11 Ways to Improve Your Travel Writing

If you are a travel blogger, you probably didn’t start as a writer. But as a traveller who is looking to share the experiences. You probably didn’t have any formal training or someone to look over your shoulder and give you advice. And, you didn’t have some to tell you, “How to improve your travel writing.”

So today I wanted to share 11 tips that will help you improve your travel blog writing. Remember, the world always needs good writers. And good writing helps in spreading your story! These tips, if followed, will improve your writing and make a big difference.

11 Ways to Improve Your Travel Writing

1. Read

This is number one. Whenever a budding writer asks me how they can improve, this is my first advice. Read the writing well. Absorb it. Let it sink into your soul. Don’t you think it’s possible? When I started, I was sick on a weekend, so I spent three days in bed reading every page of several travel books. After finishing, I switched on my laptop and started writing for the first time in days. What surprised me was the highest quality writing I had done to date. And, it was all because I had absorbed good writing and inked my writing on the page.

2. Do Travel Writing for Love

“You can only become truly capable of achieving something you love.” Do not get into travel writing for money. After all, that would be unreal. And, please, don’t worry about free stuff like free travel and hotel rooms. Do it so well that people can’t take their eyes off you. Or, in other words, strive to be such a good writer that people wait for the next update.

3. Do not stick to linear writing

You don’t need to compose a piece from beginning to middle to end. Sometimes that is not the ideal structure of the story. Sure, maybe you’ve already discovered it. But if not, it’s okay to simply see some scenes and paragraphs of the exhibition “on the paper”. Then, you can go back and look at the bigger picture and rearrange, discovering the best way to tell the story.

4. Take advantage of your sense of motivation

Several students of mine in different universities who have been most successful were not always the most talented in the class. But they were the most driven. They had read enough quality writing and had thought about it; understanding what made it so wonderful. They were not born with that understanding, but the ambition led them to seek better writing and then to think about it. It’s important to analyze what makes a piece of writing good or bad. Drive also inspires future successful writers to take risks, become vulnerable, contact more expert writers for advice, or appear before editors. So, don’t be shy! Being in the silent corner will not take you as far as extending your hands to introduce yourself.

5. Try to find out what makes your mind and writing flow

Let me explain; I can sit on my laptop and stare at a blank Word document for hours. Failing to realize how to start a story or what to write about. Then I will respond to an email from a friend who wants to know about the trip I am trying to write pen down. I will write a long email with interesting anecdotes about my experiences including some analysis about the place and culture. Suddenly I’ll realize, I can copy-paste this directly into the empty Word document. Several of my published articles have blocks of texts that were originally written as a part of emails to friends. However, this may not work for everyone.

6. Understand all aspects of the story

There are two types of travel writing: commercial and personal essays (or memoirs). In writing commercial trips, you should make the various parts of the story an intrinsic aspect of your knowledge: from ways of writing a lead to the nutty graph, scenes, exposition, and conclusions. For memories and personal essays, know what a narrative arc means at the back of your hands. It helps to get an intuitive understanding of these things by paying attention to writing and reading.

7. Don’t stress if your first draft is bad

I find this true when I am writing a personal essay or travel memories. I write and write and write, and I am not exactly sure what I am writing on the paper. What is the point of this? I wonder. Why am I doing this? But this is where patience comes in: finally, the part of the clouds, the proverbial sunbeam of the heavens shines on my computer monitor, and I see the point of everything: finally, I discover what I’m writing. And, how to count. The story just happens like magic. And not all at once: sometimes it’s piece by piece, like putting together a puzzle. But as I mentioned, patience is the key, because we never know when that divine magic is going to be activated. Nonetheless, sit long enough and it will happen.

8. Write what you know

Start telling the stories that only you can tell, because there will always be better and smarter writers than you. There will always be people who are much better at travel writing, but you are the only one who can narrate in your way.

9. When you’re done with an eraser, read it out loud

Preferably, print it and read it aloud. This will allow you to hear better. Giving an insight into how the piece sounds, the unacceptable segments and the clumsy phrases. This will make you jump in an obvious way.

10. Always put another pair of eyes on your writing

While all writers make mistakes, it’s very difficult to detect them without an editor. The editors play a very important role. But they don’t have to be experts with formal training. While hiring a copywriter is always good, you can make a friend read your travel writing, that could be good enough. It’s even better if you have someone who doesn’t know about travel.

I have a friend who doesn’t travel much; she reads all the posts on my blog because it helps me make sure to include the important details that I could have missed. When you’re an expert at something, you often fill in the blanks in your mind. You go from A to C automatically; Step B becomes subconscious. And when you write, you skip step B because it seems so obvious. Getting someone who doesn’t know the steps will help you make sure to include everything explained in your travel writing, constantly engaging the readers.

11. Finally, learn to self-edit

This is where many people go wrong. They write it, read it, publish it. And then they feel ashamed, “Oh, man, I can’t believe I missed that typo.” Well, you do not need to be the main editor. But if you follow some principles, it will be helpful. First, write something and let it sit a few days before editing it. After your first round of editions, repeat the process. Get another pair of eyes on it. Print a checklist of grammar rules to review while editing. If you follow the cheat sheet, you will capture your mistakes and end up with a better piece of travel writing.

Writing is a form of art. It takes a lot of practice and patience. When you are a freelance blogger, it can be harder to improve your work, because you don’t have an experienced voice that gives you advice and suggestions. Also, it doesn’t push you enough to be better. If you don’t take it on yourself to be better, you’ll never be.

However, even if you are not lucky enough to work with an editor, these 11 tips can surely help you improve your travel writing today. Thus, becoming a much better blogger. Write stories that people want to read! And, write it in your way.

Author Bio

I am Sumiya Sha from Cheetah Papers. I am working with a team of content writers. Our goal is to hire an expert who has a good command of English and will be able to meet the expectations of our clients. We also check if the candidates are familiar with the variety of citation styles. Then, they write a sample paper to demonstrate their analytical skills and creativity. We evaluate every single point of the writers’ abilities to choose only talented and reliable candidates.