We were recently nominated by Amy and Kieron at Don’t Ever Look Back to take part in Trip Base‘s 7 Links Project. It seems like a fun way to highlight some of our older posts, so here goes:
The Goal
To unite bloggers in a joint endeavor to share lessons learned and create a bank of past-but-not-forgotten blog posts that deserve to see the light of day again.
The Rules
- A blogger is nominated to take part.
- The blogger publishes their seven links (one in each category) on their blog.
- The blogger nominates five more bloggers to do the same.
Most beautiful post:
I think our most recent post also qualifies (in my mind) as our most beautiful. We’ve published a number of photo essays, but the one devoted to Southwest’s national parks is my favorite; the landscapes are gorgeous, the photos turned out amazing, and overall I think the post does a great job of encapsulating what a great time we had exploring this unique area.
Most popular post:
The fact that our most popular post is one in which we announce our plan to housesit in London and solicit “off the beaten path” suggestions from our readers just goes to show how helpful the blogging community really is. Apparently that old adage is true: ask and you shall receive!
Most controversial post:
While this post about our most disastrous RV mishap isn’t controversial per se, it was definitely the one we hesitated most over writing and publishing. Why? Because it’s disgusting, and it reveals just how totally absurd our life can be.
The smell of shame and regret is overpowering… but at least it makes for a funny story!
Most helpful post:
Cost is obviously a huge factor when deciding whether or not to travel, so we figured transparency in our own travel-related expenses would be helpful for others considering making the plunge.
We kept notes on everything we spent for Mayhem (lodging, gas, maintenance, etc.) and compiled it all into a monthly breakdown of real-world, on-the-road costs. We also drew from our experiences to offer a ton of cost-saving tips, so this article is (hopefully!) quite helpful for anyone considering the full-time RV lifestyle.
A post whose success surprised us:
We started this blog way back at the beginning of our trip, but we didn’t really get serious about writing for non-family until halfway through the adventure. This was one of the first posts that we actually tried to promote via social media, and when it received such a positive response we were floored; it’s amazing how much of an impact being welcomed into the community can make on the mindset of a beginning blogger.
People are actually reading – and tweeting – our posts? No way!
A post we feel didn’t get the attention it deserved:
Why isn’t everyone whole-heartedly agreeing with this post? Why haven’t we received thousands of comments describing in detail just how incredibly awesome Austin is? You guys, AUSTIN ROCKS!
We love this city so much that we spend our free time dreaming about living in a penthouse downtown… and we even look at hotpad.com’s available listings and estimate the number of years (decades? eons?) it would take us to make the millions necessary to buy one.
But I digress. We have so much love for Austin that we were surprised this post didn’t receive more.
The post that we are most proud of:
In many ways this post was a summary of everything we experienced and learned over the course of our year-long RV odyssey. We encountered both great joys and great irritations, discovered our boundaries, and realized just how terrible we are at balancing work and travel (but also just how absolutely critical it is to do).
Encapsulating what we learned forced us to be introspective and reflect on the last year, and we came out of this post with a deepened commitment to living a life built around freedom and flexibility.
We have the opportunity to nominate 5 other bloggers to participate in this project. It was difficult to choose, but we ultimately went with five of our favorite travel blogs that have yet to be nominated:
Have you been nominated? Check out the list of Nominated Bloggers to avoid nominating someone twice.
