie Hale includes details about the upcoming writers retreat she has arranged in Hawaii. But here’s the short story: Amazing location, amazing workshops, amazing pricing. Makes me want to quit my job and get myself right over there! More on Connie’s vision for the week at Mokule‘ia.

Hawaii: Six days, Five nights, Oceanview room, All meals: from $405

While Laura Fraser and I [Constance Hale] will indeed be teaching writing workshops, you are absolutely invited and welcome to come just to hang out and invent your own ideal retreat. Your families and companions are welcome—as many of them as will come.  Read more... (303 words, 1 image, estimated 1:13 mins reading time)

Michael Shapiro won the Travel Classics.com writers contest this year for his story, In Search of Dylan Thomas: Seeking the elusive poet whose words brought Wales to the world.

Michael took the slow train to Wales in 2003 to interview renowned author Jan Morris for his book A Sense of Place, a collection of conversations with the world’s leading travel writers. He soon returned on assignment for National Geographic Traveler, which became a cover story on Morris’ corner of Wales. Returning in June 2012 for Travel Classics led to an assignment to write about Wales’ narrow-gauge railways for American Way. He is the only writer to have won the Travel Classics Writers Contest four times.  Nice work, Michael!

Thanks to Anne Sigmon for her post on Jungle Pants: Twelve tips for avoiding mosquitos–and the serious diseases they carry. Anne also provides a link to Tipnut’s Over 40 Mosquito Bite Itch Relief Tips.

What is a “Visionary” Travel Writer? What is a “visionary” writer in general? How about a writer who considers the spiritual, cultural, social, emotional, physical, psychological, racial, and political context in which they travel and write, not to mention live and breathe. Where ever you go there you are, right? We take ourselves everywhere. So a visionary writer is one who travels first into the miraculously complex depths of their own soul, and is willing to look at and express the whole kit and kaboodle, the “full catastrophe”—dark AND light, joy AND sorrow, beauty AND terror—with humility, insight, humor, and integrity.  Read more... (193 words, 1 image, estimated 46 secs reading time)

October 23, 2011

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October 29, 2011

Immerse yourself in writing, relaxing, and exploring one of Mexico’s most beautiful colonial towns. The workshop is intimate, with a maximum of nine students, and held in a luxurious villa in the center of town, with lots of nooks and terraces for writing, reading, and dreaming. Workshop includes daily writing sessions in the morning, a reception, lunch at the villa, a cooking class and lunch in the country, a tour of town, an excursion to a private folk art museum, and a celebratory dinner and reading. $995 does not include airfare or accommodations (we’ll help arrange those). Visit Laura’s website for details and photos.  Read more... (174 words, 1 image, estimated 42 secs reading time)

San Francisco travel writers Jules and Effin Older made a 49-second travel video about San Francisco, and it’s a finalist in the 49 Hours of My SF Video Contest. Judging was based on “creativity, originality, entertainment value, and enthusiasm for San Francisco.” Visit the site before September 5th to view all five finalists — and vote for the Olders’ Lion Hunting in San Francisco, if you’re so inspired.

Voters who register will be entered for a chance to win gift certificates to renowned San Francisco museums, restaurants, attractions and more. Voting will end on September 6, after which winners will be announced and awarded. View the video winner prize package and official rules here.

Thanks to Cheryl McLaughlin for letting us know that Kevin Smokler’s BookTour.com is closing. We hope Kevin leaves his excellent ten-part series (“Everything you Wanted to Know about Book Promotion but were Afraid to Ask”) on the web as he moves on to other projects (his next book!)

The September issue of National Geographic features Jak’s image of an albino alligator (“Claude”) as a two-page spread, leading off the “Visions” section (formerly “Visions of Earth”). The magazine only publishes three images this way each month, selected from thousands around the world for their “intriguing” and “breathtaking” qualities.

You can see more of Jak’s photography on his Facebook page.

How close to a train track can you set up a vegetable market? Watch this video to find out.

April 20, 2011

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April 27, 2011

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May 4, 2011

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The San Francisco Waterfront Challenge, a new weekly “identify-the-photo” game, is giving prizes to waterfront-savvy locals and visitors. The challenge starts at noon on Wednesday, on April 20^th. The photo challenge is a celebration of San Francisco’s lively waterfront and a promotion for the San Francisco Waterfront website and mobile application.

Here’s how it works:  Read more... (233 words, 1 image, estimated 56 secs reading time)

• Each Wednesday at noon for the next for six months, a photo taken somewhere along San Francisco’s waterfront, from the Golden Gate Bridge to AT&T Park, will be posted online at San Francisco Waterfront. SF Waterfront Challenge rules are on the website.

May 2, 2011

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Call for entries: The annual Windland Smith Rice International Awards competition deadline is just days away! Enter your best nature photography before May 2, 2011 for a chance to exhibit your work at the Smithsonian.

The Nature’s Best Photography concept began with simple yet dynamic goals: to celebrate the beauty and diversity of nature through the art of photography, and to use this far-reaching medium as a creative tool for encouraging greater public interest in outdoor enjoyment and conservation stewardship.  Read more... (127 words, estimated 30 secs reading time)

I love this sturdy, way-clever, thin-as-paper, easy-to-conceal travel wallet.  The linked article includes easy do-it-yourself instructions. Make several before your next trip, and stash your cash safely.

In their quest to blanket the world with superior apps, Sutro Media is looking for expert authors for the following European destinations. If you’re an expert on any of these areas, get in touch with acquisitions editor Kim Grant.

England: Most regions (but specifically Cornwall, Devon, Kent, Cambridge, Oxford, Yorkshire, Bristol); London.

Wales: Cardiff.

Scotland: general country guide, and Glasgow.

Ireland: general country guide, and Dublin, Belfast, County Cork, County Wicklow, County Galway, County Kerry, Northern Ireland.

Norway: general country guide, and Oslo, Bergen, fjords.

Sweden: general country guide, and Stockholm.

Finland: general country guide, and Helsinki.  Read more... (238 words, estimated 57 secs reading time)

Thanks to travel writer Dick Jordan (Tales Told from the Road) for his review of the App Happy class Suzanne Rodriguez and I (Laurie McAndish King) taught for people who want to develop and market their own mobile travel apps. We developed so much content for the class that we’re nearly finished with an an e-book on the same topic.

 

Salon.com co-founder and New York Times Book Review contributor Laura Miller wrote in March about about the swirling milieu that is publishing…

“Last week, the book world saw a particularly symmetrical bit of revolving door ballet as Amanda Hocking — who famously became a millionaire by selling a series of paranormal romance novels as self-published e-books — signed a contract with an old-fashioned publishing house, while the bestselling thriller author Barry Eisler walked away from a similar deal, preferring to self-publish his next book. Did I mention it was the same publisher (St. Martin’s Press) in both cases? Like I said: symmetrical.”  Read more... (111 words, estimated 27 secs reading time)

Lisa Morton’s PIRATES! Or, How to Protect Your Intellectual Property on the High Seas of the Internet provides advice for tracking and dealing with unauthorized reproduction of work you’ve published online.

Here’s a short from the Wall Street Journal, which likes Don George’s Trip Lit column for National Geographic Traveler. Well, who wouldn’t like it? Great books and incisive reviews by a legendary travel writer and editor.

“It’s a photo opportunity of a lifetime. Since 2003, Smithsonian Magazine has run an annual contest, offering photographers the chance to have their winning pictures exhibited at the Smithsonian Castle in Washington, D.C. and published in the print edition of its Magazine. In that time, hundreds of thousands of shutterbugs from over 90 countries have submitted their best shots, but only a handful can win. We join judges behind the scenes and a winning photographer behind the lens to answer the question: what makes a simple picture a work of art?”  Read more... (154 words, 2 images, estimated 37 secs reading time)

Thanks to John Montgomery for this link to aerial photos from around the world.

• San Francisco Waterfront—It’s Alive!