As an editor and columnist for the BMW Riders Association’s magazine, I see a lot of stories by travel enthusiasts who are eager to share their passions. Few of them are professional travel writers, which gives me a window on common hiccups that can lead to dull, repetitive, and unpublishable articles.
Whether you’re writing a story for your blog or social post about your summer vacation, or a book involving travel, these tips will get you off on the right foot.
Start with a STORY
What makes a good travel story? A story. Not turn-by-turn directions or a blanket statement that the best fried chicken comes from the South. Share how the experience changed you, what history you learned, or if someone challenged your assumptions about a place. A good story could involve an obstacle that affects you physically, mentally, or financially.
Stories touch us in our heads and in our hearts. They help us understand the world, ourselves and each other. Give readers the STORY of your trip.
Stories and the Brain
Travel changes us, and that’s why people read travel magazines and memoirs. Write something that changes the life of the reader—even if just to brighten their day or to help them choose the best overlook of a gorgeous landscape.
How do we do this? Let’s ask a neuroscientist who studies the effects of story on our brains. Paul J. Zak, Phd of Claremont Graduate University says:
Emotional simulation is the foundation for empathy and is particularly powerful for social creatures like humans because it allows us to rapidly forecast if people around us are angry or kind, dangerous or safe, friend or foe.
Stories that are personal and emotionally compelling engage more of the brain, and thus are better remembered, than simply stating a set of facts.
Once a story has sustained our attention long enough, we may begin to emotionally resonate with the story's characters. Narratologists call this “transportation,” and you experience this when your palms sweat as James Bond trades blows with a villain on top of a speeding train.
No other creature on this earth learns from stories. With these key findings in mind, here are four common things to avoid in travel writing.
Avoid these Four Things In Travel Writing
Letting your GPS do the Talking
No one wants turn-by-turn directions unless it’s a through a specialty online forum designed to exchange GPX files. Reciting the list of places you visited is the same thing. Don’t do it! It offers no emotional punch, and doesn’t connect the reader to you as the narrator.
You can always begin your first draft by listing the places you visited and your recollections. This approach is a fine way to help you sink back into the experience, but it is not a story. It is a list. A list for the draft, not for the final version.
To turn your list into a story, look for a connecting thread. That thread might be things that surprised you or similarities and differences in the destinations on your trip. For example, here’s an article I wrote about a motorcycle trip to Italy. The connecting thread was, believe it or not, food. Of course I talked about motorcycling in Tuscany, Umbrio and Lazio, but I did not recite the itinerary. I’ve included a sample of it at the end of this newsletter.
Forgetting to Surprise the Reader
I remember the first time I rode my motorcycle on a legendary stretch of road in the Blue Ridge Mountains named The Tail of the Dragon. This curvy road is so notorious for wrecks that trucks are banned and DOT signs warn everyone that it’s a crash zone. A local business on the North Carolina end of 11-mile road features a “Tree of Shame” mounted with motorcycles and parts lost in crashes.
I had stopped for lunch in the charming town of Maryville, Tennessee, one midsummer day headed home to North Carolina. Waiting for my quiche, I consulted my map (before Google Maps) for the twistiest roads home (they’re the most fun). Highway 129 got my attention. Oh, that looks nice, I thought, and headed that way. Seeing signs that said “Welcome to the Tail of The Dragon” shocked me. I never knew the road by its official highway numbers. A cold sweat ran down my spine as I thought about all the pictures I’d seen of the Tree of Shame, and the hundreds who had lost their lives there.
Without overthinking, I reminded myself that I had the training and experience to ride The Dragon, and throttled up. Before too long I realized that the Dragon’s 318 curves was just a pleasant stretch of road, where the most deadly hazards to avoid were inexperienced and drunken riders.
Now, isn’t that a more interesting story than a simple recitation of facts about Highway 129 boasting 318 curves in 11 miles and that I rode it the first time with nary a pucker1 moment?
How can you include an experience in your story? Pick one that surprised you. One that let you down? That’s what we want!
Skipping the Best Details
Don’t tell me that a certain restaurant has the best fried calamari. Tell me why it’s better than the rest. Maybe it’s the food, maybe it’s the story behind the food. Is it fresh caught each morning by five-year-olds? Does the batter have a magical ingredient only found in that part of the world?
Maybe the best calamari is a function of the restaurant’s ambiance that would make even fried spiders taste divine. Immerse me in that experience—the color of the walls and the clothes worn by the wait staff. The way the waiter sizes you up and tells you he’ll cut your spice level in half so you can sleep, and how you fought him to season it like a local’s—and your ensuing misery. That’s a food story.
And if you can make fun of yourself along the way, you’ll endear yourself to the reader. Try that in your next story (written, or shared at a family reunion).
Trying to be Bill Bryson
Speaking of making fun of yourself (or others), go lightly on humor, especially if you’re a beginning writer.
Bill Bryson is a beloved author known for his travel books. You’ve probably heard about or read A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail. Maybe you’ve seen the 2015 movie based on it. Very witty. Great storytelling.
But even Bill Bryson couldn’t write that well when he started publishing travel books. Try reading The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America (1989). I couldn’t stomach it. The jokes were cruel and repetitive. This is typical of the mean-spirited observations that pervaded each chapter:
I will say this, however—and it's a strange, strange thing—the teenaged daughters of these fat women are always utterly delectable... I don't know what it is that happens to them, but it must be awful to marry one of those nubile cuties knowing that there is a time bomb ticking away in her that will at some unknown date make her bloat out into something huge and grotesque, presumably all of a sudden and without much notice, like a self-inflating raft from which the pin has been yanked.
Bryson improved his writing over 13 years before winning the James Joyce Award. So, it's better to focus on writing before adding humor. It is one of the most difficult writing forms to master.
The best humor puts you at the pointy end of the stick. If you call yourself a jackass for ignoring the waiter’s offer to season your food at half-heat, it’s much better than calling out someone else for their hubris.
A final note. Editing has helped me become a better writer. I’ve been writing about my travels since 2010. Looking back at some of my old blog posts, newsletters, and published stories, I cringe at some of them based on the writer I have become since then. As with any creative profession, the climb up the learning curve never ends—which is part of its reward.
Excerpt from my 2016 story, “Broccoletti, Bread, and a Beemer”
Off the bikes, we laugh and tease each other like old friends. The couple from Pennsylvania, Jo and Dan, share stories of her father, Giovanni, whom they agree Enrico reminds them of. Both Giovanni and Enrico are Roman, and hold staunch views that there are certain foods to eat and certain ways to eat them.
Enrico will indoctrinate us in Italian gastronomy with each meal: how the animal is raised and butchered; when the plant is harvested; how to keep pasta from sticking; and the fact that pork jowl (guanciale) not only tastes better than pancetta, which comes from its belly, it is the only pork allowed in amatriciana (a staple pasta dish that also includes pecorino cheese, white wine, tomatoes from San Marzano, pepper and chili).
Bread becomes an ongoing joke among us, especially between Enrico and Dan—the bread lover in our group. “Don’t touch the bread!” Enrico says each time it’s brought to the table. “Eat first, then use the bread to soak up the sauce.” I tell Enrico, “Sometimes we say ‘sop up the sauce,’” because I know he loves adding to his lexicon.
Jo and Dan exchange knowing looks, because Enrico’s admonition recalls a memory from when they were dating some 40 years ago and Dan was invited to family meals. He always wanted butter on his bread, but Giovanni wouldn’t stand for it. Eventually, Jo’s mother would take pity and bring him some, inviting her husband’s scorn. Another transgression of young Dan’s was asking for garlic bread with spaghetti, an American tradition, only to learn that this made him a Philistine in Giovanni’s eyes. It’s a wonder they got permission to marry!
Giovanni becomes the tenth person at the table in our minds as we hear more of his stories during the tour. This right here is group touring at its best. I count my blessings.
Okay, if you’re not a motorcyclist, this term might puzzle you. Think about a time when you might have slipped on ice or a soapy floor—how did your body respond? Probably with a sharp intake of breath and a pucker on the way to the ground.
I’m saving this! I have some travel stories that I’d love to write. Thanks for the rich post. 🤓🙌
This was great! Just might expand my writing boundaries.