We began this blog barely a year ago. It was begun with no goal other than to see if people would enjoy reading about our travels, our frequently-inadvisable behavior and our humor. After more than 10 years of traveling as a sister duo Blonde and Brunette (thanks to Brunette) had a treasure trove of notes and what we thought was an endless supply of stories and photos.
Blonde knew that you could have a blog on WordPress for free so she bumbled onto the site and began this grand experiment. Days into launching the blog she found out about a group of travel bloggers – TBEX- who were going to have an event in Vail, Colorado in less than two weeks. She booked a flight, ordered business cards, set up a Twitter account and showed up at the convention as a near-total fraud.
It turns out that that isn’t particularly uncommon or problematic; most of the people she met were faking it too. (In terms of knowing what they were doing blogging. In a rare display of decorum Blonde didn’t inquire if the bloggers were faking it in the “Oh that was great, can we just say we’re done now?” way.)
Blonde failed to pack one essential: Brunette. This was a seat of the too-tight pants journey. Brunette gets the vapors at high altitudes and has better impulse control than Blonde so she hadn’t gone. That led to everyone seeing Blonde’s badge which said “BlondeBrunetteTravel” and asking “Where’s Brunette”? Hmm… good point. Since that conference the answer has been “she’s right here”. (She’s puny and often needs to be pointed out.)
Our grand blogging caper began in earnest. But that deep well of travel stories? It ran dry after months of attempting to write daily posts. How could this problem be solved? Well, Blonde isn’t above just making up stuff but for two travel addicts there was a better solution – travel more often!
We had morphed over the years from one trip a year to two trips a year. (Brunette started by slinking away from her crabby husband and now she practically revs her engine when she departs.)
In the last year we went to Spain for three weeks in September using another (3 day) TBEX conference as our “justification”. We fell in love with Barcelona and the Costa Brava and they tolerated us more than we deserved. Lots of new material emerged!
But by October we were forced to once again venture forth purely for the sake of your entertainment and education. (Total lie.) So off we went to San Francisco for a long weekend and an excursion to the Napa Valley.
We not only had a wonderful time and perfect weather but Brunette’s husband had driven to the Jersey shore to attempt to save his childhood home from Hurricane Sandy. (He left western Pennsylvania to drive to New Jersey as soon as he was certain that the governor had said to stay off the roads. Plucky chap!) We were drinking wine, enjoying delicious meals and he was swimming in a basement unplugging electrical panels. Life was good!
November’s travel event was Blonde making her every 3-month pilgrimage to visit our 93-year-old aunt who lives near Pittsburgh and Brunette. Fine, but hardly inspiring.
In December we went to Puerto Rico because Blonde won a dismayingly poorly organized trip by entering a random contest on Facebook. Our prize included flights and several nights at El Conquistador. From there we took a ferry to Vieques and spent some time at the W Hotel and Resort. Our willingness to travel on someone else’s money to serve our readers was truly admirable!
January appeared on the scene and Blonde took off to join Brunette on Marco Island for one week that morphed into three weeks as snow pummeled Blonde’s hometown of Boston. Who wanted to go back to that when there was sun and warmth and Brunette’s new condo to make a mess of?
February was one blizzard after another and Blonde deeply resented Brunette’s happy existence on Marco Island while Blonde swore this was her last Boston winter ever.
Blonde did, however, manage to win another purely random contest, this one from PureWow. It provided her with a couple days at Canyon Ranch Spa where she made certain to spend every cent allotted to her on their spa services.
March finally arrived and with great anticipation we took off for Dubai and Thailand in search of new stories, dubious insights and photos we could caption in our own humorously rude way. Brunette’s goal for that trip was for Blonde to not end up in prison in Dubai and, amazingly, that goal was accomplished.
Then in June Blonde won a free trip to Iceland from #Sadcars. It was a great deal but Brunette’s diva lungs wouldn’t have survived so Blonde is going with Nola of #NewTakeTravel.
But Brunette won’t be behind for long as in early July the next adventure begins – 5 weeks in Spain doing a home exchange (a practice that Nola is an expert on and even arranged on a couple days notice for Iceland).
Is anyone still reading? I know I’m not. So what have we learned in our first year of travel blogging?
- Blonde actually can write a sentence and not use the word fuck. (Well, not that sentence.)
- Brunette’s Twitter skills are not as good as your average gerbil’s
- Free outings are a lot more fun than paid outings
- Blonde really isn’t going to go through another winter in Boston
- The more you travel the more you need to travel.
- You don’t make any money blogging, at least if you’re us.
- It’s time to turn the blog into a website so it will be less obvious that Blonde isn’t pumping out content as frequently as she wants. (She can “leverage” other people’s work and share it and maybe make a buck or two from advertising.)
- We will never be the earnest sorts of bloggers who try to make the world a better place and expand human understanding. We prefer to giggle, snorkel, consume gelato, drink wine and provide the occasional useful bit of information.
- We’re fortunate to be able to have lives that allow us to do this and, for Brunette, a husband who hasn’t figured out how to ground her. (Or really even what the hell has happened. He has never read the blog and refuses to which makes it a lot more fun!)
- We’re fortunate to have each other, always get along and have the same warped sense of humor.
- Blonde will always be an attention-seeking beacon and Brunette will happily blend in and observe.
- A year can go by very fast.
If you made it this far we honestly don’t know why but appreciate it and hope you’ll join us as we pretend to evolve somewhat as bloggers, if not people, in our second year of writing about our travels.