Blogging | Hole In The Donut Cultural Travel

Free Photo eBook – Around the World with 40 Lonely Planet Bloggers – Available for Download

Published May 3, 2011 | By Barbara Weibel

Around the World with 40 Lonely Planet Bloggers

Nearly a year in the making, the new photography ebook “Around the World with 40 Lonely Planet Bloggers” is finally a reality. As one of the 40 bloggers featured in the book I am happy to be able to offer my readers a free copy.

New readers can receive the ebook by subscribing to receive an email each time I publish an article on Hole In The Donut. Simply fill out the form in the right-hand sidebar and click on the “subscribe” button. A follow-up email will contain a link that must be clicked to confirm the subscription. Once confirmed, a final email will provide a link to download the ebook. Readers who are already subscribed will automatically receive an email with a link that will allow the ebook to be downloaded.

This first ever joint effort by Lonely Planet BlogSherpas, as they are called, features photos of almost 70 countries, taken by bloggers who are experts in travel modes ranging from family to solo to couples travel; expat living to long-term and perpetual travel; others who specialize in adventure; and even those who focus on a particular destination or region. The gathering of this eclectic group of travel experts was born out of Lonely Planet’s effort to broaden content for their audience. They sought to shine a light on the very best writing and photography around the globe by importing articles published by top travel bloggers into destination pages of Lonely Planet’s website.

Our ebook was spearheaded by Todd Wassel, who has been on the road more than ten years and publishes the popular travel blog Todd’s Wanderings. After a few years of vagabonding Wassel could not conceive of a 9 to 5 job in an office, so he created a career as an international conflict resolution specialist for the United Nations, which requires him to move every few months to hot spots around the world. Wassel is indicative of the creative solutions that the 40 featured BlogSherpas have employed to pursue lives of travel.

Aside from being a stunning collection of photos, “Around the World with 40 Lonely Planet Bloggers” is an ideal read for anyone seeking suggestions for summer travel. Please accept it as my gift to wanderlusters everywhere.

Posted in ebooks |

Tagged bloggers, Blogging, cultural travel, culture, ebooks, free, Lonely Planet, photography, photos, Travel |

12 Comments

Meeting Up With Old and New Friends While Traveling ‘Round the World

Published October 15, 2010 | By Barbara Weibel

I met Dr. Fauziah Ahmad in 2007, during my first ever round-the-world trip. We happened to be on the same city tour of Hanoi, Vietnam, and bonded when we had to fight to get a portion of our money back because the tour operator failed to deliver on promises to take us to see the Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum. We later attended a performance at the Water Puppet Theater, followed by dinner, at the end of which we exchanged contact information and she invited me to visit her in Penang, should I ever make it to Malaysia.

Dr. Fauziah Ahmad and husband, Ahmad Shukri Yahaya

Over the years we’d exchanged a few emails, but hadn’t been in regular contact, so I held off contacting her until I knew for sure my arrival dates. Once I had arrived and recovered from my horrible experience in China, I emailed to let her know I was in Penang. Realizing it was short notice, I told her I’d understand if she didn’t have time to get together, but I underestimated the bonds of friendship made during travel.

The following week, Fauziah arrived at my guest house and whisked me away to her home for the night, where she set me up in her guest room and introduced me to her lovely family. But that was only the beginning; she had plans for me…

Sitting in on student's practice presentation to Dr. Fauziah Ahmad

Fauziah is a geotechnical engineer specializing in soil stability, landslides, and ground improvement, and a full professor at the Universiti Sains Malaysia (Malaysia University of Science). She had timed my visit to coincide with the Hari Raya Adilfitri, one of the high Muslim Continue reading →

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Posted in SE Asia travel |

Tagged Around The World, bloggers, Blogging, cultural travel, culture, Friends, Malaysia, Penang, round the world travel, Travel, tribe |

14 Comments

Finding My Tribe Through World Travel

Published May 8, 2010 | By Barbara Weibel

Lonely Planet Blogsherpa

For most of my life, I felt like I didn’t belong. In elementary school, I was chubby, had crooked teeth and crossed eyes, and my mother, God bless her, permed my hair into a ridiculous frizzy mass. They called me four eyes and probably lots of other names I never knew about. In high school I was nearly two years younger than everyone else because I’d been moved ahead twice – being one of the “eggheads” certainly didn’t help my popularity. Throughout my adult life I had great business success, but never liked what I did for a living. Certainly, I had friends, but I always felt like there was a huge, gaping hole in my life. It wasn’t until I left the corporate life to pursue my true passions of world travel, writing, and photography that I found my true calling. I finally found my “tribe.”

About a year ago, that tribe grew exponentially when Lonely Planet invited me to join its Blogsherpa program, which imports content from member blogs to the Lonely Planet website. When visitors to the LP website search for information on a particular travel destination, they can now also read posts from Blogsherpa bloggers that refer to that destination. It was a great concept – tie a commercial site to people who are actually out there on the road, traveling the world.

Then something miraculous started to happen. Lonely Planet bloggers began to band together. A simple proposal to exchange links quickly evolved into plans to interview one another on our various blogs and publish a book about our collective world travel experiences. In the midst of all these wonderfully creative ideas, one Blogsherpa member created a special website – a Squidoo lens – where the content from all of our blogs is imported. Travel junkies can now read world travel posts from Lonely Planet’s top notch bloggers in one easy place.

Finally, I feel like I belong. I’ve found my tribe and I’m thrilled to be able to share it with all my readers.

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Posted in Travel General |

Tagged bloggers, Blogging, blogsherpa, independent, Lonely Planet, Squidoo, Travel, tribe, world travel |

24 Comments

Meeting American Expats in Mazatlan

Published March 6, 2010 | By Barbara Weibel

I’d been in Mazatlan, Mexico for exactly one day when I received an email from Nancy Dardarian. She and her husband are American expats from the Seattle area who retired to Mazatlan more than two years ago. When they first started thinking about moving permanently to Mexico, Nancy and Paul launched a blog, Countdown to Mexico, in order to chronicle the entire decision making and relocation process. Not only is it a great resource for anyone considering moving to Mexico, it’s full of the most interesting information about Mazatlan.

Nancy and Paul Dardarian, Mazatlan, Mexico

But here’s the fun part. Nancy has Google alerts set up to email her when anyone writes about Mazatlan, so when my first blog post appeared about her adopted city, she read it and emailed, asking if I would be staying long enough to get together. They picked me up at my hotel last Sunday and treated me to lunch at one of the beach palapas along the Malecon – the traditional Ceviche they served me was so huge I could hardly finish half of it. Even better, they invited another expat friend, Michael, to join us for lunch, because they knew of my plans to hike Mexico’s remote Copper Canyon and Michael has hiked it twice. As a result I now have a remarkable amount of information about Copper Canyon – the kind of stuff that can’t even be found on the Internet. Serendipitous events like this aren’t uncommon; they happen to me all the time when I travel slow, without plans, and allow the path to unfold before me.

One thing is for sure. It’s definitely a small world out there.

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Posted in Mexico travel |

Tagged Americans, bloggers, Blogging, community, countdowntomexico.com, Dardarian, expat, Mazatlan, Mexico, Nancy, Paul, small world, Travel |

35 Comments

Passports With Purpose Breaks My Silence

Published December 3, 2009 | By Barbara Weibel

Between moving out of Sarasota and traveling for the Thanksgiving holiday, I have been somewhat silent for the past two weeks. But things are settling down now and I can’t think of a better reason to get back into the swing than to tell you about a wonderful charity effort being mounted by my fellow travel writers through Passports With Purpose.

This year, the Passports with Purpose fund raising effort is supporting American Assistance for Cambodia (AAfC), an independent, nonprofit organization dedicated to improving opportunities for the youth and rural poor in Cambodia, with a goal of raising $13,000 to build a school. In order to achieve this goal, travel bloggers have either personally donated prizes or arranged for companies to donate prizes. These items are then raffled off online, with each $10 donation entering the donor into a drawing for the prize of his or her choice.

Smiling children like this little girl hawk merchandise on the streets all day rather than attending school

I know first hand how much this is needed in Cambodia. When I visited the country in 2007, I was particularly struck by droves of children who roamed the streets, carrying baskets heaped with hand-made jewelry or toting hand-woven mats twice their size. Without exception, they interspersed pesky sales pitches and arm tugs with the few words of English they knew:

“Hello, where you from?”

“U.S.A.”

“Oh, U.S.A., A-Number one. President George Bush; capitol Washington, D.C.”

These children, some of them barely old enough to be left alone, much less on the streets all day selling merchandise, seemed desperate to learn. I can think of no better way to celebrate the holidays than to help build a school for these lovely children.

If you wish to join me in supporting this worthy cause, check out the list of prizes being offered at Passports With Purpose. Select the drawings you’d like to enter and indicate how many $10 donations you want to make for each prize. For example, I entered “3″ in the box to the right of the $100 Amazon.com gift card donated by Continue reading →

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Posted in Contests |

Tagged Blogging, Cambodia, charity, Children, donation, fund raiser, Passports With Purpose, school, travel bloggers |

20 Comments

Hole In The Donut Nominated For Travel Blog Award – Help Me Win!

Published August 29, 2009 | By Barbara Weibel

I’ve just been notified that Hole In The Donut has once again been nominated for a “Love This Site” Award in the travel blog category at Divine Caroline. I was nominated last year as well and placed 10th; this year I’d love to be in the top three. To vote for Hole In The Donut as the best travel blog, go to DivineCaroline.com or click on theÂ Divine Carline badge in the right-hand sidebar. You must be registered to vote, but joining is free. Thanks in advance for your support!