How to keep blogging once you're #rtwnow

This entry is mostly geared towards a group of people known to me as “those #rtwsoon people.”  #rtwsoon is a “tag” used by twatters on twitter who are preparing for their ‘round the world (RTW) trip and are looking to share and absorb advice from their peers and those already on the road.  Unfortunately, I was already RTW when this hashtag was created, so in an attempt to rebel, I created #rtwnow which hasn’t taken off nearly as much, but hopefully will gain some street cred once more of those #rtwsoon people go on their trips already!

Anyway, being nosey, I listen in on the #rtwsoon conversations even though I’m not in the club, and one of the most recently voiced concerns has been over the frequency and ability to continue blogging and tweeting once you people are on the road. 

I started this whole travel blog thing after I started traveling almost 3 years ago (wow!).  And the transition for me was quite easy.  I didn’t do much preparation, a couple pre-trip posts, a new blog host (moved from LiveJournal.com to Off Exploring – which I mentioned in my post on travel blog platforms a couple days ago) and a promise to my mother that I would post EVERY day while I was gone.  That didn’t seem like a huge promise at the time, as I had been blogging almost daily on my LiveJournal and saw no reason why I couldn’t keep it up.

Enters the Eiffel Tower, Colloseum and crappy internet café bandwidth. Suddenly, I realized how daunting the task was going to be.  But I did it.  For 2.5 months, I backpacked around Europe and I published a blog entry every single day I was there. 

So how did I do it?

Set realistic goals
What are you trying to get out of your blog?  Are you trying to make an income? Are you trying to keep your family informed? Are you trying to keep a good travelogue to scrapbook when you get home? If you are trying to blog, or write, as an income, either solely or in part, you need to take into consideration the expectation of your readers and the devastating blow (ok, maybe a bit dramatic) your site ranking can take with a drop off in content.  Don’t believe me? Take a look at your site visits on average on days when you don’t post a new blog entry. If you’re keeping a blog to keep your friends and family informed, blogging frequently may still be at the top of your list.  My mom generally freaked her pants off if I didn’t write every 26 hours. But some people may be more comfortable posting weekly or even less frequently.  And if your blogging solely for your own personal nostalgia, then this is more of a question of how much detail you want to retain in your posts and how insanely long you prefer your posts to be.

Set aside time every [insert time period] to blog
Once you decide how often you want to post, getting it done is as simple as setting aside time and sticking to it.  I found that it was easiest to blog between 5 and 8 PM.  By that point, you’ve gotten most of your daily sightseeing completed and it’s around dinner time, which means the hostels are not bustling with the “let’s go out!” crowd just yet.  Keep in mind that from the time you start looking for an internet, get paid and signed on, check your e-mail and pump out a blog post, you’re talking at least an hour.  The less frequently you post, the more this time block increases.  For me, if I stuck to my 1 blog post a day, I could crank out the details of the previous night and the day in about 45 minutes.  This didn’t include time to upload pictures (which to me, was a secondary activity).  At this point in my life, blogging was not an priority, purely a travelogue and a way to keep in touch with my family and I had no interest in talking about anything besides what I had experienced in the past day or so.  

Don’t be afraid to change your mind
I do not blog on a daily basis anymore.  Mostly because my travel plans are not nearly as aggressive as they once were.  I used to travel for a couple of days in each city and so I had plenty of content to crank out a blog entry every day.  Now, if I were to do the same, my blog would be plagued with entries that started out “Well, I slept in until noon, walked to the coffee shop, read the newspaper and then worked on my [blog/website/tan/beer gut].” Not so interesting. So my blogging style has changed as my travel style has.  Now I focus more on finding specific things about a city and diving into them.  That takes a bit more planning and a bit more time to write. So I’m lucky if I get a blog entry out every 3 days – and I’m ok with that.

Be prepared
Ok, here comes the Girl Scout in me, but it’s a pretty obvious afterthought that I must throw out there.  Will you spend time out of your day hunting for an internet café or will you only post if you have a laptop? Do you forget people’s names 30 seconds after introduction? I cannot blog without a notebook.  My Moleskin is my best friend and it knows more secrets about me than I even remember.  But it also helps me remember what the hell I did last night after my brain is overloaded from 100 paintings at the Louvre.  I can, however, blog perfectly fine without a computer, and have done it well for years.  I only brought my laptop on this most recent journey so I could work on some graphic design and back home IT consulting while I travel – not for blogging – and I’m finding that it doesn’t impact me much to have it. I’ve actually blogged less in the past 3 months than I have, well, in history.

Basically, know yourself, and know what you’re actually capable of and more importantly, what you actually want to do.  Arm yourself with the correct tools (I prefer to hunt with a shotgun, but you may be a crossbow kinda gal).  Don’t be afraid to change your mind. And don’t push yourself.  A quote I saw once in an article about writing said "Don't ride a bike with the brakes on." If blogging is keeping you from doing what you came to do (i.e. travel) then it’s not worth it.  You must maintain equilibrium in your nomadic lifestyle and your tendency to hole up in front of a computer for several hours a day.

So don’t give me that “it can’t be done” crap. Just set your priorities and get 'er done.