 How many times have you said to yourself, “I feel like a yo-yo, I’ve been here too long?”
Rock showman David Lee Roth has long known how to convey a feeling of wanderlust, from the tropical cover photography on his “Crazy From The Heat” EP to songs such as “Black Sand.” Throw in a little Jimmy “Coconut Telegraph” Buffett, Tom “Even Cowgirls Get The Blues” Robbins, and Douglas “The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy” Adams, and you end up with the BootsnAll Travel Network (www.bootsnall.com).
 A remarkable venture of a small circle of friends, BootsnAll (pronounced “boots an’ all,” preferably with an Australian accent) has grown into a respectable travel site. But it’s not a stodgy, travel agency sort of place, nor is it the type of site you use to book a minivan rental on your way to Disney World.
BootsnAll is more for the bushwhacking crowd, the bohemian backpackers of all ages who feel the urge to drop everything and go. It’s for individuals who wouldn’t mind giving notice to their bosses over the phone—or taking early retirement—to stay a few more weeks in Tanzania or Thailand. If your itinerary calls for more hostels than Holiday Inns, you’ll feel right at home at BootsnAll.
 Bootstrapping |
Every journey starts with a single step. Let your first stride be to the BootsnAll Travel Network. |
The site launched in March 1999, when the Silicon Rush was in full swing and travel sites were actually starting to become useful resources. Australian Chris Heidrich and American Sean Keener envisioned BootsnAll while hiking together; right down to a Code of Conduct for its future members (www.bootsnall.com/codeof.shtml). Others joined in to help get BootsnAll.com on the road. You can read profiles of BootsnAll’s founders past and present at www.bootsnall.com/profiles.shtml.
Heidrich and Keener borrowed the site’s name from an earlier trip to see the 1996 European Football Championships with a couple of friends, during which the topic of the perfect boot (suitable for hiking and soccer, yet not out of place at pubs and restaurants later in the day) became a recurring seed of discussion.
BootsnAll isn’t really about footwear, of course, although the site’s crew still pays homage to good boots with varying levels of levity. If Adams’ galactic hitchhikers always know where their towels are, BootsnAll’s founders hope that their wandering community feels the same way about their boots (www.bootsnall.com/boots.shtml).
Travel Info
So what can you do at BootsnAll? You can plan a trip or post photos and stories from trips you’ve already taken. You can check out other wanderers’ accounts of their sojourns and ask their advice on any topic. You can book a flight to Egypt or a hostel in Prague. You can blog. You might even get an invitation to crash on somebody’s floor while you’re in Amsterdam or Guangzhou.
A large part of the site is devoted to links to information, ticket sales, and room booking services. BootsnAll provides some services while third parties provide others. Sponsored links are labeled, although they’re generally presented in the same font and style as regular material.
Links about travel destinations break down by general region, such as the islands in the Pacific (www.bootsnall.com/pacific-islands), and by a few specific cities and areas such as Mt. Kilimanjaro (www.mtkilimanjaro.org). Look closely and you’ll even spy links to book reviews (www.bootsnall.com/reviews) and travel insurance providers (www.bootsnall.com
/travel-insurance).
The Round-The-World Travel Guide (www.bootsnall.com/rtw) is a special section that addresses the entire process of an international trip, from the initial inspiration to the return home. Meanwhile, the World Adventures area (www.bootsnall.com/adventures) is the meeting place for shark divers, mountain climbers, and other walkers on the wild side.
One ingenious decision the founders made was to log member contributions into a database, which makes a traveler’s wisdom and road stories easier for others to browse. Searchable from a Google-powered field on the right side of the BootsnAll’s home page, the database offers an easy way to find articles, booking services, and travel guides for cities and regions. Type the name of a city or country into the field and see where the database takes you. Believe us, it’s easy to spend a few hours this way, so wait until your boss goes off to a meeting.
Nomadic Community |
As you sign up for a free membership, read the notes beside some of the fields. |
You can read almost anything on the BootsnAll site, although if you want to contribute or ask someone a question, you’ll need to sign up for a free membership. See the “MembershipnAll” sidebar in this article for details on why and how to enroll. There are plenty of materials available to nonmembers, too, including the BootsnAll newsletter (www.bootsnall.com/memberfaq.shtml).
After you’re a member, you can swap info and stories with others. Even better, you can make contact with someone who lives in an area before you travel there. Ask about sights to see, places to stay, foods to try, and situations to avoid. Locals are especially good resources on how much things cost, although frequent visitors may know more about where to get the best currency exchange rates.
Articles. Members who have been there and done that often have fascinating tales to tell. You’ll find articles sprinkled throughout various sections, usually categorized by region or city. If you’re open to potluck, check out the newest arrivals at www.bootsnall.com/articles/recent.html.
We found advice on how to travel solo without becoming a recluse at www.bootsnall
.com/guides/05-07/beating-loneliness-on-the-road.html. There’s even an article on penguin encounters in Antarctica (www.bootsnall.com/articles/03-07/black-tie-affair-antarctica.html). Some stories are a little salty, so be advised.
Speaking of travel articles, you can find out how to get your own wanderings-cum-musings published on the site at writers.bootsnall.com. You might inspire someone to make a particular journey they’ve been putting off, or even help them avoid making the same mistakes you did.
Message Boards. The Travel Message Boards (boards.bootsnall.com/eve) are mostly divided into region-specific categories, but there are other forums devoted to topics ranging from health on the road (Health And Travel) to work woes (the Corporate Wasteland board).
The Travel Buddies forum is for people looking for others to travel and split costs with. Other boards offer places to discuss books, movies, food, and GPS devices.
Browse the Go, New, Find, Notify, and Tools menus just above the message boards for things to do and settings to set. For example, click Go and My Space to access your member Profile and Preferences. Click Karma from the same menu to find out why the heck newbies are called Thorn Tree Refugees, anyway. |
The Travel Message Boards provide a great way to get acquainted with the rest of BootsnAll’s community. |
Blogs. You can read others’ travel diaries, or Web logs, at blogs.bootsnall.com. Photos, quirky observations, and complex personalities make some of these blogs real gems. The Top 10 Blogs list on the right provides a good way to find the cream of the crop. And, should you find yourself inspired, learn how to start your own at blogs.bootsnall.com/makeMyBlog.php.
Another way to discover blogs you’ll enjoy is to use the BootsnAll Tag Cloud (blogs.bootsnall.com/tags/, and don’t leave off the forward slash at the end of the URL). It offers quick links to popular topics in blog entries. These are mostly categorized by country, such as Greece and New Zealand, but news and apparel are also represented. If you want to read what the staff has to say, check out their posts and news at www.bootblog.org.
Many blogs offer RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds for XML (Extensible Markup Language) and My Yahoo! readers. Check out the growing list of feeds at www.boot
blog.org/04-08/bootsnall-travel-network-rss-files.html.
Insiders. These are members who will try to answer your questions about particular cities and countries. At www.bootsnall.com/insiders, choose a region, then read the profiles of individuals who have lived or extensively traveled in those areas.
Like the fine folks on the Message Boards, Insiders can be phenomenally helpful to you. They’re interested in the same regions you are and can help you make the most of a journey. If your personalities click, you might even arrange to visit an Insider while you are in the neighborhood.
Insiders are happy to help you to one degree or another, but of course, you don’t want to impose too much on their good natures. Try to whittle down your list of questions with diligent research first so you’re not wasting an Insider’s time asking things you could easily find answers to elsewhere.
Undiscovered Country |
A Google-powered search field lets you browse BootsnAll’s database of services, anecdotes, and posts. |
Like an unfamiliar region, the more you delve into BootsnAll, the more you see. There’s an alternate overview of its features and links to related sites at www.bootsnall
travelnetwork.com. There’s even a sideline music download business selling 99-cent MP3s of songs from around the world. At www.bootsnall.com/music, you can feel like you’re rocking the Casbah even when you’re stuck in a cubicle, saving up for your next adventure.
One recent addition to the site is a travel visa service at www.bootsnall.com/passports-visas. Also new is a set of links to so-called Park Sleep Fly hotels at www.bootsnall
.com/park-sleep-fly. These inns guarantee parking, room reservations, and usually shuttle transportation to airports and cruise ship docks, so you have less to worry about on the road.
With so much to discover at BootsnAll.com, it won’t be long before you’ll be itching to put its resources to good use with a trip of your own. And before you embark, you’ll be sure that you’re as prepared as can be—boots an’ all. 
by Marty Sems
MembershipnAll
You could lurk for days at BootsnAll.com, just reading blogs and sighing over all the places you’ve never seen. Eventually, however, you’ll have a question for a longtime forum denizen or Insider, or maybe a travel saga of your own to share. Before you can do so, you need to sign up for a free membership.
At boards.bootsnall.com/groupee/login, select the I Am Not Registered On: BootsnAll Travel Forums and click Continue. Enter your birthday (month, day, and four-digit year) and click Continue again. On the following page, fill in the fields and pay attention to the notes next to some of these fields. For instance, some of your answers will be visible to BootsnAll Community members, so you should take care in what you write.
In the Type Of Member field, choose the best description for yourself: Backpacker, Flashpacker, First Class, Small Group Tourist, Expat (expatriate), Spiritual Seeker, or Cheapie. We didn’t find explanations of these descriptions, but Cheapie sounded like a fit for us. Read www.bootsnall.com/insiders before you decide whether to declare yourself an Insider.
Click Submit when you’re done. BootsnAll will email you a confirmation message in a day or so. Click the URL in the email to activate your account. We also received a personal email from one of BootsnAll’s “Bouncers” welcoming us to the community.
After you are approved, founder Sean Keener says, you’ll be able to create a free blog, ask Insiders questions, rate hostels, post travel reports, and submit articles. At this writing, Keener says BootsnAll is also launching Google Maps for members to visually plot out their travels. That beats an oft-misfolded map and a highlighter pen any day. |
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