New adventure travel site goes live
- Added:
- Jul 01, 2009
Adventure travel site Big Earth has gone live, produced by the team behind TV series ‘Long Way Down’.
Big Earth acts as a portal through which travelers can plan their trip, and then share their experiences with the online travel community.
Created by Russ Malkin, expedition leader for shows 'Long Way Round', 'Long Way Down', 'By Any Means', and 'Race to Dakar', the site's aim is to pass on the knowledge built up when
planning these programmes, combined with the experience of other experts and the wider adventure community.
Big-name companies already signed up to add to the content available on the site at launch include BMW, Nikon, Nokia and Nissan.
The site's message is "Plan. Share. Discover", and visitors will find a dedicated channel for each strand.
The Plan section offers advice on passports, visas, insurance and vaccinations, as well as in-depth guides on filming and photographing travels, preparing vehicles. It features interviews and tips from leading explorers, including Tom Avery, the youngest person ever to trek
the South Pole, and Joe Simpson, mountaineer and author of Touching The Void.
The Share section is home to the Big Earth community, where visitors to the site can publish information about their own adventures, uploading pictures and video to their personal Travel Blog.
An interactive map lets users zoom into any location around the world and get real up-to-the-minute stories and advice from other travellers.
In addition a forum area allows further interactive discussion and debate, where visitors can post questions and help other travellers with their queries.
The Discover area of the site helps users plan overseas volunteer work, in partnership with organisations such as Unicef, VSO and i-to-i.
Founder Russ Malkin hit upon the idea of Big Earth after creating a series of acclaimed travel TV shows, and being deluged by emails from viewers asking for advice on planning their own trips.
Russ Malkin, founder of Big Earth, said: "The key to successful adventure travel is preparation and research, and with Big Earth we're aiming to open up the knowledge we've built up to the online travel community, and also inspire them to get involved. The combined knowledge will ultimately become a sort of living encyclopaedia - inspiring and supporting a new generation of adventure travellers"
www.bigearth.co.uk
By
Robin Langford
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