Welcome to “Our Planet Images”!
A travel blog that focuses on places to see from destinations around the world with quality photos of each topic.
Hi!
I’m Doug,
I created “Our Planet Images” to help adventurous minded people to find out more about our planet and to help travelers get more information about places that they want to visit.
I have spent most of my life researching places to go and things to see and I seldom get a complete picture of what it is like to see these places.
This blog and website is designed to provide the reader with more than an overview about a city or country with one or two photos of each site to visit.
My Vision
When I created “Our Planet Images”, I had two main goals.
1) To create a blog that would deliver a new travel related post every week. Each post is designed to inform my subscribers about travel related topics that they might not ever knew existed or to show them more details about famous place then they get from a normal travel site.
Subscribe to this blog and start receiving a new travel post every week.
2) I wanted to create a travel website that could be used for travelers when researching places where they wanted to go.
Use this website to help plan your next trip!
About OPI Blog
My primary objective for this blog is to deliver a new travel related post to my subscribers every week. On each of my weekly post I will mix up my topics and locations so that my subscribers will be able to read about travel topics from many different categories and locations.
My goal for each of my posts is to let the reader know what it is like to experience the topic of the post. I try to achieve this goal in four different ways.
#1 Each post is dedicated to a single topic
Focused on one place at a time!
Garden by the Bay – Singapore
A typical travel blog will make a post on a location and try to tell the reader what there is to do in that location. Typical articles titles could be:
- The best things to do in (insert city).
- The top 10 things to see in (insert city)
- Everything you need to know before visiting ________
Every traveler is different and the things that are interesting to me might not be interesting to someone else. There is no way that can I tell everyone what the best things are for them to do in a location.
My intent is to post on an individual topic and to let the reader get a good understanding of that topic. Then each person can know if that is a place that they are interested in visiting.
The downside to this approach is that it will take me longer to let everyone know all of the things there are to do in a location but over time most of my locations will have more than just 10 things to do.
#2 Get a better perspective with more pictures
I know that people read my blog for different reasons. Some people are looking for ideas of things to see when they travel to locations and other people don’t travel much but like to see my topics because they are interested in seeing things even if they don’t intend on visiting those places.
Pictures allow you to see for yourself!
Each of my posts will contain a larger number of photographs than most travel blogs provide on a specific topic. The idea of showing more photos is that most places that people are interested in learning about or want to visit have a lot of details that make that place interesting.
When I post on a topic, I am revealing it through my eyes.
I want to present the best views of a site to allow everyone to be able to fully to see the site.
When I visit a site, I see it from a distance and I examine it up close. I think that is the way I should present a topic in my posts.
Angkor Wat – Cambodia
#3 Written to inspire, not to inform
The write-ups on my posts are intended to be brief. Many of my posts may be on topics that are unknown to most people so I will include just enough information to let the reader know the basics about the subject. There are many places to get detailed information about almost any topic so my posts will be more focused on experiencing the topic and less about the details of the topic.
The write-up of each post is meant to help you get a better sense of the things there is to see if you choose to visit the site or go to the event. Hopefully this will inspire you to see each topic for yourself.
Short write-ups focused on experiencing the topic
#4 The Dust on My Shoes
At the conclusion of many of my posts I will include a section titled “The Dust on My Shoes”. This section is where I express my thoughts about the experience I had while visiting place or attending the event.
Most of the places that I go makes an impact on my life. My travels have changed me. Traveling has changed the way that I think, the way that I see the world and ultimately it has changed who I am.
We travel to see things but those experiences change us in ways that we never expected.
Find out what “The Dust on My Shoes” means to me.
About the Topics
All of the posts in “Our Planet Images” blog are on topics of things that can be seen when traveling to destinations around the world. Many of the posts are on places to visit. Other topics are on special nature sites, interesting people, entertaining events and local wildlife in a destination.
Most people travel to visit places that are world famous and places that they have dreamed about seeing for most of their life. These places are the places that I list as “must see” place when traveling to a location. I absolutely include these places in my travel topics because everyone from the novelist traveler to the lifelong traveler want to visit these places.
There are other places that aren’t as famous but are every bit as interesting to visit. These are places that many people won’t know about but they might be interested in visiting if they only knew they existed. I will make some of my posts about these places so that travelers will be able to decide if this is a place they would like to visit when traveling to a location.
Almost every place that I have visited has an amazing nature site nearby that can easily be seen on a daytrip. When I plan a trip I always checkout if there are any interesting nature sites that I might want to see. Getting out of the city to spend a relaxing day in nature can be one of the best memories from your trip.
Alternatively, some people travel for the sole purpose of being in nature. Many of the best things to see in the United States are its National Parks.
Don’t forget to check out the possibility of spending some time in nature when you travel. It could turn a good trip into a great trip.
Visiting sites and seeing things are fun and exciting but attending an international event or seeing local people doing unusual things can be an excellent experience that will make a trip more memorable.
Many people travel to attend world famous events. Events like the Rose Parade in Los Angeles or the Cherry Blossom Festival in Japan are known to everyone and thousands of people travel to attend these types of events every year. Other events are regionally popular but are not known to the average traveler. Attending an event can be the highlight of the trip.
Sometimes in my travels I come across people or things that people are doing that I find fascinating. Many of my best travel memories have been of unexpected encounters. Occasionally those encounters have been seeing people doing unusual things. Some of these experiences will be shared in my posts because they are likely to be enjoyed by other travelers also.
The posts that I make on people and events are intended to provide information that will allow travelers to have a better experience in the locations that they will be visiting.
Don’t be so focused on seeing things that you overlooks the people and events around you. Attending a local event or seeing people doing unusual things can be an excellent trip enhancing experience.
I think that it is important to bring attention to the wildlife that shares our planet with us. Earth’s wildlife is all around us, we just need to slow down and look close. Many of the posts that I have on wildlife will be on things that I have seen in urban areas and others will be on wildlife that has required going into remote locations.
Sometimes having a wildlife encounter can be thrilling. I normally try to reserve at least one day of my trip to seek out the local wildlife. It has been amazing to see some of the things that I have encountered.
The write-up on posts that I make about wildlife will be very limited. My intention on my wildlife posts is to bring a little attention to wildlife in an area that can be seen when visiting a location and to provide a couple of interesting facts about that species.
I hope that you will enjoy my post on wildlife topics and that they will help us all to be more aware of the wildlife on our planet.
About OPI Website
The main focus of the OPI website is to help travelers to learn more about the locations that they want to visit. Each of my posts about specific topics are grouped by the location of that site (country or city). So if you want to see all of my posts about a location then they can be found by going to that location. But “Our Planet Images” website is more than a collection of my past posts.
#1 Information about locations that is not in the posts
While each post is on just one topic, the website will provide more information about many of my travel locations that is not in my posts.
Many of the countries that I have visited have a separate page to help get a better understanding of the country.
Arenal Volcano – Costa Rica
The pages that I create for a country features an overview write-up of that country, my list of must see attractions in the country and of course I include a few photos that represent the country.
At the bottom of the page will be a photo of places that I have already featured in my past posts with a link to the post.
#2 Travel Guides
Travel guides are designed to show a more complete picture of the country.
Some countries have been very fascinating to me and I have spent more time in those countries including multiple trips. The extended time that I have spent in these countries have given me a better knowledge of the country. These are the locations that I want to share more information about and I have designated these locations for my “Travel Guides”.
Just like the other countries, my travel guides will start with an overview write-up of that country, my list of must see attractions in the country and of course I include a few photos that represent the country.
Experience the location
Traveling to a country and seeing the top attractions is wonderful but there is more to most locations than just the top sites. When I return home from a trip, I want to feel like I have experienced the location. One of my primary focuses on my travel guides are the major qualities of the country that should not be missed for someone traveling to that country. The major qualities of a country are not a specific site but a key characteristic of the country helps to define the country.
These key characteristics are essential to truly experiencing the county. While it is difficult to truly know a location without actually living there, the information that I want to share for experiencing a country is designed to help a traveler get the most out of a trip to that location.
Food, Food, Food
There is more to experiencing a location than seeing and doing things. Part of experiencing a location is trying the local foods. My travel guides will include the foods that I think a traveler should try while they are visiting the location.
Planning your trip
One of the major factors in having the best experience on a trip is being there at the right time. I provide my recommendation for the best time to visit and when to avoid. This information includes major weather considerations, holidays, peak season and off season.
Location to visit
All of my travel guides are on countries that I have visited multiple locations within the country. Near the bottom of the page will be a link to the cities or areas that I have visited where all of the posts that I have made on that city can be found along with an overview write-up of that city.
See an example of a travel guide by clicking on the button below.
#3 Additional Features
One thing that I have done on this website that I have never seen before is to group all of my posts into categories. All of the categories that I post on can be found on the top menu bar.
Nature topics
When I make a post, it usually is about a very specific place (i.e. a beach, mountain, tower, ancient site, etc.). So if you want to see all of my posts on a specific category then go to the main menu bar just under the main picture of the blog. Each designated group on the main menu will let you see all of my posts on the category under that group. The major groups of categories of my posts are nature, wildlife, people, events and specialty categories.
Wildlife topics
I find it interesting to see a comparison of common categories of things that may be done differently from place to place around the world.
Special Category topics
My Desire
My desire is to share my thoughts and photos of specific spotlight travel topics. Each post I will share my photos and a little bit of information or a few thoughts about that topic. I will try to mix in topics that most people know about with topics that are not as commonly known. This way I will be able to show things that a new traveler may not have seen and I will be able to show things are unknown even to many experienced travelers.
See the world through my posts and start planning your own adventures!
I hope that you will find this blog interesting and that you will continue to follow my posts on “Our Planet Images”. If you do, I think that you will enjoy spending a few minutes looking at some nice picture from around the world and I am sure that you will see things that you never knew existed.
I look forward to hearing your comments.
Cheers,
Doug W