How to write travel writing

Travel writing is place writing: it carries a reader somewhere using sensory detail and the people and moments that make a place mean something. It is not a list of sights — it is an experience, told in a way only you can tell it.

What it is

Travel writing describes a place through your experience of it — the scenes, the people, the food, the sounds — and tries to give a reader a real sense of what being there felt like. It can be a short piece for a magazine or a long-form feature.

How to write it

Show the place through the senses. Not just what it looks like, but what it sounds like, smells like, feels like. "The market smelled of fish and rain" places the reader better than "the market was busy."

Tell a story or find a thread. A travel piece is stronger when it is organised around something: a person you met, a theme, a question, a single day. A list of attractions is forgettable; a thread makes it a story.

Use specific, concrete detail. "The blue bus" beats "a bus"; "the smell of grilling suya" beats "good food." Specifics make it real and immersive.

Include people, not just places. A place is understood through the people who live there. One conversation or one character often carries a travel piece.

Add a sense of meaning, not just facts. Why does the place matter, and what did it change or reveal? Travel writing moves beyond description to reflection.

Be honest, not romanticised or stereotyping. Write the place as it is, including its difficulty. Avoid reducing a place or its people to a cliché.

The structure to copy

1. Open in a scene — the reader is placed there in the first line.
2. Develop through sensuous detail and people.
3. Weave in a thread — a person, a theme, or a question.
4. Reflect on what it meant.
5. Close on a note that stays with the reader.

Common mistakes

A list of sights with no story. General, vague description. Romanticising or stereotyping. No people or no thread. Reading like a brochure or a factual guide.

Practical tips

• Write down sensory detail as you go — you will forget the smell of the market.
• Find one person or one moment that sums up the place.
• Ask what the place taught or revealed, not just what you saw.

Checklist

• I used sensory detail, not just what it looked like.
• I found a thread that organises the piece.
• My detail is specific and concrete.
• I included people, not just places.
• I reflected on what the place meant.
• I was honest and avoided stereotyping.