Travel Writer of the Week: Kristin Montgomery of Growing Global Citizens

Aspiring Travel Writer of the Week: Kristin Montgomery

Kristin’s website is Growing Global Citizens and was launched in 2019.

Bio: I am a passionate traveler and life-long learner.  My dream job was to be a student forever, but since that didn’t work out I became a teacher.  I’m certified to teach French, Spanish, ESL, History and Bilingual Ed. I speak French and Spanish fluently and can get by in a handful of other languages.  I’ve always been an advocate for language immersion and I currently teach Spanish language immersion classes.

In college, I studied abroad in southern France, and after graduating worked for a year in Madrid as an English assistant at a bilingual school.  It was this experience that finally convinced me to become a teacher.  I started researching international teaching and realized that teaching could be an international career.  My first job was at a boarding school in Switzerland and after four amazing years in the mountains, I moved to Singapore to live in the city life and see Asia.  I moved back to my hometown of Madison, Wisconsin four and a half years ago but travel whenever I can.

Here is Kristin’s Q&A About her Life as a Travel Blogger

Kristin is a Part-time blogger.

Part Time or Full Time Blogger/Writer/Photographer?: Part-time

If Part-Time, what is your day job? High school teacher

How long have you been a blogger/writer/photographer? A year and a half

Where do you call home? Madison, WI

How many countries have you been to? 52

How many continents have you been to? 5

Top 5 destinations on your travel to do list: Cuba, Uzbekistan, Argentina, Namibia, Brazil

Earliest travel memory: One of my favorite travel memories is summer road trips with my family.  Our go-to car activities were trying to spot license plates from all 50 states and playing road trip bingo.  Plus, we always had to have a pack of Twizzlers to snack on.

Favorite Travel Writer: Rick Steves

Favorite Travel Blog/s or Website/s: Amateur traveler, NOMADasaurus, Jessie on a Journey

Favorite Travel Instagram sites: Natgeotravel

Paragraph about the trip that turned you from a vacationer to a traveler: When I was 16 I went on a school trip to France.  When we had free time the other students would hang out in a restaurant but I dragged my friends all around Paris to see the sights I had carefully researched from my guidebook.  Especially in those pre-smartphone days, navigating a big city in a foreign language at a young age was an amazing adrenaline rush and I knew that I wanted more.

Paragraph about the trip that turned you into a travel blogger:  When I went to Ireland and Norway a few years ago, I took some beautiful pictures (easy to do in those places) and realized that I didn’t have to be a professional photographer or writer to blog about my experiences.

Paragraph about your first steps to become a travel blogger: Living abroad I had always thought about documenting my travels but it was only when I was back in Madison that I finally got around to doing it.  I have a love-hate relationship with technology, but teaching myself WordPress and all of the blogging tools has really given me a lot of confidence.  You can teach yourself just about anything nowadays!

I am an independent traveler? Yes

The social media platform driving the most traffic to my site is: Pinterest. Pinterest traffic takes a while to heat up, but once your pins are there you are in it for the long haul.

My favorite tool/app for social media (and why): Tailwind to schedule Pinterest and now Instagram posts.

If only I had the time, I’d do/finish…… : Write all of the 50+ posts from the last five years of travel that I have in my head but never have time to write down!

Don’t get sucked into spending all of your time trying to get followers on social media.  Focus on your blog and your email list.  Social media is important, but ask yourself if the time you are spending on it is giving you the returns you’re looking for.

Best travel tip for travelers: Make sure you are using airline credit cards if you are flying even once a year.  I’ve gotten a number of international tickets for free, plus many other perks!  I charge just about everything that I buy on my credit card and it adds up quickly.

Best Tip for Student Travel: I have done a lot of travel with students and parts of my blog are focused on educational travel.  It is so rewarding to see students experiencing a new place, culture, and language for the first time.  Seeing my students’ reactions always brings me back to my first school trip abroad to France.  Traveling with students is always rewarding but can also be tough because any time you have a big group things are bound to go wrong.  I’ve done emergency trips to the hospital in France and Vietnam and to the police station in Berlin.  In Berlin a student bought handcuffs from a street vendor and put them on both hands for a photo.  When he went to take them off, the key didn’t work!  We had to find a police officer to escort us to the station and have them cut off!  Travel is always an adventure

Connect with Kristin!

Website: www.GrowingGlobalCitizens.com

Social: Youtube | Pinterest | Instagram 

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More Travel Blogger of the Week Features!

Aspiring Travel Writer of the Week: Maggie McKneely with Pink Caddy Travelogue

Aspiring Travel Writer of the Week: Jorge and Claudia with Travel Drafts

Nominate a friend (or yourself!) as our next Aspiring Travel Writer of the Week!

I invite you to be a featured ATW (Aspiring Travel Writer) of the week. As ATW of the week, you will be featured on my travel website, 52Perfectdays.com and the BreakintoTravelWriting.com website! Here are all the details! breakintotravelwriting.com/aspiring-travel-writer-of-the-week-guidelines/

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