Writing is like painting with words. Words create images in the head. The better the text, the more intense the image it calls up in the reader’s head. Boring texts leave the reader cold, and they won’t read to the end. How to approach travel reports in general so they turn out interesting, we already explained in part 1. Today we get down to the nitty-gritty and talk about the language in texts and little tricks that make your text even more interesting and gripping.
Let’s pick up the pace
Did you know that you can underline the meaning and the pace of your text with the length of your words and sentences?
“Slowly the smell of warm, dry wood creeps into our noses, while a drop of sweat comes loose from my forehead and slides to the ground as if in slow motion. I look around. Despite the searing heat, the leaves on the trees seem frozen stiff. Nothing stirs except the beetle pushing itself over the dry clods of earth on the ground in front of me. There isn’t much more movement than that in this town. Golden. It hasn’t lived up to its name for almost a century.”
And how does that sound? Long, sluggish and numbing, isn’t it? Long sentences, verbs that describe slowness.
“The alarm howls, lights flash, and I tumble out of bed. No time for coffee, barely time to breathe. Doors slam, footsteps thud dully on the hotel carpet. Voices swirl through the air, a wild jumble. Screams? I race down the stairwell. And hope. Hope it’s only a false alarm again.”
Phew! Unlike the first passage, I used short sentences and fast, active verbs to create a feeling of speed and urgency. The rapid switch between scenes and actions adds to the general rush.
But careful: main clauses in quick succession get tiring over time. Unless you’re using sentence length as a device within a paragraph, alternate moderately long with moderately short sentences. That gives you a lively text.
Who exactly is this “one” everyone keeps hearing about?
“One”, the ominous stranger. The faceless figure. Confound it. Who is that? It keeps quietly sneaking into your texts. Especially when you want to give your readers tips. Look away for a second and there it sits in the middle of the sentence, grinning.
A few examples:
- “From up here one has a great view.”
- “One can buy lots of handmade goods here.”
- “One is not safe from mosquitoes here. Best to pack mosquito spray.”
“Ones” meet us everywhere. But who even is it?
- “From up here we had a great view.”
- “Tourists can buy lots of handmade goods here.”
- “Travellers are not safe from mosquitoes here. Best to pack mosquito spray.”
With a little thought you’ll soon work out how to replace the “one”.
Language quick tips
Use expressive verbs instead of adjectives.
Not good: “The car drove slowly up the mountain.”
Better: “The car crept up the mountain.” Or “The car climbed the hilly road.”
Use the active, not the passive.
Not good: “In a quick operation the whole rack was mounted back onto the vehicle and the car was parked.”
Better: “Two of our group took the roof rack and fitted it back onto the Defender.”
Avoid noun-heavy constructions.
I often read words in travel reports where a verb is hiding inside a noun.
Not good: “Around midday we set ourselves in motion.”
Better: “Around midday we took the track south.”
Not good: “Michael gave precise instructions once more.”
Better: “Michael told us to hit the dunes especially steeply.” Or “Michael’s voice boomed out of the radio speaker: ‘Take the dunes steep and head-on and …'”
Spare yourself the filler words.
We often use too many words. We want to make our point clearer or make our texts feel more emotional. So we fill them with words that say little, water down our text and rob it of its clarity.
Examples:
- “I was a bit hungry.”
- “That’s not really all that funny.” (two fillers at once)
- “That was just so typical again.” (two fillers at once)
- “That’s really bad.”
Let’s see how the sentences work without the filler words:
- “I was hungry.”
- “That’s not funny.” Or even “That’s annoying.”
- “That was typical.”
- “That’s bad.”
You see, sometimes less is simply more.
Direct speech
Direct speech brings your characters and encounters to life. Instead of saying “An old man told us about his childhood in the town”, you could write: “The old man smiled and said with a spark in his eyes: ‘When I was a boy, we played on these streets all day long.'” Direct quotes make the reader feel as if they were right there and could listen in on the conversation.
Be precise.
Give precise examples and concrete details. The more exactly you describe, the more vivid the scene becomes. Instead of “I ate the tastiest food of my life” you could write: “The butter-soft lamb, seasoned with a mix of cumin and coriander, melted on my tongue.”
Not good: “We picnicked under a big old tree.”
Better: “By the road stood an ancient oak. A wonderfully shady spot for a picnic.”
Vivid, metaphorical language
With metaphors and vivid language you give your text depth and colour. A metaphor or a vivid comparison is, for example: “The peaks rise into the sky like silent guardians that have watched over the land for an eternity.” Or: “The dunes were golden waves in a still ocean of sand.” Images like these stir your readers’ emotions, so that pictures quickly form in their heads.
It really isn’t easy to find fitting metaphors that don’t sound worn out from being used so often. Metaphors are the icing on any travel report. If you put the other points into practice as far as you can, you’ll write a good travel report in any case, even without metaphors.
Read your text out loud
When you think your text is finished, read it out loud. That way you hear where the text stumbles, where sentences are too long or complicated and the rhythm is off. The melody of a well-written text is just as important as its content. When the two are in tune, your travel report gets read, and felt and lived too.
Conclusion
Remember this: what counts in a travel report is the story and, just as much, how you tell it. You can have the greatest story, yet no one will read it if the language of your text is boring or a chore. So read your text through again at the end and watch for variety and the right word choice, and make sure you cut all the filler words, the “ones” and the passive sentences from your text.
Good travel reports are works of art made of words. They take the reader along on your trip, let them feel, smell and taste foreign places and cultures. With the right techniques and a bit of practice, you too can write good travel reports. Always remember that above all you’re conveying emotions, and information comes second. Put the tips above into practice and you’ll see: your stories become more alive, more colourful and more memorable. Have fun with it!
And now you!
Did you know that your next travel report could be published in a book? Matsch&Piste and the Paul Pietsch Verlag are looking for the best travel reports. And the best bit: we’re turning them into a book!
If you’d like to be part of it, send us your travel report by 18/09/2023. From the entries, we, the Matsch&Piste editorial team together with the Pietsch Verlag, will pick the 15 best travel reports. The reports will appear in spring 2024 in a collected volume from the Paul Pietsch Verlag.
Your travel text should be between 15,000 and 20,000 characters (including spaces) long. Finished writing? Then send your finished travel report with photos to reisebericht@matsch-und-piste.de
Title image: oneinchpunchphotos, Envato Elements