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When you’ve got wanderlust in your soul and a pen in your hand, it makes sense to use one to fund the other. If you want to have adventures criss-crossing the globe, it’s ideal if you can use your travels to finance all those plane tickets. Travel writing can be a good option: if you can get across why you wanted to see Nepal, Argentina or anywhere else on your list of places to see, it can make for a solid living.
Defining A ‘Solid Living’
While you can find publications willing to hire you full-time to travel the world, such jobs are getting harder to find every day. However, there’s quite a few freelance travel writing opportunities out there. Because they’re a little easier to find — and land — I’m planning to focus my posts for the next month on the specifics of freelance travel writing.
When I say you can make a solid living, I’m not suggesting that you’ll get rich as a travel writer. If you put in plenty of hours and have great writing skills, though, $60,000 isn’t out of the question. How far that $60,000 goes is up to you. If you’re backpacking in Southeast Asia, you’re going to have one hell of a nest egg when you’re ready for retirement. But if you’d rather stay in swanky hotels in London and Paris, that money won’t stretch nearly so far.
That $60,000 assumes that you’re working full-time — and that you’ve been at it for a couple of years. You’re probably not going to make nearly that amount the first year or two of your travel writing career.
Do You Need $60K?
Depending on what your travel goals are, you might not actually need that much money, which allows you to make some decisions about priorities. If you’re living somewhere with a significantly lower cost of living than the U.S, but you’re still pitching U.S. markets, you may be able to exist comfortably on a few hours worth of work a week. That can sound particularly good if you really want a lot of extra time to explore. Such a strategy doesn’t really guarantee that you’ll wind up with a lot in the bank, though.
The money you can earn from travel writing, once you get past the question of writing skills, depends almost entirely on how much time you’re willing to spend on it.
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Comments
07.05.09
I've been making a full-time living out of freelance travel writing for 20 years, but I have to say it's getting a whole lot tougher out there. Like many other writers, I'm moving my work onto the web and earlier this year launched a travel website called 101 Holidays.
However, I also offer a free travel writing clinic for aspiring writers, so if you think you've got what it takes, feel free to contact me.
01.12.10
It’s very difficult as the competition is immense, especially with bloggers who write for free. Best to do it as an additional side job unless you are capable of exceptional writing.
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