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Living the dream: people who work and travel

While you’re sitting on the train or at your desk today, think of Michael Turtle.

Depending on where he is in the world, the former Triple J newsreader might be driving a Lamborghini around a racetrack, meeting orangutans in the jungle or mushroom hunting with a Michelin-starred chef in Spain.

If it’s a really tough day, you might catch him swimming with turtles on the Great Barrier Reef or having a sauna in rural Finland.

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Actually, he’s in London right now, but Mr Turtle, who left his long-term career in TV and radio to pursue a passion for telling stories in his own way, has done all these things in the past three-and-a-bit years of nomadic life – and made a living from them.

Mr Turtle, 34, worked at the ABC for eight years, and then Channel 7 as a producer before deciding that the media landscape was changing, and not necessarily in a good way.

“I felt generally that the focus was shifting more from telling good stories to chasing ratings or trying to keep within budget,” he says. “My passion had always been in finding out new things and sharing them with others and so I thought maybe I could try doing that on my own terms.”

The result was his blog, Time Travel Turtle. “The blog was really a way to keep myself sane, to have a bit of structure and a record of my journeys.”

While he hoped the blog would attract some interest, he never expected it would eventually grow to be his main business, with 60,000 unique visitors a month.

Michael Turtle

Just another day at the office: Michael Turtle in Machu Picchu in Peru.

While he was focused more on travelling than making money in his first year overseas, at the 10-month mark he was offered his first free trip, which would turn out to be the first of dozens.

Mr Turtle made the decision early on to steer clear of more common blog money-making methods such as advertising, sponsored posts or affiliate links, worrying they might damage his brand.

“So I mainly earn money from the blog by working in partnerships with tourism boards and travel brands on projects where we all get something out of it,” he says.

“That includes things like providing them with some of my images, writing a version of my stories for their website, covering certain things on my social media channels, or working within some key messages.”

Mr Turtle says he looks for an offbeat or different angle on the more popular tourist haunts, and often tries to tell stories of humanitarian or social development work.

Fellow blogger Jen Bishop, founder of Interiors Addict, has also managed to combine her work with flitting around the globe. She’s just returned to Sydney from a six-month trip across Europe and the US, which she describes as “an amazing, once-in-a-lifetime experience”.

Having set up the blog in 2011 as a way to indulge her passion for interior design, Ms Bishop made it her full-time job after being made redundant in 2012.

After working “all the hours God sent, and then some” Ms Bishop decided to hit the road with her husband, while continuing her business at the same time.

Jen Bishop

Toughing it out on the daily grind: Jen Bishop with husband Damian in Monaco.

While her trip was incredible, Ms Bishop says there were also plenty of challenges – the largest being operating across time zones.

“It hasn’t been easy constantly juggling the blog, managing a member of staff remotely, staying organised with the financial side of things and maintaining the impression that it is business as usual,” she says. “When people refer to it as a holiday or say I am lucky (I believe you make your own luck!) I sometimes want to slap them!

“But I’m proud of how I’ve managed to keep it going, and growing.”

Michael Turtle agrees that juggling work and pleasure can be the hardest aspect of working on the road.

“I have made the mistake at times of trying to do too much travelling and sightseeing at the same time as doing too much work,” he says. “The result is burnout and you end up not enjoying either the travel or the work.”

He says some of the upsides of his lifestyle are that he never gets bored, is constantly challenged and can set his own agenda. “The biggest downside is having no escape from any of those things.”

While he may miss his family, friends and even his couch sometimes, Mr Turtle says he has no plans to stop travelling any time soon.

“I’ve always got a desire to see more and learn more and I don’t think that’s ever going to go away.”

Larissa Ham is a freelance writer and blogger who loves interviewing people in exotic locations.

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