I am sure there are lots of peeps out there dreaming of being a travel writer. There must be. I see them all the time hanging out in travel forums on the web.

My advice is to do what I have done and start your own web site rather than sending them to magazines or other web sites in the hope you’ll get paid. Usually you won’t unless you very good or experienced!

As travel writers you have the main ingredient to be a web site publisher. You can write good quality content. Not waffle like I write but really informative and encapsulating stuff.

So what’s stopping you? Stop sending your work off and create your own web portfolio of your written work. You can earn money from your travel articles through Google Adsense and once you have a big online portfolio then you can just email the magazines a link to your new web site!

Go for it. I am happy to help as best I can so don’t be afraid to contact me!

Monday 17th October and I will be off! Got a bargain one way ticket from London to Bali with a brief stop in KL. Can’t wait to go now.

I had originally planned to book a flight to KL and pick up an Air Asia onward flight to Bali but I have discovered that many airlines in South East Asia will chuck in a free onward flight!

In terms of web work I had my first outing today working with my laptop in the pleasent surroundings of a local coffee shop. I also discovered that while I’m away from an Internet connection I actually work much harder and I am generally more productive. The Internet is quite a distraction!

Well it’s been a good day all round. Always nice to the get flight sorted out and behind me. I can now concentrate on my work.

There will be an earnings udpdate soon. I am pretty much on for matching what I achieved in July and August. Traffic has been down on my sites this month so far which surprised me for September. Anyway still another week to go.

I am likely to leave the UK in under 4 weeks time and I still have n’t bought a flight out of here yet. In fact I am not even sure whether to buy a one way or return?

In all my travels I have always had that return ticket lurking deep within my backpack. It seems more trouble than it’s worth sometimes.

For instance on my last trip I was sold a ticket where I could change the date of the return leg. This was fine until the day I called Malaysian Airlines while in NZ to be told I could not change the date and would have to fly home on my original return date!

Anyway 3 days later after numerous faxes and telephone calls to London, Melbourne and KL I finally managed to get the flight changed!

I guess the other consideration is cost. At the moment I am looking at GBP300 one way to KL or Bangkok. Open returns are around GBP500.

I am leaning towards a one way ticket despite the extra cost. Anyway when I am ready to come back to the UK I will have made so much money from the web sites I’ll be chartering my own plane (positive thinking!!).

One way it is then.

You know when you are nearing a big trip when your arms are punctured full of holes from your friendly Nurse. Luckily in the UK many of the injections come free with our wonderful NHS.

Last time I went away I had the Rabies jab but it has now worn off and I am not wanting to fork out another £80 for a course of three injections.

One tip. The nurse tried desperately hard to ’sell’ me a prescription for Malaria tablets but I declined knowing I can buy them in Bangkok for a 1/10 of the UK price.

The nurse said she would n’t trust tablets from anywhere outside the UK despite me telling her that I will be purchasing them from Boots (Bangkok branch)!

See ya.

Working for yourself on web sites can be hugely rewarding but like any work you have good days and bad days. Motivation is the key to make this suceed and there are a number of ways I try and motivate myself to work harder.

1. Log in and see how much money I have earnt today and then transfer this to my running total and monthly totals.

2. Walk to the undergound station in the morning with all the other glum looking commuters and then turn around and walk home.

3. Visiting web sites such as webmasterworld.com for moral support and read about people that have made it big doing this type of work.

There are lots of ways to keep yourself motivated. When I am on the road I will be only spending what I earn. So the previous days’ earnings will be the next day’s spending money. If I only make enough to cover my room and a bowl of rice then so be it.

I know this has nothing to do with this project but got congratulate the England cricket team on their Ashes victory over Australia.

It’s not often we beat the Aussies (apart from the Rugby World Cup ;o) so had to mention it.

Well back on topic and I am now working full time from home on my web sites. September has been good so far and I am on for a record month. This is needed because I am still paying rent on my London flat for September!

Well I am having the morning off work to pop down to Trafalgar Square to watch the England celebrations then off to some bookshops to do some research for the sites.

Bye for now!

Just a quick update to say it is my last day at the company where your future is n’t always that bright. Four weeks now before I move out of my house and another couple of weeks after that and I’ll be in the delightful surroundings of the Heathrow departure lounge.

Still trying to decide if a one way ticket is the way to go?

Anyway best get back to work - and good luck to the England cricket team in the Ashes today…

I have added a useful frequently asked section.

If you don’t feel you have the time to read the whole site and want a quick flavour of what I am doing then check out the FAQ page.

This section of the blog will be used to post details of how my budget is going. I will be posting the following information on a weekly basis:

- How much I have spent and a breakdown of costs
- How much I have earnt through the web sites
- How much I have managed to save

I will also detail how many hours I have worked as well.

This is the first post of the working nomad blog. In a little over one month I will be embarking on a six month plus trip around Asia. I have n’t decided where but likely locations will be Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Nepal early next year.

The difference between this trip and the 1000s of other trips undertaken by backpackers is that it will be entirely funded by money earnt through maintaining sites on the Internet.

Well I have almost finished my contract job in London that came to a bit of a surprise ending! Without naming where I worked lets just say the future was n’t bright for me there ;o)

I had planned on going away to do this in November / December just before the short winter days fall upon Northern Europe but now I am leaving on October.

Have a look around this blog. I hope to help others who might be thinking about working on the road as well.

Well I have to renew my passport (thank god I can have a new picture in my passport!) as it expires early next year so that should be fun.

I have a lot of things to buy for the trip. Not least a small portable laptop and a new backpack.

Well thats my first blog entry. It is a hot afternoon in London and I am about to go to the pub and watch England v Wales. Bye for now.