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Photo by Daniel Rintz, Himba children, Namibia

The only impossible journey
is the one
you never begin

Photo by Daniel Rintz,
Himba children, Namibia



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  #1  
Old 3 Oct 2013
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Own blog with photos :)

I've recently been looking over the photos that I've collected from my travels and I've now started thinking about having a blog or a website where I can put them all together and write up a little story (for my benefit as much as for others). It would be nice to have them all gathered together and in context I think. So, I've been browsing the web to see where I could do it but found so many possibilities that I don't know which one to go for. There are things like blogger, WordPress and more professional ones like Website builder – build your own website with 1&1. But which one should I go for? I thought I'd ask on here as I'm sure there's someone here who has done it and can maybe suggest something for me? Any input would be great, thanks!
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  #2  
Old 3 Oct 2013
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If your primary aim is to post and share photos, then one of the photo-sharing sites is probably going to be more user friendly than a website or blog site. There are many of these available, all with slightly different features and price points.

After reviewing several of the photo-sharing sites, I chose SmugMug. It is very easy to upload photos to the SmugMug site - literally a case of dragging and dropping the images. You can sort the images into different categories/galleries, etc so that they are easy to find. You can add information about each photo but you can't have pages of text about you, like a website or blog offers. My own SmugMug site is bermudarover if you want to get an idea of how they look.

For several years I have had a website hosted by Homestead and I used it to document trips, motorcycles, boats, and various interests. However, it isn't the easiest software to use and I began to find it all too time consuming to keep updated. I still have that site (www.morefish.com) but it is really a historical site that I seldom update anymore and the design is very dated.

For the past couple of years, I have been using WordPress to document/blog the purchase and upgrading of my Land Rover and my preparations for a five-month trip in 2014. What a contrast to the quirky Homestead option! WordPress is very easy to use and offers many different themes so that you can customise the appearance. Another nice feature is that you can have several website-style pages of info that can be updated as necessary, whilst still having the blog component for trip updates, etc. My WordPress site is www.bermudarover.com if you'd like to see it. You might also want to take a look at Sirocco Overland | Сирокко Оверленд | Solo Vehicle Dependent Exploration, Travel & Adventure - a WordPress site that I think is very well done

It is relatively easy to upload photos to a Wordpress blog but they have to be uploaded individually, so it takes more time than SmugMug, where you can just highlight a big bunch of photos and drop them all in at the same time.

I also manage a much smaller website via GoDaddy. It is OK for what we use it for but I wouldn't recommend GoDaddy for sites that will feature a lot of photos. It isn't that user friendly for photo uploads.

Anyway, I hope this helps a little.
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  #3  
Old 4 Oct 2013
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Thanks for that. Just been looking at your word press site btw and it's great, love the pics of the HUE166!
I hadn't thought about the photo sharing sites as I want to write something too.
But you've helped a lot, thanks
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  #4  
Old 4 Oct 2013
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Some where within the HU website there is a facility for writing a travel report/blog.
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  #5  
Old 4 Oct 2013
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Originally Posted by Walkabout View Post
Some where within the HU website there is a facility for writing a travel report/blog.
Yes, and it should be easy to find!

It's linked to from the second forum on the HUBB, just below "Ride Tales," as well as other places.

It's a simple, non-fancy blog, works well, does the job. Not very pretty and cool though.

We're also planning (well it's planned, spec'ed etc) a new blog system for sometime this winter when we have time and hopefully a little cash to pay for it.

The advantage of course of having a blog on HU is that it's with a whole lot of other blogs on the centre-point of motorcycle adventure travel, and thus easier to find than a lonely corner of the web!
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Old 4 Oct 2013
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I started a website back in 2007 to write up the trips that a bunch of us had done starting back in the late 60's and continuing (more or less) up to the present day. Not knowing anything at all about web design / hosting back then (and now!) I just got myself a copy of Dreamweaver, followed the instructions and tried to work out how sites hang together. That's not a route I'd recommend unless you've got a lot of hair that needs tearing out :confused1:

Eventually I did manage to put something together (and learnt a fair bit about web coding at the same time), then scrapped it and used a template (loads available free on the web) to start again. Five or six years on I've still not finished it, but that's down to getting distracted rather than technical issues. For hosting I bought my domain name of choice (a few pounds / yr) and located it as a sub domain on space rented with 1&1 for my business site.

The advantage of doing it like this is that the design is in your hands - you can lay it out any way you want, add as many pictures as you want etc but that assumes you have a good idea of what you want it to look like before you start. Sometimes it can be easier if the layout is fixed as you don't have to make too many design decisions! When I wrote up my 2013 Elephant Rally trip last winter I used Blogger.com on Google as it was easier than my own site.

Site - www.pisquicktours.co.uk
Blog - A winter's tale
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Old 9 Oct 2013
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I have tried blogger and wordpress both for my travel blog but somehow wordpress seems better for me, there are a lot of themes and it is handy with all the extra tools.
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Old 9 Oct 2013
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I thought about using WordPress here in Sudan but unfortunately they don't seem to like the website very much. It's painfully slow and can't guarantee an upload.

I ended up using Tumblr just because of the simple "drag and drop" photo system but then again, it seems to be full of trendy people... I'm not trendy?!
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