Top 10 Twitter Travel Tips
The Top 10 Twitter Travel Tips
Love it, loathe it or have no idea what the hell IT is ‐ Twitter is an influence that’s blazing through the indie traveller circles faster than the greased up pork joint falling off the flag pole at the beginning of La Tomatina. It’s being hailed as the Trip Advisor du jour with instant updates from across the planet, allowing you guys to keep track of the best destination ideas, travel tips, money saving hints, last minute airway sales and much more. With so much information flying around it can be intimidating at the get go, so here’s a handy collection of tips about where to start, who to follow and what you can get out of it.
- Where Do I Begin?
I asked myself this very same question about two weeks ago when everyone kept saying I should: “Twitter” instead of e‐mail, which apparently is now out of favour. Not wanting to look like a technical dinosaur I tentatively dropped twitter.com into my browser and fortunately the sign up process isn’t too much of a time consuming pain in the ass. You just fill in your name, the user name you want to appear as online and click through. After the usual activation e‐mail is sent out you’re good to start sculpting your profile. From here think of it as Facebook with everything except the status updates and the messaging service, stripped away.
- Where Did All This Start?
Twitter is the brain baby of Jack Dorsey, Noah Glass, Biz Stone, and Evan Williams. It kicked off in March 2006 and after several company names and technical evolutions, today it’s the third most popular social networking website ‐ after Facebook and MySpace of course. According to the source of all almost accurate online knowledge (Wikipedia) ‐ Twitter: “enables its users to send and read other users' updates known as tweets. Tweets are text‐based posts of up to 140 bytes in length.” So in essence, mini blogs without the stress of setting up your own website! Further to that, you can tweet through internet browser plug ins (it makes it look like an MSN Messenger pop up), Tweetie on iPhone and iPod Touch, and many more convenient, procrastinating platforms.
- What’s The Etiquette?
So on Facebook you have to accept friend requests but on Twitter people can follow your status updates at the click of a button. You can of course lock down your profile but doing so means you won’t show up in as many searches. So if you’re going to give Twitter a go, keep it social and don’t lock down. Controlling the calibre of people who follow you however is whole different kettle of fish because your tweeting clique obviously reflects on you. Make a point of going through your followers every week or so and blocking the hanger‐on‐ers, who only add you for the sake of it. As for getting the best twitter travel tips, the following few pointers showcase the best travel advice gurus that I’ve come across on Twitter so far.
- Craig Martin
Craig is an international adventurer who set off from New Zealand with his wife in 2006 and never looked back. Since then the pair have travelled through more than 40 different countries and they’ve shared their experiences, their advice and their unique point of view on the world at every step of the journey. Better yet these experiences have turned into Podcasts, Blogs, Facebook pages, Flickr accounts and best of all ‐ a good old book, called Travelling Europe. This is jam packed with on the road advice about who to go to first for advice, the best times to hit a country and how you can have the experience of a lifetime on a shoe string budget! Craig very recently won the Lonely Planet award for Best Travel Podcast ‐ so you can’t really argue with such an authority now can you? You can get to know Craig better by seeing what he had to say in this month’s Interview Time feature, by reading the April extract from Travelling Europe or by checking out his Twitter profile ‐ twitter.com/craig_martin
- Luke Ford ‐ whltravel
A lot of people throw the term: “responsible travel” around like they know what it means or in a more cut throat fashion, they know what it’ll mean for them in the good PR stakes. What I like about whltravel is that he cuts through all that and pairs locally owned and operated travel types (the momma and pappa businesses) with an ethical audience who want to travel and experience a real taste of where they land. In other words ‐ you guys! Mr Ford writes some very informed, travel writing words of wisdom about events like Earth Day, coming up on April 22, 2009. This annual event brings together organisations from around the planet to brainstorm and act on an issue that’s very close to whltravel’s heart ‐ sustainable tourism. You can of course find out more on Twitter!
- Wanderluster
Not to be mistaken with British Travel Mag Wanderlust, Wanderluster is a web writer who focuses on female travel in a similar fashion to that of our regular female backpacker, E‐zine instalment ‐ Beauty Terrorist. The person behind the name is the very lovely Beth Whitman who not only authors Wanderlust and Lipstick guides for female travellers, but is also Editor‐in‐Chief of wanderlustandlipstick.com. Her rather groovy tip offs have included the Timbuck2 Hidden backpack, a compact carry bag that I reckon can double as a larger version of a money belt on your travels. Stuffing this two shoulder strap over your front and under your clothes might make you look a couple of sizes bigger than you are, but I think it’s a great new security tip off and I’m giving two nights of free accommodation at any St Christopher’s Inn, to the first person to put this into action and e‐mail the proof to editor@st‐christophers.com ! I digress but twitter.com/Wanderluster is a great one to follow for the ladies.
- madtravelmag
The big attraction of this Twitter beauty is that the guys behind it pay travel writers to share their experiences. I kid you not. All you have to do is sign up for their online community (before the critics jump in ‐ it’s free) and go through the submission process. Said process is a wee bit drawn out but if you’re a dedicated disciple of the travel writing craft, you won’t even notice. Madtravelmag.com is still in the testing stages but the principles of this, just like their highly informed travel tweets, are sound, bringing you up to date advice from people who are living in the areas that you want to travel to. Favourite travel topics from these guys have included a rather lucid guide about how it’s possible to get it on in a hostel and how you can avoid or repel the evil hunters that are sandflies! twitter.com/madtravelmag is a definite favourite of mine on Twitter.
- stchostels
That’s right ‐ St Christopher’s Inns are on Twitter and I’m going to plug them shamelessly because this particular social networking outlet is a great way to stay in touch with you guys, see what kind of time you had, share e‐zine features ‐ like this very top 10, our top five books of the month and the free extracts from Lonely Planet, and also link you guys with the cool and current goings on that we learn about from our buddies on the same site. It’s like one big happy family! Nauseating platitudes aside we also like to make sure that you guys get the most up to date info about saving your hard earned travel pennies ‐ by booking online and we make sure you get something back for free ‐ like this E‐zine. It goes out on the first Wednesday of every month and it’s jam packed with free event guides for the St Christopher’s cities and much more.
- nationalexpress
Britain is famous for ripping off it’s unsuspecting tourists with stupendously high train fares and confusing rules about when you can travel, and with what ticket. Getting hold of someone to explain how to get the cheapest fares and when you’re allowed to use them is a whole different and rather angry battlefield, which is why I like that Britain’s biggest private train service has a Twitter‐er who responds to all enquiries and doesn’t just pawn people off with a link to the home page. The tip offs about when super cheap advance ticket are going to go live online are a thing of beauty too! Did you know for example that you can travel from London to Newcastle and back for as little as £28, just by cruising nationalexpresseastcoast.com and chatting with their discount reps at any staffed station? Crazy good times. Check out twitter.com/nationalexpress
- holymolydotcom
So this follow isn’t travel related per say but it is a guilty little pleasure that’ll keep you distracted from the mundane trials of plane delays, baggage being lost and trampy travellers who insist on having sex or snoring in your shared dorm. Holy Moly has become THE big thing in internet gossip and their tweets range from the dirtiest breaking secrets to the highly entertaining commentaries about the latest adventures in Pot Noodles and office politics. It’s fun silliness with a razor sharp wit or two to boot.
‐ Rob Savage
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