Travel writer Carolyn Heller starts with FOOD

HALLIE EPHRON: Years ago, when I first thought I might like to write books, I took my first writing classes and joined my first writing group. That’s how I met Carolyn Heller. She was raising twin girls, discovering her passion for travel,  beginning what would grow into a stellar career as a travel writer.

Nowadays, Carolyn lives in Canada, and she's a regular correspondent for the Forbes Travel Guide where she reports on luxury travel, culture, and food, and for Hotel-Scoop, where she shares the scoop on lodgings around the globe. She's also a Vancouver local expert for Google's new Touring Bird site.

Reminiscing, now, on how she got started writing travel.

CAROLYN HELLER: In the early 1990s, I was doing marketing work for a software company in the Boston area, and I realized that what I enjoyed most about my position had nothing to do with software; it was the writing and traveling I got to do.

With no real idea of how to get started as a “travel writer,” I found two classes at our local adult education center: one was an introduction to travel writing, while the second was called “The Business of Freelancing.” Taught by the editor of a technology magazine editor who dabbled in freelance travel writing, the latter course was a fantastic introduction to everything from where to find ideas, to how to pitch stories, to how to manage your time. During that class, I sold my first travel piece – about a family trip to the Caribbean with my then two-year-old twins – to the Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, and several other newspapers.

When the course ended, I asked the instructor to think of me if she was ever approached about a travel project she couldn’t do. And not two weeks later, she called to say that an editor at the Fodor’s guides was looking for writers to help update a New England guidebook, and should she give them my name? That was my entrée into guidebook writing.

HALLIE: It’s all about making opportunities for yourself, and following your passion. Carolyn, you’ve gone on to write slew of articles and books for various publishers.

CAROLYN: I’ve since done numerous assignments for Fodor’s, spent several years as the Boston editor for the Zagat restaurant guides, and write regularly for both the Moon guides and Lonely Planet. Between these 50+ book projects, I’ve been writing travel articles, too. 

Whether you’re writing a full book or contributing several chapters, travel guides are big projects with lots of short writing – often you’re describing a restaurant, sight, or place to stay in about 50 words – so even a 500-word article can feel like you have plenty of room to spread out!

HALLIE: And your latest book is on Ontario in your adopted country, Exploring Ontario with Travel Writer Carolyn B. Heller.

CAROLYN: I moved to Canada from the United States in 2003, and as a travel writer, I’ve been able to do lots of exploring in my adopted country while calling it “work.” I’ve written three travel guides covering different Canadian regions, including two books – Moon Vancouver and Moon Vancouver + Canadian Rockies Road Trip – about western Canada, where I live. Writing Moon Toronto and Ontario, available this month in a new third edition, let me get to know another part of the country. 

Most people know Ontario for its largest city – Toronto – and for its most famous attraction, Niagara Falls. But as I found while researching Moon Toronto and Ontario, there’s so much to discover in this diverse region.

HALLIE: What's your approach to writing an entire guidebook?

Start with the Food

In any place I visit, I always start with food. Toronto is one of the most multicultural cities on the planet, where you can eat your way from dim sum to bibimbap to baclava. I’ve tried Finnish pancakes in Thunder Bay (which has a large Scandinavian community), checked out local wineries and craft breweries (of course, I had to try “beer pie”), and sampled my way along a “cheese trail” through southwestern Ontario. I was excited to discover gooey, sugary butter tarts, too, which might be Ontario’s signature dessert. You can even follow a “butter tart tour,” traveling from bakery to bakery to find your favorite.

From Outdoor Adventures to Indigenous Cultures

And there’s more to Ontario than food. Bordering four of the five Great Lakes, Ontario offers plenty of outdoor adventures. You can canoe on the lakes, hike trails that border Caribbean-blue waters, or snorkel among surprisingly intact 19th-century shipwrecks.

In central Ontario, Old Order Mennonites still travel by horse and buggy and sell homemade preserves at local farmers markets. With Ontario’s large indigenous population, you can take a hike with an aboriginal guide or watch a performance at a First Nations-run theater. Ontario has lots of great museums, too, where you can check out everything from Inuit carvings to Elton John’s platform shoes.

HALLIE: Do you prefer writing about where you live, or where you don’t?

CAROLYN: As a guidebook author, I’ve covered places where I live and destinations that are farther away. Writing about an area that’s not my home base is exciting, since I love exploring new places, although it’s definitely a lot more work. ]

When I researched the first edition of my Ontario guide, I was on the road for almost four months. It’s a big province! For this new third edition, I still spent eight weeks traveling around the region. There are always new destinations to discover and new experiences to try. And of course, lots of new things to eat.

HALLIE:  Start with food! That’s why Carolyn’s travel books are perfect for me.

Anyone else out there ever toyed with the idea of being a travel writer? Seem daunting? Carolyn will be dropping by today to answer your questions, or to hear your WISH LIST of what you're looking for in a travel guide.

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