Not always easy: writing a family travel blog | The Family Without Borders

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Not always easy: writing a travel blog

Bloggin at night in Antigua (Guatemala)

Bloggin at night in Antigua (Guatemala)

Running our blog brings us a lot of fun and great energy from our readers. But everybody is complaining why the posts appear so seldom. Let me tell the story why.

So imagine you sit in this Maya mountain village or between this super-interesting Zapatistas community or just on the beach with a drummer from Belize and you talk. Thanks to our blond, and very exotic for locals, girls – we are “in the group” very easily and very fast. So we sit and talk. And we try to notice, hear, smell – as much as we can.

Not alone

But imagine that at the same time you have with you: 2,5-year-old Hanna, who is not able to sit even for a minute and 1-year-old Mila, who tries to walk around everywhere and who tries to eat everything she finds. And what you (hopefully) notice is that your kid doesn’t jump into the river in too deep place and that you baby doesn’t eat a spider walking by. And what you hear is: “mummy, look, monkey!! mummy, look, a boy with a ball!! mummy, why this? mummy, why that?”. Or what you hear is: “mamamamam, mniam mniam mniam”. And what you smell is.. I mean, every parent knows what you can smell with kids around.

So you want to be a nice parent, who explains the world to his kids and who changes nappies when it’s needed. And at the same time you want to be a journalist, a reporter, a photographer. You want to lead the discussion, ask fast questions, make pictures in a right time. And when the people finally feel relaxed, when they are open and trust you, when the sun light is just perfect… your Hanna has to pee. Or your Mila would like to walk after this dog, which left the garden some minutes ago.

Yeah. What I want to tell you is that already collecting material for the blog – is not always easy. You need to have at least one hand free to make notes or to make a picture. That was a bit easier during our first trip: around the Black Sea, only with Hanna (because Mila was still not with us). We could change a bit, Hanna was sleeping a bit. Two babies are… not a one baby!

Not during a day

And when you already have your notes and your pictures downloaded – next step is to find time to prepare everything for being published. Time for that we have only in the late evenings, when our girls are sleeping. Evenings here come quite early:  between five or six it is dark outside and we have a place to stay for a night. At some river or in the mountains. But it doesn’t mean that our girls are going to bed. Usually all the evening games, reading books, cooking together and eating takes some hours. And after those very intensive days in Central America – when the girls are finally sleeping, we… basically could sleep too.

But no no no, blog is fun and not only parents are waiting for new posts! So if we are still a bit alive and if we remembered to load the laptops’ batteries – at night there is our blogging time. Coffee and chocolate are needed, good if it’s not raining (not so comfy to sit on our bed in the car) and nice if there are not too many mosquitoes. We try every evening at least to make a selection of pictures and delete those which are not needed. If we wouldn’t do that regularly, we would get totally lost in all the files. After the selection – depending on the energy we have – we go to bed or work further:

Because one our laptop broke – only one person can do something at the same time (me-writing or Tom-editing pics). And then I write, put all the information together: about how are we, how are the girls, where were we, who did we meet, what is the story behind, where the person comes from, when, why… (And I never know how much of what you – readers want to read.)

Working on our travel blog in a Cafe

Ok: the post is written, pictures are edited, ordered, subtitled and ready for being published. Then only internet is needed. Easy, isn’t it?

Not online

But this can take a while – to find an internet cafe with something more than cafe. Sometimes takes some hours, sometimes takes some days. When we found a place – one of us has to play with kids and second one is uploading. And uploading. And uploading. And if all luckily works – we are done. Then just an sms to grandparents – that they can watch new pictures of girls online.

And then? And then we just like every of your “likes” : – )))

This post is also available in: Polish


Our first book is out!

We have published our first book (for now just in Polish:) about our Central America Trip.
See, read and order here »

10 Comments

  • Posted February 20, 2012 at 21:46 | Permalink

    Oh, stop whining already, would you…?!?! I bet there are thousands of people who would love to have that kind of problems… Where do you think the “likes” are coming from…;-)

    Great pictures! Have fun!

    Reply
  • Posted February 20, 2012 at 21:59 | Permalink

    Dear Family wihout Borders,
    we love to read your blog frequently. Infact, at the moment. We are travelling with our 8-month-old daughter through Singapore, Australia & New Zealand and are writing a Travelblog, too. So we feel quite similar to your situation to keep the blog updated (for friends, readers and especially for grandparents).
    We hope, you have a nice and safe further trip with your sweet daughters. greetins from Auckland, Sarah, Julian & Alejandra

    Reply
  • Posted February 24, 2012 at 14:19 | Permalink

    Hallo! Ich finde eure Abenteuer sehr interessant, die Bilder gefallen mir und durch den Blog versuche ich noch Englisch zu lernen ;) Ich folge euch seit ihr in Schwarzes Meer gereist seid. Ich kann mich gut vorstellen wie gleichzeitig Internet zu finden, gut reisen, einen gut Aufenthalt haben, so viel wie möglich lernen, was ihr seht, und gute Eltern für die beide süße Schönheit sein, schwer ist!
    Ihr seid verstanden und entschuldigt :)
    Elle
    (ich lerne noch immer Deutsch, entschuldige meine Fehler )

    Reply
  • Bianca Buhl
    Posted March 4, 2012 at 21:40 | Permalink

    Hello you four! All the troubles are definitely worth it! I love looking at your blog and thinking about you and your great adventures. Keep posting :) x Bianca

    Reply
  • Posted December 1, 2013 at 03:13 | Permalink

    Sounds hectic but fun also if I have to imagine travels with my lovely kids.., keep us posted on their adventures too.love to read that!

    Reply
  • Kirsten Milne
    Posted July 1, 2014 at 02:16 | Permalink

    Hello/Kia Ora from New Zealand!
    I just found your post/blog and wanted to say hi because in 2012 we were also traveling in Guatemala for 4 months with our 4 kids! I wish we had met you because we didn’t really see anyone else with children (except maybe in a few tourist places). I felt like we were ‘watching our backs’ (not so safe) but I still really loved Guatemala. I agree the chicken bus drivers are crazy haha. We traveled to quite a lot of ‘not tourist’ places which was so cool but it was also nice to go back to Antigua or Atitlan or Xela and find a great coffee or cafe. It was such a beautiful country and we got to make friends with some locals and I would love to go back some day! I absolutely understand you not being able to blog much because of the internet being a bit unreliable and also how busy it is with children too. I think you have done a marvelous job! As we say in NZ ‘Ka Pai!’ (Can mean various things but in this case it means ‘well done/great job’)
    P.S There are HEAPS/MANY places in New Zealand that are wild and free-I can’t believe you didn’t find any!!!!!!!!!!????Very weird. There are so many places even where I live where you can be the only person on the beach for miles for example, or walking a forest trail with absolutely no-one around-and I am in the more populated North Island!
    Enjoy your travels :-)

    Reply
  • jadegraham
    Posted December 17, 2015 at 21:00 | Permalink

    There’s an incredible police presence everywhere you go, which is oddly reassuring. cheap flights to pakistan

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  • Posted July 19, 2016 at 10:44 | Permalink

    Your blog is really interesting. Your language is simple and pretty. I love that.

    Reply
  • Posted December 2, 2016 at 07:59 | Permalink

    Hello you four! All the troubles are definitely worth it! I love looking at your blog and thinking about you and your great article
    thanks

    Reply

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