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The Expert in Baby Boomer Travel

Travel Copywriter

Women travelers

Rome’s Trevi Fountain, 1970

When we last left Sandy Coghlan, an Aussie baby boomer who has written up her 1969-70 European travels in her new book, Yesterday: A Baby Boomer’s Rite of Passage, she was in Monaco enjoying the somewhat casual changing of the guard in front of Prince Rainier’s and Princess Grace’s fairytale palace.

If you haven’t read Part I of excerpts from her travel diary, you can go there now. As with Part I, I’ve added some of my own notes to provide context. Sandy has included her vintage photos and a few postcards from her travels.

We pick up the narrative in Rome, where she has gone to work as an au pair, looking after five children under the age of seven. (She confesses she got the job by saying she was the oldest of five children and had lots of experience looking after her… Continue reading

This is one of the beautiful images you'll find on StrideTravel.com. Photo by Dennis Cox.

This is one of the beautiful images you’ll find on StrideTravel.com. Photo by Dennis Cox.

“The Savvy Path to Breathtaking Travel, Without the Hassle”

“Less Planning, More Experiencing”

“A Journey of a Thousand Smiles Begins With a Single Click”

These are some of the taglines that express the essence of the new travel website, StrideTravel.com, where I worked for more than a year as Content Director. (My job is now in the capable hands of Content Coordinator Samantha Scott, who, together with co-founders Gavin Delany and Jared Alster, comprise a formidable team.)

In practical terms, Stride aspires to be — and in many ways already is — the best place on the Web to survey the wealth of multi-day, pre-planned trips that are now available from hundreds of travel suppliers around the world.

“Pre-planned trips” may encompass guided group or private tours as well as independent journeys… Continue reading

The author climbing a mountain in Switzerland, temporarily solo.

The author climbing a mountain in Switzerland, temporarily solo.

If you’re planning to travel solo — or, perhaps more to the point, worried about traveling solo — the infographic below from Solos, A UK-based travel company that specializes in singles tours of Europe, may help ease your mind.

Solos has been in business for more than 30 years, running escorted tours to the UK, Ireland, France, and Italy, and has been voted the Best Singles Holiday Tour Operator in the UK for the past four years. An experienced tour leader accompanies all tours and you’re guaranteed your own room, a big plus when compared to many other tours.

You can also choose tours designed for folks in the 50s-plus age range.

Solos is happy to work with American travelers, and has a special website directed to them, with prices listed in U.S. dollars. You can also go to their… Continue reading

Probably time to rethink your packing strategy. Photo by Keith Williamson on flickr.

Probably time to rethink your packing strategy. Photo by Keith Williamson on flickr.

Anyone who has struggled with hauling luggage onto a train or up or down a flight of stairs — where suitcase wheels don’t help all that much — knows the value of packing light.

It’s just that — if you’re like me — you also struggle with knowing what to leave out when you travel. As a friend, Jade Chan, just wrote me in response to a recent post giving tips on how to pack light:

“I can totally relate to you being a heavy packer when travelling. I try to think of every scenario possible, so I’ll pack everything that I think I’ll need. Although I pack only two pairs of footwear, it’s the ‘everything else’ that weighs down my suitcase. My backpack is quite big too. So I always marvel at how backpackers… Continue reading

Picture yourself alone on a tropical beach. Photo by Vale 979, Panoramio.

Picture yourself alone on a tropical beach. Photo by Vale 979, Panoramio.

A female friend of mine, who has traveled extensively but usually in the company of family or others, recently remarked that she didn’t feel brave enough to travel alone.

Having traveled a lot on my own myself, especially in my younger days, and never feeling particularly threatened by it, I realize that single women may have a different perspective: Safety issues, getting hassled by unwanted attention, perhaps dealing with creeps who think they can take advantage of you, having to dine alone, and so on.

So I thought this would be a good time to reprise a post that first appeared more than a year ago, with a dozen tips for women traveling solo or considering traveling solo for the first time.

Never having traveled as a baby boomer woman myself, I asked my good friend and fellow… Continue reading

The Age Busters Power Summit runs every day from March 13-April 2.

The Age Busters Power Summit runs every day from March 13-April 2.

I’m being featured on The Age Busters Power Summit for Women on Saturday, March 29 at 8 pm, talking about “The Important Role of Travel as We Age.”

 You owe it to yourself to attend this free virtual event!  

Go now to the www.theagebusterspowersummit.com/clanor for more details.

Thanks!

 

Answer to Last Week’s Travel Quiz:

About what percentage of jobs worldwide are related to tourism?

A. Five percent

B. Two percent

C. Nine percent

D. 12 percent

The answer is C, nine percent!

 

Boomers -- especially boomer women -- book more travel online than any other group. Photo from Adventure Women

Boomers — especially boomer women — book more travel online than any other group. Photo from Adventure Women

I’ve come across some statistics that should of interest to any travel marketers who wonder whether to reach out to women, boomers — and boomer women in particular.

In a previous post, I wrote about how boomer women spend the most money on travel.

Now, new findings show that if you’re basing a travel marketing campaign on social media, it pays to aim it toward women. 

With the exception of Linked In, where the majority of users are men, women dominate social media in the U.S., according to findings published at FinancesOnline.com (compiled from reports by the Pew Research Center and others).

Here are the stats: about three-quarters of adult women in the U.S. use Facebook, compared to two-thirds of the adult men.

For Pinterest, women outnumber men 33 percent… Continue reading

The Age Busters Power Summit runs every day from March 13-April 2.

The Age Busters Power Summit runs every day from March 13-April 2.

The Age Busters Power Summit is just a few days away — and I invite you to join me on what should be an incredible journey.

I’m excited to be part of the Age Busters Power Summit for Women, which will offer tips and strategies from leading experts to help you look your best, feel fantastic and have the time of your life — including travel, which is where I come in.

Organizer Jodye Friedman, who hosts the online summit, has brought together 21 of the world’s most influential and successful wellness and lifestyle gurus in one “virtual” place (or at least 20 and yours truly — I’m still working on guru status, though I’m happy to announce that after less than a year of blogging, alexa now ranks my baby boomer travel website among the top 176,000… Continue reading

Ellen Perlman of BoldlyGoSolo (top) on Maui. (She did ride the bike down Haleakala volcano solo.) Photo courtesy of boldlygosolo.com

Ellen Perlman of BoldlyGoSolo (top) on Maui. (She did ride the bike down Haleakala volcano solo.) Photo courtesy of boldlygosolo.com

Last week I was interviewed about baby boomer travel for a recorded series called the Age Busters Power Summit, which will air sometime on or after March 13 (I’ll have more specifics in a later post).

The target audience is baby boomer women, and — never having traveled as a baby boomer woman myself — I asked my good friend and fellow travel writer Ellen Perlman, who writes a blog called BoldlyGoSolo.com, to give me a few pointers about what to suggest to women traveling alone.

Her tips were so valuable that I want to pass them along on my own blog.

While they pertain to just about any woman traveling solo, a baby boomer woman who is trying solo travel for the first time might find these especially… Continue reading

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According to government and private surveys:

  • Leading-edge baby boomers (born between 1946 and 1955) and seniors account for four out of every five dollars spent on luxury travel today.
  • Roughly half the consumer spending money in the U.S.--more than $2 trillion--is in the hands of leading-edge baby boomers and seniors.
  • Baby boomers (born 1946-1964) travel more than any other age group.
  • When asked what they would most like to spend their money on, baby boomers answered “travel” more than any other category, including improving their health or finances.

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