Secret Diary Of A Travel Blogger: What I Do When I’m Not Travelling

The 9 to 5 (yeah right, more like 8 at least) of a travel blogger when she’s not on the road, laid out in all its boring, unsociable glory.

8.30 Alarm goes off. (It’s called work/sleep balance yo.)

8.35 Do a quick catch up on social media and scroll through emails from bed. Today my inbox has some nice comments from readers, a few loosely worded emails from people who want to work with me but don’t explain what exactly they mean and a reply from a company that gets me really irate. Earlier this week I crafted a well thought out response to a company that got in touch last week wanting to promote their services on this blog you’re currently reading. They were a good fit so I responded with my ideas for how I could feature them and also told them more about my audience and demonstrated how engaged they were with the topic they wanted me to write about. I also shared my standard rate for this type of work and received a reply today saying it’s too high for them and having looked at my site they want to know how I came to this figure. Ouch. Really want to reply saying – “Coz that’s what I charge (insert expletive)” but am talked down by the more professional side of me.

9.00 I’m at my desk with a cup of tea and breakfast bar. Reply to emails that warrant a response and ask Facebook what to do about the one that’s offended me. Whilst a few cheeky friends insist I reply using the blunt phrase above, most agree I should just ignore it. The best suggestion is that I reply “I just looked at what the local plumber charges and add $2 on.” This makes me laugh for far longer than a normal person would. Eventually I decide to delete it and move on, albeit still a little grumpily.

9.30 I begin working on a blog post for one of the companies I freelance write for. I have some lifestyle brands I work with in Oz as well as travel clients so I could be writing about anything from Instagram Husbands to making your home cosier in the Winter. Today I’m writing a delectable piece on Aussie bakers to follow on Instagram. I want cake badly.

10.30 Do a bit of Yoga With Adriene whose YouTube Channel I am obsessed with. Having completed the 2016 30 day challenge earlier this year and feeling amazing, I’m now working my way through 2015’s version.

11.00 Decide it’s time I should shower. My freelance rule is ‘always wash before lunch’ so I usually break up my writing with a shower break around 11. Go to grab my phone from the living room, forget curtains are open, flash the neighbours.

11.15 Send some snaps. Hubby is working away and I’m lonely. Snapchat has to pass for social interaction.

11.17 Realise I have a strange Snapchat voice that only comes out when recording. Can’t stop it.

11.20 Curses. I’ve dropped the Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick gifted to me by World Duty Free for a campaign 2 years ago and that I’ve loved and worn every day since.

11.30 Do a bit of invoicing and admin. Check who has paid me, who hasn’t, lodge some expenses and wonder if I can afford to buy a Shimmer Brick. Send a silent thank you to Serj Mustafa who has created a Kisstory playlist on Spotify that makes this UK expat very happy.

12.00 Read over the blog post I wrote this morning. Edit, source images, send to client for publishing.

13.00 I usually break up my days working from home with a lunch date with a fellow blogger or freelancer. I haven’t got anything in the diary today so prepare lunch at home and watch Masterchef, which is ironic as what I ‘made ‘ for lunch was a jacket potato and baked beans. After that I clean the kitchen, put a load in the washing machine and realise rather sadly that the best bit about freelancing right now is being able to do housework mid-week and not on my weekends. #freedom #ironic

14.00 Decide I really need to get out the house. Head to post office to send a card to a friend back home who’s just had a baby. Accidentally buy coffee and chocolate. Fitbit says I’ve done less than 3000 steps. Vow to go further than 2 blocks tomorrow.

14.30 Start work on a blog post for another client. This time it is travel related and has less research involved but a lot more formatting as I upload it direct to the client’s CMS.

<Insert various distractions from Facebook/Instagram/all the social medias. Ain’t gonna lie – it happens.>

16.30 Get to a point where I’m happy with the article but decide to sit on it and reread tomorrow when it’s due to be completed.

16.35 Start working on a post for Girl Tweets World. You’re reading it. (Ha, inception!)

17.30 Check back in with inbox again. Client who I sent the article to this morning loves it. Breathe sigh of relief. Have been a freelance writer for 4 years now (wow? when did that happen) but still get the daily fear of receiving a reply from a client that says ‘you’re shit, what were you thinking?’ RSVP yes to a few events, send pitches for more commissions, negotiate a collaboration with a brand who see the value in my work and are happy to pay me. (Hurrah!) Make a few more plans for upcoming trip to Sri Lanka – decide insurance is crucial if a little expensive.

18.30 Press publish on the GTW blog post and get to work creating, sharing and scheduling social media posts about it. Try to time all activity for when both the UK and Oz are awake. Spend a bit of time reading, commenting and sharing blog posts by my favourite bloggers.

19.00 Co-host a Twitter chat. We’re talking travel mistakes and I have a heap of them.

20.00 Have a Skype call with a UK client now they’re awake. Then I catch up with my mum and over share every minute of my day as I’ve spoken to no one but the barista since yesterday lunchtime.

20.30 Have a lazy dinner of chicken fajitas as I’m a crap cook and this is the best I can muster. (Justin is usually the chef in our house.) Settle in to watch some trash telly on the couch, phone in hand as I chat to peeps on social media/read the comments on the blog post I published earlier.

23.30 Get into bed, still holding phone. Give every app one last check. Fall asleep half way through a tweet. Favourite it in the hope I’ll remember to reply in the morning.

So that’s my average day working from home in all its boring glory. Was it what you were expecting?

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