New Voices In The Ears Of Travelers And Tourists -- Podcasters

For those who love travel the best source of information has historically been the guide book, the travelogues or the occasional travel show on television. Increasingly travelers are augmenting or replacing this information with information gleaned from the internet. The newest source of travel information on the internet is the podcast which is regularly produced audio program. In and amongst the podcasts from traditional travel publishers is the amateur travel podcaster who is publishing for the love of it.

San Jose, CA (PRWEB) February 10, 2006 -- During the work day Chris Christensen is a computer professional. He has worked as the Vice President of engineering and operations for an internet company for the last ten years. But, during evenings and weekends, he pursues a hobby born out of a love of travel and of story telling. He is a podcaster.

Podcast is a word that is just now starting to make inroads in popular culture. A podcast is basically a radio show that is distributed via the internet instead of via more traditional radio stations and radio networks. Someone who wants to listen to podcasts runs a special program that allows him to subscribe to shows that interest him or her. The most popular of these programs is Apple's iTunes program. When the podcast listener runs that program it checks their list of shows to see if new episodes have been released and downloads any new episodes to the listener's computer and from there perhaps to their iPod or other music player for later listening in their car, at the gym or where ever.

This new technology has enabled podcasters like Christensen to publish audio programs to people around the world. And because they are not tied to radio stations their shows are not limited to particular narrow topics. There are podcasts for knitting, podcasts that play music and podcasts for travelers.

A laptop and a microphone become a broadcast studio and a podcaster is born. But that is the easy part. What can a podcaster talk about week after week that someone would want to listen to?

"I had been listening to podcasts for a few months before I started podcasting", Christensen says. "I knew I wanted to create a show but it was not until a Memorial day picnic that I knew what I wanted to talk about. As my friends and I talked all afternoon I was surprised how often the conversation came back to travel. So many of the interesting stories we shared with each other were the places we had seen or the people we had met on our travels. Travel has a unique way of changing the way we see the world."

An episode of Christensen's "Amateur Traveler podcast" might contain stories from personal experience. An episode on bad hotel experiences told a story about walking into a hotel room to find an older couple already asleep in the beds. It turns out that the hotel had given the room to two different families. In an episode on driving internationally Christensen related a story about driving in small towns in the Andalusia region of Southern Spain where the road became so narrow that he had to wait for an older woman to step onto her front step before he had room to drive by. The road continued to narrow until he got to a corner he was able to round only by inching the car backwards and forwards more than a dozen times with passengers standing outside the car guiding him.

But an episode might also feature a travel story from friends or listeners who become friends. In an episode on traveling around the world a couple who listen to the show told of taking a year off from work and traveling around the world for their honeymoon. Traveling on a very tight budget meant buying a used car in Australia, driving it around for 2 months (and sleeping in it) and selling it two months later. Another listener describe the "trip of lifetime" that he and his wife took upon his retirement - a safari to Tanzania. This trip was more upscale with each couple having their own tent complete with a houseboy who would wash and iron their clothes while staying out on the serengeti. The houseboy used an iron that was heated with coals from the campfire. For some reason they would not wash the women's under garments.

Another show style that is sometimes used by travel podcasters is a "soundseeing" tour where the listener travels along as the podcaster goes on location. In a recent show the Amateur Traveler podcast had a soundseeing tour of San Francisco complete with a guided tour of the city, a gallery of pictures and an annotated map on the web site. In the background the listener can hear the evocative sounds of china town, the cable car barn, sea lions near Fisherman's wharf and a ride on cable car. Above those sounds is a narration from your own personal local guide who tells you how cable cars work (they have no motor) and where you can find the best street musicians (Pier 39).

It seems unlikely that travel podcasts will replace guide books but don't be too surprised if you see people walking around the streets of San Francisco this Summer with a guidebook in their hands and the Amateur Traveler podcast playing in their ears.

The Amateur Traveler podcast can be found at http://amateurtraveler.com

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