It’s a dream scenario for anyone out there who has been well and truly bitten by the travel bug: getting paid to visit the most beautiful places in every corner of the world. It may sound like a fanciful idea, and more often than not, not everyone can do it, but there are ways and means of changing it into a reality.
With the right amount talent, determination and a sprinkling of luck, you can turn your globe-hopping passion into a viable career, or at the very least a means of funding more trips. Here’s how:
Get paid exposure
Pretty much every traveler brings along a camera to document their trip. In most cases, the developed reels of film or digital files only serve as visual reminders of the places visited, the landmarks seen and the people met. Instead of using your camera as a kind of visual diary, you can turn it into a veritable money maker. Keep it on hand to capture the unique and retina-busting moments that only you, as a traveler, can witness, and thousands of people across the world would pay for.
With the right exposure of your portfolio, companies like Lumas, which scour the photography world for up and coming artists, could pay to feature and sell your images as a variety of print sizes.
Blog for bucks
It’s the same deal as with the camera, except this time it’s words that win prizes. So if you keep a diary while on your travels, why not spend a little extra time adding that extra sheen to make it a professional blog or website (like the one you’re reading right now).
Lucrative commercial partnerships from big companies can bring in a substantial amount of money, but even if you don’t manage to land a deal right away, straightforward paid ads via Google, for example, can turn the tables on your financial outlay in a matter of weeks.
Stock up on elbow grease
As already mentioned, we’re talking about a dream lifestyle here, one that’s definitely not available to everyone. So if you can’t turn your travels into a commercial venture, you can always put in some hard graft as you go. The concept of working and traveling can sound scary and counter-intuitive, but there are thousands of people out there who will tell you how doing part-time jobs while traveling have helped enrich the experience, and not just from a financial point of view.
Whether it’s as a bartender, au pair, or English teacher, working abroad opens up so many more avenues of wonderful opportunity. This is because you expose yourself to the locals, the language and the culture. As Mark Twain said:
“Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
Alas, if the notion of working while traveling isn’t your wheelhouse, you can always cut costs and try and travel the world for next to nothing.
Image by Marco Zanferrari under creative common license