Today marks the 3rd anniversary of As We Travel – yes we started this blog way back on the 1st of Feb, 2010!

It feels like these past 3 years have gone by so quickly and yet we’ve experienced and learned so much since we started blogging – when we began this journey 3 years ago we never realised how much it would end up changing our lives and the decisions we made.

Who knew a blog could be life changing in such a way?

Today we want to take a moment to look back at our year and the things we’ve learned about ourselves, blogging and business, and what we’re most grateful for …

1) Learning Skills For Any Industry.

Sometimes there is just no short-cut, and you have to do things the hard way by learning from your mistakes – this year, we’ve done that more than ever before with the 3 new non-travel related websites and 2 iPhone apps we are working on.

But while we learned so many new things, we also realised just how much the knowledge and skills you get from travel blogging can be used in other industries online.

Next to the good old “make-money-blogging-bloggers” – travel bloggers are among the most internet-tech-savvy of bloggers, and it’s a great industry to learn new things which you can implement in other projects.

Techniques we take for granted or are over-used in travel blogging can be used to really push and promote your company websites to another level elsewhere.

2) Our YouTube Fans Are Awesome!

Among the things we’re most grateful for this year with AsWeTravel are our YouTube followers - if you are not following us on there yet, make sure you join us: www.youtube.com/AsWeTravel

After we released 50 travel videos in 2011 and 2012, it was a big anti-climax when nobody seemed interested in them on our blog – not many comments, not much appreciation – nothing … we thought the hard work of making these videos had been a massive waste of time.

But it turns out that good things sometimes take time.

Today we have over half a million views on YouTube, and 50,000 monthly viewers watching our videos – we love the crazy comments and wild discussions that our videos provoke, from laws about filming publicly to how you’re really supposed to drink Turkish coffee.

We have had TV channels from America, Canada, China, and Czech Republic reaching out to us wanting to use our video content on their official TV channels, and it’s really fun to see that people appreciate the effort we have put into them.

3) Every Path In Life Has Sacrifices. 

No matter what you do in life, there will always be sacrifices – there will be as many sacrifices if you choose to quit your 9 to 5 job as there will be if you choose to stay.

This isn’t something many people care to talk about – we live with this illusion that getting away from everything will cure every problem we have, when in fact leaving will often bring up even more problems than if you were to stay at home if you don’t understand the real cause.

During the last 3 years we have been tested over and over again if this life choice to travel and work the way we do really was the right decision to make – the amount of times we nearly decided to give it all up for a “morally-correct” job can’t be counted on our fingers.

The realisation that you will have to sacrifice things with any choice you make in life really helped us stay on track and continue to build what we have done.

It all comes down to what means more to you, and what you’re willing to let go of.

We chose an uncertain life over a safe path, and we have to deal with the consequences of that, but in the end it has all been worth it.

So we just wanted to say a BIG THANK YOU for following our blog and videos the last 3 years, and we look forward to sharing yet another few years with you all!

Many people, especially those on a competitive career path, are very hesitant about taking some time off to travel the world.

I’ve met people who say that they would love to travel the world for a year, and that they probably will – one day …

“One day, when I’ve finished studying”, “One day, when I’ve made it in my career”, “One day, when the kids grow up”,
“One day, when I retire”….

We both know that day will never come, because there will always be something in the way.

There is no right time to travel, which is why you should do it RIGHT NOW – we can’t live our whole lives dreaming about the future.

But what about that career? Won’t it look bad on my CV – having a whole year just blank?

Here are some tips on how to travel and still make it look good on your resume…

Volunteer Or Work

Taking a whole year off to volunteer will look very impressive on your CV, and you’ll have a great time doing it.

Besides, there are so many types of volunteer work that you might actually find something which will be directly related to the skills needed in your job.

This will show that you have an incredible passion and love for your work, care about others and aren’t afraid of hard work.

If you have training and work in health care, taking a year off for medical volunteering abroad will be both a rewarding as well as a beneficial experience for your career.

A more general but also very beneficial option is to teach English abroad. There are both jobs where you volunteer for free as well as jobs that actually pay you a salary.

That way you can work, but still have time left over to explore the country you’re in and enjoy the best it has to offer, be it on the weekends and afternoons.

Just Want To Travel?

If you’re not into volunteering or working abroad but just want to travel, then don’t lie about it on your CV and say you had a work experience when you didn’t.

Instead, be honest about it and put your gap year under “Other Experience”, including the dates.

This, however, doesn’t mean that your experience wasn’t important.

You learn a lot of skills from traveling, it’s just about putting it down the right way on paper.

If you learned how to bargain and haggle, you’ve learned some great “negotiation skills”.

The planning, financing and organization of your trip taught you “planning and budgeting”, and how to keep a record of your expenses.

Your unplanned situations, culture shocks, and how you dealt with them can be put down as “adaptability”, and you can write about how you cultivated great “language and communication skills” when communicating with people and overcoming language barriers.

Show Off The Blog

If you have a travel blog, it’s definitely something to include on your CV, and why not include the long list of skills you learned from maintaining your blog:

Website designing, php coding, networking, writing, SEO and social media skills are all very good and useful skills to include!

The Big No-No

Many companies like that their employees have taken a year off because it often means they’ve “done it” already and won’t be traveling again.

Don’t let on that you might be leaving for another big trip, even if you are…

For those of you who are doubting whether to take that year off to travel the world, I hope this article gave you a kick in the right direction, and for those who have just finished a big trip, I hope this helps with working out what to write on your CV.

It almost feels like a lifetime has passed since we started AsWeTravel.com exactly two years ago today – so much has happened in our lives since then.

Last year we posted a blog about some of the things we learned from our first year of blogging, in the hopes that you might learn something from our experiences as well.

This second year has been different in so many ways and we have learnt as much about travel blogging as we have about ourselves and the kind of life we want to lead.

Here are some of the main things we’ve learnt from our second year of travel blogging…

1) Limit Your Daily Time Online

During our first year of blogging we became obsessed with having internet access everywhere and being connected online all day every day.

During our second year we realized that the blog doesn’t ALWAYS need ”round the clock care”, it can take care of itself for most of the day – and, more importantly – many things you think you need to do can wait.

We realized that we were spending many more hours online than we actually needed – the work we had to do could have taken only a few hours, but we were messing around, working ineffectively which would result in us spending 6-8 hours instead.

By giving ourselves a deadline, or a time limit, we worked much more effectively, and gave ourselves more free time to explore the places we visited.

Decide how many hours you really need to spend online every day, and then only spend that time working.

2) Learn How To Separate Travel & Travel Blogging

When you travel full-time like we have for the last 2 years, it is very important to learn how to separate work and travel, then draw a clear line between the two.

Rather than sitting in a café or bar tweeting on your iPhone (for your blog) – sit back, relax and look around you – learn to enjoy the moments just as a traveler, not always as a travel blogger.

By always being connected with your iPhone, updating Twitter telling everyone where you are etc – you risk not actually enjoying the places you visit.

As a travel blogger, it is easy to lose yourself in work, and by always “looking for the story” you might actually miss it.

We noticed that when we disconnected and simply went out as travelers – the right story for the right city came to us by itself.

3) Ask & You Shall Receive

This year we’ve realized that if you want something – sponsored trips, free hotel stays, travel products to test etc – all you really need to do is ask.

After getting sponsored stays in over 30 hotels and hostels in the last year, and getting plenty of other sponsored attractions, passes and activities with tourism boards – we’ve realized that the worst that could happen is to simply get a ‘no’, and that shouldn’t put you off but instead push you to grow your site & connections even more.

The same goes for other things as well – if you tell yourself that you will reach a certain goal (monthly traffic, twitter followers, earnings etc) eventually you will find a way to achieve it – if you just trust and are passionate enough to work hard for it.

We’ve really learnt how to appreciate the power of positive goal setting and mental focus on what we want, rather than giving any focus to negative events which may show up.

4) Pace Yourself & Don’t Try To Do Everything

In the last year, we completely overwhelmed ourselves and tried to do too many things rather than taking one thing at a time - one example was the Europe Train Challenge.

During the train challenge we traveled to 33 countries in 75 days, spent 2 days in each place, filmed a video episode from each city & wrote 2 articles about each city – phew!

That really was an amazing experience, and it forced us to really focus and work hard, but looking back we have learnt that it is better to focus on fewer things and do them as well as you can, than trying to do too many things at once.

By trying to film, take photos, stand in front of the camera, write articles and at the same time capture and experience every place we visited – traveling became pretty stressful, especially with a time-limit.

We learned to focus on one thing at a time and pace ourselves so that we wouldn’t get overwhelmed - remember that you can always go back next year again.

5) What Others Think Of Your Blog Is None Of Your Business

You will meet a lot of people who don’t understand why or what you’re doing when travel blogging (my parents still don’t understand what we really do), and some will even disapprove, but just because people don’t agree with what you do, that doesn’t mean they’re right.

Never do anything you don’t want to do, and never give up on something you believe in just because others don’t.

When I heard Wayne Dyer say “what you think of me is none of my business”, I could really relate this to travel blogging.

Learn to meet jealousy, doubt, ignorance and confusion with a smile.

Our second year of blogging has been full of many great successes and a few big mistakes, but that’s what life is for – to live, to learn, and to see every mistake as a learning curve which helps you grow as a person.

We still have a lot left to learn, and I’m really looking forward to see what lessons this year (2012) will bring.

What have you learnt from travel blogging in the last year?

What?! Was the first thing that came to my mind – how the hell did we get here?!

This year has gone past so fast - we have had As We Travel for exactly one whole year, and we’re enjoying it more and more as every week goes by.

We have definitely had our ups and downs, and despite having so many great bloggers to learn from, we still learnt SO many things the hard way.

Here are a few things we have learnt during our 1st year of blogging – ENOJY!

1. Blogging Is Easy – Travel Blogging Is Not

Sitting at a desk in a nice ergonomic chair with your laptop, having all day to work, food in the fridge and a home to live in, is far away from the reality of a travel blogger.

We write on our 11 inch laptops lying in awkward positions on hard beds in run-down hostels, moving every few days and trying to explore the places we visit while working on a website.

To me, the most difficult task has been to keep the focus and inspiration while trying to deal with Visa applications, transport, finding WiFi etc.

Traveling while running a blog full-time is unlike anything we’ve done before. It has really taken our travels to a whole different turn.

2. Good Things Take Time

I’ve found that many people I meet who know nothing about blogging (and don’t have a blog themselves), have many presumptions about it.

They either think it’s really easy to create a successful blog – that it’s just to start writing a few posts and you’ll make heaps of money, or they think it’s a waste of time and don’t see it as an actual job.

Either of the two, they don’t take it seriously at all.

This can easily make you doubt yourself and question what you’re really doing.

You know you would never work at a place without getting paid the first month, never write for a magazine for free everyday for months, but at the same time you’re spending as many hours as a full time job without getting paid for your blog at first.

Just try to remember that all good things take time.

Soon you will be rewarded for your hard work, and you can give all those who didn’t believe in you the middle finger

3. Without Passion You Lose The Drive

To keep up a blog, you need to have a true passion for what you do, or else you can stop doing it right away.

We learned pretty quickly that blogging and traveling is exactly what we want right now in our lives.

We want to share our travels, our thoughts and our tips, and we want to do it on our own terms.

We want to be our own bosses, no matter how much we have to work for it.

People always go on and on about how the young people today want to start their own businesses but never realize how much work it means.

I don’t care how much work it means, I want it. And I know that if I didn’t want it so bad, I would have quit doing it a long time ago…

4. Even The Smallest Things Make A Big Difference

We like to play around a little and test different things on our site. Sometimes it works, sometimes not. But if we’re curious, we’ll give it a try.

What we have noticed, though, is that some of those tweeks sometimes make a big difference.

Put a plugin here or there, and you can either lose subscribers or gain subscribers. – “It’s in the little things”.

5. You Can’t Do This On Your Own

Blogging is a social business. Bloggers interact and share with each other. A blog with good content and design would be nothing without readers and other bloggers sharing your site with others.

Social network means everything for a website, being able to connect in different ways with people. As much as you would like to, you can’t only rely on yourself, but you also need the social network to help you out.

Well there you go - we feel so blessed to be able to do this as our full-time jobs, sharing our content with you as we travel around the world – hoping that a picture, a few lines will provoke and inspire you to also go out there and live this life the way YOU want.

We thank you from the bottom of our hearts, since we know none of this would be what it is without you reading these words, and sharing what we do with others around the world – SO THANK YOU SO MUCH!!

Well well well – 2010 has nearly come to a close. So, we thought it would be a great time for us to take some time and reflect back on this year – not just at how much AWT has grown as a site but also at how many amazing other travel blogs there are out there – sharing, provoking and living this travel lifestyle to the fullest.

There are so many travel blogs out there, and every day more and more are starting up – so it is nearly impossible for us to track, and fully study every travel blog out there.

The 25 blogs below are some of the best blogs which we feel have inspired and helped the travel blog industry grow the most this year.

#1 Wes Nations / Johnnyvagabond

Why has he made the list?

Wes is all about the story – he travels around the world ‘ low and slow’ sharing so many well-written travel stories and experiences – I am waiting for the book!

Every time we visit his site, his stories get us laughing, and aside from telling ‘lies’ and taking amazing photos, Wes also shares very useful tips and a great “daily budget” box for each country he visits.

Site: www.johnnyvagabond.com
Twitter: @johnnyvagabond

#2 Matt Kepnes / Nomadic Matt

Why has he made the list?

Matt is one of the few who has turned travel blogging into a full-time career. He is an inspiration to others, and shows everyone what is possible.

Matt’s blog is easily navigated and updated several times a week with both useful information, tips and personal travel blogs. Matt is also a huge inspiration for long term traveling, as he has traveled for many years funding only by the income he’s making online.

Site: www.nomadicmatt.com
Twitter: @nomadicmatt

#3 Rolf Potts / No Baggage Challenge

Why has he made the list?

Rolf Potts recently got back from spending 6 weeks around the world without any baggage – The No Baggage Challenge. On this new blog he shares videos and proves that you don’t need a 60L+ and heaps of gear to be able to travel – less is more.

This is so close to our mindset, the no-excuse way of travel and with so many excuses out there for WHY people can’t travel, it’s great that someone stepped up and did this – even if the trip was funded by high-profile travel companies.

Site: www.rtwblog.com
Twitter: @rtwnobag

#4 Ryan & Liz / Pause The Moment

Why have they made the list?

Currently traveling around the world, Ryan and Liz have built up a great travel blog very fast – with so many awesome tips, videos and photos, it seems like these guys have been around for ages.

Great couple, and they really really prove that this lifestyle is possible for anyone.

Site: www.pausethemoment.com
Twitter: @pausethemoment

#5 Lauren & Todd / GlobeTroopers

Why have they made the list?

Lauren and Todd have created a great unique site for travelers to meet. A place online where you can find other like minded people to travel with.

Meeting people and making friends while traveling is a big part of the whole experience, and many people who travel solo sometimes want to share those moments with others.

Built from the ground up this site really seems amazing and has been featured in Mashable and the Los Angeles Times.

Site: www.globetrooper.com
Twitter: @globetrooper

#6 David Hoffmann / Davids Been Here

Why has he made the list?

Dave has created an informative and professional blog, on which he shares video guides for many places around the world. He also helps people plan trips and gives them tips on different countries in a unique video format on a section on his site called Ask David.

David is now starting to create his own PDF Downloadable City Guides which he is creating for every city he visits. His mission is to inform the world – about the world – because he believes that traveling changes people to the core.

Site: www.davidsbeenhere.com
Twitter: @davidsbeenhere

#7 Stephine Yoder / Twenty-SomethingTravel

Why has she made the list?

Even though she has only just left for her RTW trip – Steph has built her site up into one of the top travel blogs – with a large loyal readership.

On her site you will find a very personal and honest travel journal where she is unafraid to share her thoughts and emotions.

If you want to follow someone from the start of a round the world trip, Steph takes you through from dreaming to planning to making RTW a reality.

Site: www.twenty-somethingtravel.com
Twitter: @20sTravel

#8 Anil Polat / Fox Nomad

Why has he made the list?

Anil is THE tech- guy, sharing practical advice for many necessary things others may over look. Whenever you have a question about where to find Wi-Fi, which lap top to choose, how to jailbreak your iPhone etc, this is it.

He also writes a lot of safety advice, many about things that many people wouldn’t think about but then end up needing advice on. Anil also belongs to one of the few who are making a living and travel completely funded by his blogs.

Site: www.foxnomad.com
Twitter: @foxnomad

#9 Keith Savage / Traveling Savage

Why has he made the list?

Keith writes in a completely different style from most other travel bloggers. He writes more about thought-provoking subjects, and in a way which makes you contemplate, wonder and think twice. His mission is seeing the world one month at a time – while still having a home base.

He is the philosophical traveler who in a poetic way writes about things that many travelers can relate to, and subjects that engage people on a different level.

Site: www.traveling-savage.com
Twitter: @travelingsavage

#10 Christine Gilbert / Almost Fearless

Why she made the list?

Christine Gilbert is currently in the process of making of a film about digital nomads, and is traveling around the world filming those of us who have left the 9/5 life in search of other options. She has also released 3 books about leaving the 9/5 life and creating a life of freedom.

On her site you will find many guest posts, which makes her site a resource where you’ll find different styles of writing and view points from each guest poster.

Site: www.almostfearless.com
Twitter: @almostfearless

#11 Matthew Kyhnn / Backpacking Matt

Why has he made the list?

Matt is a seasoned traveler who has just spent the last 6 months exploring the depths of New Zealand, and shares many good quality articles about the country. So if you have any questions about New Zealand, send him an email, he prob. knows more about the place than me (and it’s my home country!)

Currently Matt is in Thailand, so keep a look out for more awesome info about South-East Asia. I am sure he will bring the same detailed passion he used to share New Zealand with the world.

Site: www.backpackingmatt.com
Twitter: @backpackingmatt

#12 Aracely Santos and Jason Castellani / Two Backpackers

Why have they made the list?

Aracely and Jasons way of travel is very similar to Johny Vagabond’s ‘low and slow’ – they are currently in South America, and are sharing so many amazing videos of the places they visit.

On their easily navigated and well-designed blog, you will also find a lot of practical advice – based on real experience.

Site: www.twobackpackers.com
Twitter: @twobackpackers

#13 Craig & Linda Martin / Indie Travel Podcast

Why have they made the list?

Craig and Linda have a Lonely Planet Award-winning podcast every week where they talk about the places they’ve been to, have interviews with other travelers etc.

They are one of the few couples who travel the world funded by their websites, which is a big inspiration to us, and it is great to have Craig share many great tips about making money on your travel site via makemoneytravelblogging.com

Site: www.indietravelpodcast.com
Twitter: @indietravel

#14 Brock Groombridge / Backpack With Brock

Why has he made the list?

Brock is the HD film master – he has nearly finished a 12 month trip around the world, and shared every step on his site via full HD film.

Despite being a solo traveler he manages to film himself a lot rather than just the surroundings like many others do. It’s always much appreciated to see the face of a blogger you follow – it really helps to build a strong connection.

Site: www.backpackwithbrock.com
Twitter: @backpackerbrock

#15 Gary Arndt / Everything Everywhere

Why has he made the list?

Gary is a great photographer and shares photos daily with his visitors – also offered as desktop wallpaper.

Apart from sharing daily photos he also has a very active travel forum, but the best place to get to know Gary is on his weekly audio podcast where he talks with some of the big-name people in the travel community.

Gary is known as one of the best travel bloggers out there, and he certainly is very successful in terms of getting thousands of visitors a month coming to his site.

Site: www.everything-everywhere.com
Twitter: @everywheretrip

#16 Amar Hussain / Gap Year Escape

Why has he made the list?

To us Amar has been one of the friendliest guys out there, taking the time to chat, and share his experience – one of which is getting trips, and other things for free while traveling.

He is currently writing an ebook about how to get things, trips and hostels etc. for free, something I’m sure everyone would like to know more about. He just arrived back in the UK, but I am sure you will see him out there again traveling soon.

Site: www.gapyearescape.com

Twitter: @gapyearescape

#17 Benny Lewis / Fluent In 3 Months

Why has he made the list?

Benny has taken on a smaller niche in the travel blogging community – learning languages. Knowing a few languages while traveling certainly makes it easier, and knowing the language in the current place you are is even better.

Benny can speak 8 languages and is constantly striving to get better, and to learn more languages. Whether you want to hear how it’s going for him or learn from his tips and advice, his blog is the place to be for language lovers.

Site: www.fluentin3months.com
Twitter: @irishpolyglot

#18 Robin and Amanda / Mango Manjaro

Why have they made the list?

Robin and Amanda are the authors behind a new travel blog – which is about something that most people would love to do, but would be way too scared…

Their plan is to hitchhike (YES – hitchhike) from Sweden all the way down to India.

They share videos of all the drivers who pick them up. They’re a small but very inspiring blog who truly deserve a shout out.

Site: www.mangomanjaro.se
Twitter: N/A

#19 Andi Perullo / My Beautiful Adventures

Why has she made the list?

Andi’s bubbly personality shines through so strongly on her personal travel journal where she shares her beautiful adventures. She seems like an amazing person, who never stops smiling and really just seems to CARE.

What makes her stand out the most are the amazing pictures she shares, and the well thought-through songs that she picks to match each of her blogs – to really get you in the right blog-reading mood.

Site: www.mybeautifuladventures.com
Twitter: @andiperullo

#20 Dave Lee / Go Backpacking

Why has he made the list?

Dave is a great inspiration for those wanting to get away and travel – he runs gobackpacking.com sharing many great tips and inspiration for world travel – he also earns a full-time living from his sites, which helps fund his travels.

He has been blogging since 2007, so has spent many years in the game, and can offer many tips – which he shares via his online course called Travel Blog Success.

Site: www.gobackpacking.com
Twitter: @rtwdave

#21 Audrey Scott & Daniel Noll / Uncornered Market

Why have they made the list?

Audrey & Daniel have been traveling since 2006 with a mission to humanize the places they visit, drawing their readers in through photographs and stories, so they connect with people and places they might otherwise never hear about or actively disregard.

I love the way they measure how far they travel around the world by how many footsteps they take – 39,537,390 right now!

Site: www.uncorneredmarket.com
Twitter: @umarket

#22 Caz and Craig / Y Travel Blog

Why have they made the list?

They have been working abroad in different countries for 10 years, and finally created this site in 2010 as a source of inspiration and encouragement to others.

They have built up ytravelblog very fast, and it is great to see them building such a great strong community-feel on facebook etc. I am sure in the future, this site will be one of the top ones out there.

Site: www.ytravelblog.com
Twitter: @ytravelblog

#23 Colin Wright / Exile Lifestyle

Why has he made the list?

Colin Wright has done what so many people aspire to do, he not only left to go travel on an open ended journey. He moves to a new country every 4 months, and his readers decide where he will go next by voting.

I love this guy’s mindset, and even though we haven’t met yet, I can tell this guy has it figured out, and we can all learn a few things from him about developing an awesome location-free lifestyle.

Site: www.exilelifestyle.com
Twitter: N/A

#24 Dave Bouskill and Debra Corbeil / The Planet D

Why have they made the list?

With a mindset of ‘Anyone Can Do It!’ you know this blog is going to share some great value to it’s readers.

Dave and Debra really are the adventure couple, traveling around the world doing many crazy things like: cycling 12,000km through Africa, and climbing to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro. Look out for their next adventure to Fiji, I am sure it will be full of many amazing stories.

Site: www.theplanetd.com
Twitter: @theplanetd

Well wasn’t that a big list! If you have read all these blogs and would like to read more – then make sure you check out our Travel Blog Directory - which includes over 100 more awesome travel blogs.

We really look forward to 2011 to see what happens in the travel blog industry – hope to see your blog on there!