Ninety-five celebrated and aspiring travel writers and photographers gathered for four days (August 8-11) at the annual Book Passage Travel Writers & Photographers Conference in Corte Madera, CA. They came from all over the United States and one from Spain to discuss the art and craft of travel writing and visual storytelling. They tackled issues affecting travel, from artificial intelligence and overtourism to climate change and the frustrations of Google algorithms. Despite the dizzying changes in the world of travel, I left the conference with a renewed sense of inspiration and purpose.
Travel Writing and Photography Legends
Now in its 32nd year, the conference is the brainchild of Book Passage owner Elaine Petrocelli, who enlisted Conference Chair Don George, then Travel Editor of The San Francisco Examiner/Chronicle, to help organize the first conference in 1991.
It was a success, attracting renowned figures like Arthur Frommer, founder of the eponymous travel guidebooks, and literary luminaries such as Jan Morris, Peter Mayle, Simon Winchester, and Isabel Allende.
Not long after, the accomplished photographer Robert “Bob” Holmes joined George as co-chair. His work has appeared in National Geographic, Geo, Life, Saveur, Time, and Wine Spectator.
If Elaine Petrocelli is the brains behind the conference, then Don George and Bob Holmes are the heart and soul.
With the characteristic reserve of the Englishman he is, Holmes is the perfect foil to George, who is unabashedly sentimental. George’s love for his profession, the conference, and fellow travel writers was evident in his passionate opening and closing remarks, leaving the audience exhilarated and tearing up along with him.
Holmes’ witticisms, with a zinger or two about the superiority of travel photography over travel writing, kept the audience laughing throughout the conference.
From Lens to Pen: Holmes Debuts "Passages"
Holmes debuted his new book, Passages, at the conference. It’s a beautiful limited-edition memoir and monograph filled with sublime landscapes and evocative portraits of Butan, Burma (Myanmar), Cuba, India, the Middle East, and other corners of the world.
I plan to write a review in my book review section, “Journeys In Travel Literature.” In the meantime, you can contact Holmes directly for a copy of the book or stop by Book Passage.
Phil Cousineau On "Writing Down The Country"
Author and storyteller Phil Cousineau’s “Writing Down The Country: On The Road Research” class opened to the public a few hours before the conference began. The term “Writing Down The Country” was new to me. Cousineau said the 19th-century French explorer René Caillié coined the term while embedded in Timbuktu. Foreign correspondents once used the term to describe “avid on-site research with scintillating prose.”
It’s impossible to capture the richness of this two-hour class in a couple of paragraphs. Cousineau’s talk contained copious literary and historical references. I’ve made a mental note to read more classics and revisit Greek mythology.
Summary of Cousineau's Advice to Travel Writers
Observe. Do not rely on your cell phones. Never leave home without a notebook. Tell more than the outside story. Go deeper. There is no story without change. Don’t just write about something beautiful; confront chaos. Ask locals what is happening or find a local authority or a local reporter. Use all five senses every day. Buy a book of local poetry before you visit. Find a way to remind yourself about the soul of the place, whether through poetry or music. Lift your game—read great books. Ask yourself if your story will transport the reader. If you are stuck in your writing, read Cousineau’s book, Stoking The Creative Fires.
Conference Kick-Off and Recommended Readings
Don George and Linda Watanabe McFerrin
In her opening remarks, Linda Watanabe McFerrin credited George with changing the travel writing industry with his San Francisco Examiner/Chronicle Sunday Travel Section focusing on literary travel writing. The multi-genre Watanabe McFerrin wrote book reviews for the Examiner back then. Today, she is best known as a poet, travel writer, and novelist. Watch this space because I will soon review her latest book, POST-Apocalyptic Valentine, which came out on 9/3/24 and includes “travel poems.”
Like last year, George and McFerrin shared “20 Books to Inspire.”
Talented Voices From The Field
This year’s attending faculty included authors Tim Cahill (see my book review), Phil Cousineau, Don George, Jeff Greenwald, Andrew McCarthy, Linda Watanabe McFerrin, Michael Shapiro, and Lavinia Spalding.
Journalists, editors, and freelancers from AFAR, Hidden Compass, CondeNast Traveler, Los Angeles Times, Outside, Travel & Leisure, Sierra Magazine, Smithsonian, and Via joined them. They included Sivani Babu, Blane Bachelor, Sabine K. Bergmann, Celeste Brash, Jonathan Hahn, Catherine Hamm, Kimberley Lovato, Whitney Phaneuf, Chris Reynolds and Jill K. Robinson. Each shared valuable tips on polishing travel articles, getting queries read, and finding out what editors want.
For those preferring to tell stories with a camera lens, Bob Holmes and his business partner, Andréa Johnson, a wine, agriculture, and adventure travel photographer, along with National Geographic photographer Catherine Karnow, led workshops and presentations about photojournalism and storytelling.
Pauline Frommer (Frommer Media) and Celeste Brash (Lonely Planet) discussed the changing world of publishing and writing travel guidebooks. Host/producer at OnTravel Media, Elizabeth Harryman Lasley moderated “The Podcaster’s Path,” the “Insiders’ Guide to Guidebook Writing,” and “Navigating the World of AI.”
Content creators Pier Nirandara and Bri Sneller led a workshop on storytelling and content creation focused on using visual content for blogs and social media. Nirandara revealed the beauty of the ocean with her stunning underwater shots of large mammals, sharks, and other sea life. Sneller displayed stunning photos of her travels around the world. For more about this workshop, see “The Power of Storytelling in the Age Of Digital Media” below.
Author, mentor, and speaker Jenn Baljko shared a documentary about a transformative journey and participated in a panel about filmmaking and videography. See “A Walk From Bangkok to Barcelona” below.
For the complete star-studded line-up with bios, you can click here.
Andrew McCarthy Interviews Don George
On day two, Andrew McCarthy, the Hollywood actor, TV director, author, and travel writer, hilariously grilled Conference Chair George about a couple of heartfelt stories in his travel anthology, The Way of Wanderlust.
“Despite yourself, you are actively searching for something. Whether it’s connections or a whale,” McCarthy quipped about George’s story “Baja: Touched By a Whale.”
“Another story where you are wonderfully childish…is when you were climbing Half Dome, where you’re terrified. Your kids are eight and 12 and scampering up, and you’re terrified for your life and not even aware in any way that your children’s lives may be in danger…Have you no shame? You seem utterly oblivious. I really admire that.”
And so it went. It was both an interview and a comedy. It loosened the audience before the evening’s karaoke. McCarthy’s playful digs proved how writing with vulnerability connects us with our audience. I recalled reading “Conquering Half Dome” and sympathizing with George and his acrophobia.
Author Pico Iyer felt that connection too when he wrote in the book’s foreword: “… if you meet Don on the page or in the flesh, you quickly see that he’s always tilted toward the sun, as a perpetual singer of yes to life, to fun, to innocence, to vulnerability, and to surrender.”
A Walk From Bangkok to Barcelona
A new faculty member, Jenn Baljko, walked with her partner, Lluís, from Bangkok to Barcelona, published a book, and showed a documentary film about their walk at the conference.
The documentary is 27 minutes long, but the walk took 3 1/2 years and was 16,000 kilometers (nearly 10,000 miles). Now that’s slow travel.
The journey took its toll on their feet and relationship. By the time they got to Turkey, one was walking the northern route and the other the southern route. They talked about parting ways for good when they arrived in Macedonia but didn’t. The journey ended as the coronavirus pandemic began. Their mission was to explore the world, seeking the goodness of people. They believe they found it on this epic trip. The kindness of the Iranian people was one of their biggest surprises.
Jenn and Lluís’ blog, written in Spanish and English, has more than 300 posts about their journey.
Jenn told TT4C, “The best part of the conference was meeting and connecting with like-minded individuals who speak the language of wanderlust.”
Ethical Travel: Telling Stories that Matter in a World of Overtourism and Greenwashing
A recurrent theme at the conference was about improving the world through travel.
Jeff Greenwald, author, activist, and co-founder of Ethical Traveler, has dedicated himself to protecting human rights and the environment through mindful tourism. He urged attendees to dig into local issues with empathy and curiosity. Each year, his team surveys developing nations and lists The World’s Ten Best Ethical Destinations based on environmental protection, social welfare, human rights, and animal welfare.
Nirandara advised writers not to be parachute reporters. Be aware and ask the right questions.
Like Greenwald, Nirandara wants travel writers to consider where the money goes. Are residents benefiting from tourist dollars or international corporate entities?
Celeste Brash of Lonely Planet noted that guidebooks can make or break people’s businesses. Due to litigation concerns, publishers like hers provide more guidance to writers. You’ll unlikely find descriptions like “Cockroach-infested.” She focuses on promoting good businesses but notes that readers don’t want to be told what to do; they want to be guided. So, Brash adds detailed information boxes. Like the others on her “Responsible Travel” panel, she is impressed by ecologically minded businesses but cautioned that “greenwashing is rampant.”
Workshops and Panel Discussions
If I could clone myself to be in multiple places at once, I would have done so. This was my second year as a newly minted travel writer at the conference, and again, I agonized over which three-day morning session to commit to.
The choices were “Advanced Narrative Workshop” with Tim Cahill, “Finding, Telling and Selling the Story” with Catharine Hamm and Chris Reynolds, “Travel Storytelling & Content Creation in the Digital Age” with Pier Nirandara and Bri Sneller, “Writing the World” with Kimberley Lovato and Lavinia Spalding, and Travel Photography with Sivani Babu, Bob Holmes, Andrea Johnson and Catherine Karnow.
I decided on “Travel Storytelling & Content Creation in the Digital Age.”
The Power of Storytelling in the Age Of Digital Media
Pier Nirandara & Bri Sneller
Nirandara and Sneller’s workshop on “Travel Storytelling & Content Creation in the Digital Age” ran for three mornings from 9 a.m. to noon. The pair (@piersgreatperhaps and @bucketlistbri) have stellar reputations in the competitive social media world. They generously shared their thoughts and traded tips for building an online audience and making money online.
Sneller advised participants to identify their “Super Power,” or “Zone of Genius,” a reference to Gay Hendricks’ book The Big Leap.
While others debate whether blogs are dead, Sneller views blogs as the centerpiece to which social media posts feed. She advises posting frequently (more than once a week) and nurturing readers through newsletters because subscribers are the most loyal readers.
Social media, of which blogging is a part, has three revenue streams: 1) Advertising, 2) Affiliate Marketing, and 3) Digital Products (Digital Guides and Maps). While we all know how hard it is to break into the digital travel space, both instructors were upbeat about the many opportunities once you do.
Tools Of The Trade
Here are a few of the valuable resources we learned about in this workshop:
- If you are a freelancer, join TravMedia, a global network connecting media and PR professionals, to see what editors want in real-time.
- Editing: Photos should be shot in RAW, which is a higher image quality than JPEG. Even iPhones have this option. Nirandara discussed the power of cropping photos and said Adobe Lightroom is the go-to software. She also recommends the video editor and maker app, InShot, now my top choice for editing Instagram photos. If you have ever wondered how to generate video captions or about all the fancy visual effects you see on Instagram, InShot makes it easy. For those shooting Instagram videos, vertical orientation is better than horizontal. The latter is better for YouTube.
- Drones/GoPro: Don’t forget drones and GoPro, but be mindful that countries have different regulations on the use of drones.
Tips on Productivity
- Sneller said to use social media with “intention” to avoid “wasteful scrolling.” It’s a simple ratio: Create > Consume. Put a posting calendar together and stick to it. Watch and study experts like “TheLoversPassport” on Instagram.
- Lastly, original photos tend to perform better on Google than stock photos. Sneller referred to Pinterest as a search engine for photos, which I hadn’t heard before. I now have a new appreciation for Pinterest.
The Afternoon Sessions
A choice had to be made about afternoon sessions, too. Here I share a few notes from the sessions I sat in on:
Issues & Opportunities in The New World of Travel
Pauline Frommer, Jeff Greenwald, Sivani Balou, Jonathan Hahn, & Don George
The message for travel writers was to embrace their role as bridges between cultures, using their platforms to highlight positive stories, political issues, and local voices. While the news media may focus on negative narratives, travel writers can offer a more empathetic, curious, and community-driven perspective.
Listening to diverse global voices and addressing issues thoughtfully can counter social media’s isolating effects and foster collective understanding.
- There’s a lot of immigration due to environmental change or strife. Travel writers/photographers become the bridge. The best editors are empathetic. (Don George/Conference Chair)
- Major newspapers publish negative coverage because that’s what people want. “In travel, we have a gift, and we can write about the positive.” (Pauline Frommer/Frommer Media)
- “The piece missing in journalism is the nuance…We need to be listening to the voices around the world.” (Sivani Babu/Hidden Compass)
- Curiosity (not just empathy) is essential, too. Look for an issue when you travel. (Jeff Greenwald/Ethical Traveler)
- Social media trains us to be active in silos. Gather and mobilize as a community. Look what happened in Bangladesh. (Jonathan Hahn/Sierra Magazine)
Tim Cahill In The Spotlight
Tim Cahill is a clever writer. His books are filled with humor and vivid prose, and he has a gift for storytelling. But as accomplished as he is, he still faces “the terror of the blank page.” How does Cahill push through it? And how does he remember the details? Here are a few of his tips:
- Cahill takes notes in longhand and reads them before he goes to sleep to commit them to memory. He finds that he misses follow-up questions with voice recorders.
- You don’t know what you will write about until you begin.
- The first 20 minutes are what Cahill calls “priming the pump.” We think, “Gee if I just had one more day.”
- Break up scenes that might be part of “the crux.” Put them in different places.
- Make a note about possible endings. You might put your best scene toward the end, and the second best scene might be upfront.
One of the many things I admire about Cahill is that he is a stickler for the facts and never makes things up. When someone asked him if he might write a memoir one day, he replied: “I’m extremely careful with my facts. I might exaggerate for humor, but you know it’s humor. The idea of a memoir scares him. “If a memory is not intact, I would worry I had invalidated everything I had ever written.”
He’s conscientious to a fault. It bothers him if someone writes about having an epiphany at the top of a mountain. “If you have an epiphany, it’s later,” he said. “This is why I prefer to write in the past tense.”
For my review of Cahill’s Pass The Butterworms see Journeys In Travel Literature.
Navigating The World of AI
Sivani Babu, Pauline Frommer, Bri Sneller & Elizabeth Lasley (Moderator)
Generative artificial intelligence is reshaping the travel writing market, offering helpful tools while posing competitive challenges and raising ethical questions about authenticity and originality. Sneller called it theft.
Pauline Frommer said Amazon is flooded with AI-generated travel guidebooks that scrape information off the web. She mentioned a travel guidebook on France, authored by a mysterious “Mike Steves,” who vaguely sounds like Rick Steves but isn’t. The New York Times quoted Frommer and the real Rick Steves on this seemingly fake author in an investigative piece entitled “A New Frontier for Travel Scammers: A.I.-Generated Guidebooks.” The NYT could find no information on Mike Steves and concluded the book, author, and photo were AI-generated.
Meanwhile, Frommer noted that Google’s new AI-generated summaries also reduced book sellers’ revenues due to fewer click-throughs.
Sivani Babu, a former public defender and now Co-founder and co-CEO of Hidden Compass, worries that journalism will act out of fear over AI and fail to establish AI policies and guidelines. “We do need government regulation, but it won’t save the credibility of journalists.” She advises writers to read their contracts with publications carefully.
Catherine Karnow's Cambodia Presentation
I attended several other great panels (tips on pitching publications from the editors themselves), filmmaking, and Catherine Karnow’s photo presentation on Cambodia. Karnow’s photos of the people, particularly the amputees who stepped on land mines still buried in the country, touched my heart.
I reported on the raging Cambodian insurgencies from 1985 to 1990 for Defense & Foreign Affairs magazine, so it’s hard for me to visualize Cambodia as a tourist destination. I deeply admire Karnow’s efforts to document the ravages of the post-Pol Pot era. Karnow has two photo workshops with gastronomy tours in Vietnam and Cambodia planned for later this year.
My Conference Take-Aways
My biggest takeaway from the conference is that now more than ever, writing travel stories with local empathy and a journalist’s sharp focus on the pressing issues is not just important—it’s essential.
The once-mythical Timbuktu is just a plane ride away. Isn’t it time we returned to the lost art of “writing down the country?”
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