I once asked a guy who had just come from a journey what he’d seen. His response was, “I don’t know, I’ll have to check over my photos.”
Long before everybody owned many cameras travelers used to make sketches of interesting sites they visited. The practice was not limited to architects and artists. The travelers’ journals are a cultural treasury. Why couldn’t we revive the tradition?
Using your sketchbook instead of a camera requires some changes in traveling habits. You may not be able to fill your itinerary with as many points of interest as before. But is that a bad thing, really? Maybe this is a tourism equivalent of the slow food movement!
Sketches don’t have to be professional pieces of art. Just make verbal and visual notes on what you see or feel. Some people keep a travel journal in which they include mementos that they’ve picked up during their travel: entry tickets, cards, beer mats, and so on.
Scan the sketches and distribute them digitally. I’m sure this time your “travel photos” will stand out.
There is a flickr group that showcases travel sketchbooks. If you want to see a professional illustrator's travel journals visit the site of Joaquín González Dorao.
