Travel Shaper Mihaela Popa – Romania – WorldTravelBug.Com
I met Mihaela in the Czech Republic during the TBEX (Travel Blog Exchange) conference in Ostrava. I wouldn’t say we hit it off right away. But then, we were together on a 4-day Fam trip around the Central Bohemian Region. And soon enough, we became fond of each other. What helped was her love for Kerala, India. She is an awesome travel photographer and her Instagram rocks! Read on about the Travel Shaper Mihaela Popa to discover what she likes during her travels, and what attracts her to Kerala!
Who is Mihaela Popa?
Hello! I am Mihaela, a travel photographer and entrepreneur from Romania. I am a former finance professional who left a long term and rewarding career in corporate finance for the freedom of travel blogging. Never did I think I would end my planned career in such a prolific domain to follow my biggest passions: travel and photography. But, since life doesn’t always turn as we plan, at the end of 2014, I took a sabbatical and returned to my home country of Romania, after 11 years living in Belgium.
Then I took a 5-month solo trip to Southeast Asia and the rest is history.
Upon my return from that trip, I started my blog and my Instagram channel, which I got addicted to. I loved looking at photos, analyzing them, editing them. And I did that daily, for hours on end. However, I only made this my new profession by 2017, when I realized I did not want to go back to finance and office work.
What’s her kind of travel?
I always say that my blog reflects my style of travel, which I define as smart, cultural and luxury travel. Now, don’t misunderstand me, I am not travelling only to 5 stars hotels. Luxury means a lot more than that! What I do not do though is backpacking style, staying in hostels or roughing it out. I go camping every so often and I say yes to an RV road trip too! In fact, I just returned from the longest one yet: 5 months, 20 US states and 10,000 miles!
My main reason for travel is to discover and learn. I always say that travel is the best teacher, and it doesn’t matter how much you study or how many books you read if you want to learn about travel, travel itself is the best teacher. It not only teaches you about the world, but it will surprise you how much it could teach you about yourself.
The things that I love to do most when I am travelling (other than photography, of course) are meeting and spending time with locals and trying local food.
Mihaela’s favourite destinations
I noticed that most people cannot pick the top 3 destinations as they love many places. And the more you travel, the more you discover, and more places you fall in love with, which makes it difficult to choose those top 3 or even 5.
But, as opposed to most people, I know my number one destination: Japan. I find it so unique, so different from everything else, and I feel incredible there. Kyoto is my favourite place on earth!
India is one of my biggest loves too. I even lived there for a while and it was the country that I visited most times. Now I think the USA took its place. In India, Kerala feels like home to me.
Now it is getting tricky to pick 2-3 more because I love so many!
Asia is my happy place, so almost any country there will go into my top 3 or 5. I love Laos and Vietnam for different reasons!
And, because I discovered it more, the USA is moving up among the first 5. The landscape here is breathtaking.
Mihaela Popa and her travel experiences
I visited Japan for the first time in 2011. I didn’t have a smartphone back then and phone GPS was not a thing. So I was using a good old paper map to find my way around. One day I got quite far from Kyoto, trying to find a specific temple. I was on a local bus; the instructions were spoken only in Japanese, and I was trying to identify the names of the stations looking at the list. So many people jumped in to help me. It didn’t matter that they did not speak English. The same happened almost every time I looked at the map. Maybe they thought I was lost. But how much they went out of their way to help, touched me.
In Nepal, I met one of my idols at his home in Schechen Monastery. His name is Matthieu Ricard, and he is a former French biologist turned Buddhist monk over 50 years ago, and an excellent photographer! I cried when I met him. That was one of the best days of my life!
Her bucket list destinations
There are so many places that I haven’t been to, and they have been on my bucket list for a while, but the problem is that I keep adding new ones, so my bucket list is huge now, haha! But I have my top ones!
Bhutan has been number one on my list for a few years now. I love Asia, I am very interested in the Buddhist culture and Bhutan is so different (just like Japan). Writing this, I realise that I like unusual and unique places.
Tibet is my second bucket list destination, for the same reasons as above.
And then, Africa. There are so many places that I want to visit in Africa, with Okavango delta, Serengeti National Park and Madagascar’s Baobab Alley being up there on top.
Her recent trip
I just returned from a long road trip of the US. Like I mentioned earlier, we drove 10,000 miles across 20 US states in 5 months in our new travel trailer.
I enjoyed every minute. The country is so diverse that I fell in love. I had visited the States in the past, quite a few times, but I saw the cities. This time I explored the country. The landscape is beyond words. You feel you are on another planet in so many places! Utah and Arizona have a unique landscape I have never seen elsewhere.
I visited many National Parks that left me speechless, saw incredible coastline and waterfalls in Oregon. And California… Well, California needs no introduction. San Diego is now one of my favourite cities in the world.
Pandemic’s effect on her travel plans
Besides making me spend longer time in the US (which I cannot complain about), it made me spend more time at home, in Romania. I spent more time with my family and I discovered a few places in my country that I knew of, but never visited.
However, my life as I knew it like everybody else’s out there, came to a complete stop for a while. And like it did with so many people out there, it also affected me money-wise. But, at the time of writing this, I am vaccinated and ready to take back my life! Slowly… but surely!
Her travel plans
None at the moment. I just came back from the US and I am planning to spend some time at home and catch up on writing, editing and other work I could not do while on the road. But ask me again in one week and this might change.
Her advice to aspiring travel content creators
The very first question that you have to ask yourself is WHY! Why do I want to become a professional travel content creator? And the answer better not be money! Haha!
Second, I would say, get your toes in first and test the waters. Is the temperature to your liking? Do this while you still have your job (or whatever you are doing) so that you see what it means. Know from the beginning that it is A LOT of work. Travel content creation does not mean putting on a pretty dress and taking a nice picture in a nice location! Though, even that requires more work than you think.
However, proper travel content creation requires a lot more, regardless of where you choose to put focus (photography, video, writing). It requires discipline, dedication, long working hours, short nights (as you need to catch all those sunrises) and a lot of learning.
But again, start with WHY and once that is clear, take one step at a time.
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