World Travelers and Travel-bloggers Come Together In the Worldwide Web

Let me take a little bit of detour in my travel blog. When I first decided to be a traveler, I already had my sights fixed on world travel. I thought it would be best to take one little step at a time, visiting places within my own country, then in the Southeast Asian region, expanding to the whole continent of Asia, and to the rest of the world.

Out of my passion to travel, I’ve put them into writing, another fervor that I have. Wanting to immortalize my travels, not just with photos, I started writing about them. And with my eagerness to share these experiences, I created a travel blog. In fact, I tried making several travel blogs until I decided to make this one my official and regular blog.

From there, I became part of the Lonely Planet world as I enrolled under their blogsherpa program, wherein they RSS my posts in their site. I wasn’t after the money (which I am now starting to ponder on) but on the joy of sharing my experiences through my blog posts.

Never have I thought that I’d meet online several travelers who share the same passions as I have. The Lonely Planet blogsherpa was like our crossroad where we all converged. From different parts of the world, travelers have come together online, all embarking on world travel. Somewhere, somehow, our paths would cross again, whether on the road or in the virtual world.

Our meeting points were on Google groups, Twitter, Facebook, Stumble Upon, and recently, Squidoo. It’s fun to read the posts of all these blogsherpas in one site. And for those who enjoy armchair traveling, you can conquer the world while all these people do the physical work for you.

I’d say that this is a first-time experience for me as a traveler – to be able to belong to a travel group. And though we don’t travel together, it’s like having a companion in each one of them. I feel like I go with them as I read their blogs. Whenever I come home after a trip, I’d eagerly compose my story so I can share it with the rest.

It’s time for me to embark on a new journey. Keep watch of my recent adventures. And also the sojourns of other blogsherpas. Join us as we travel the world.

You would usually find our feeds at the lower left box of a particular place when you click on the destination pages in Lonely Planet. But it is no longer active and they were taken down.

*Update: The Lonely Planet Blogsherpa Program ended in 2012. It recently introduced a new opportunity for travel bloggers, called Pathfinders.