5th edition
It has taken months of same-subject dinner conversations. But husband @luefkens (he is the digital media guru @davos) has finally convinced me. For my 6th edition of Lonely Planet’s Provence & the Côte d’Azur (I wrote the 1st in 1998), I am going the full social-media hog.
Using this blog, Twitter and a spanking new Facebook page I have just created (become a fan!), I hope to get a conversation going with anyone and everyone who has something to say on the region I’m researching: a budget shack to die for, a beach bar that’s the biz, what’s up at E-1027, racy screenings at La Friche, bike routes, lighthouse art showings, organic cuisine on a bull farm … I’m indiscriminative.
I’ll regularly post where I am in Provence, what I am looking for, what fun stuff I’ve found (all those gems I just can’t squeeze into the book), and see what happens. I’ll post in French to catch the local crowd and in Marseille I might just try a Tweetup.
Twitravel with @tripalong: talk to me on Twitter
As part of my pre-trip research and planning – minimum two desk-heavy weeks aka now – I quiz everyone I know in the region on what’s happening, what’s new, what’s not. On the road I travel intensely: I visit everything, I walk to the end of most streets, I work long and hard and I grill pretty much everyone I meet … in the most charming of manners bien sûr – an English gal speaking French is 99.99% foolproof.
Yet the more conversations I have pre-trip, the more leads I glean, the more potential discoveries I can make in situ. With social media’s gargantuan, eager-to-share and often well-informed audience, it would be churlish not to ask.
I leave for Provence on 22 March 2009. First leg: St-Tropez area.
Tripalong 