Welcome to “CreativElena”!

Creativity is my passion – not only when travelling. I have started writing stories as early as primary school, and have naturally moved on to chronicling our family travel adventures in early travel diaries (there where no blogs back then 😉 ). After spending an entire year of living abroad in London, I just knew that travel and meeting people from all over the world would not only continue to be my passion, but also my life.

Creative travel pictures with artists form Porto Alegre, Brazil, taken during the summer of 2014.

After successfully finishing my master’s degree in international tourism management studies, complete with high-profile internships in both Madrid and Paris, I decided to move to New Zealand for a start. For well over a year, I immersed myself in the wonderful Kiwi and Maori cultures, to the end of spending an entire summer working as a national park guide there. Two more round the world trips later, I am happy to direct you to my New Zealand travel blog here, telling you all there is to know about cultural travel in one of the most fascinating countries on Earth. Already now, I can’t wait to take my own son and husband back to the “Land of the Long White Cloud”, or Aoteaora, as New Zealand is called by the First Nation Maori people.

During all those years of world travelling and becoming my own boss, I always had that one dream: Writing and publishing my own book.

I started this travel blog at virtually the same time as I launched my own business, “CreativElena”, as a PR agency. It has subsequently led me to publishing my first book, and got me round to visiting travel trade shows, network with people from all corners of the world, and gather up “a few more languages” along the way: It’s seven languages I now speak fluently, which does, I admit, make me a little proud. All the more as I have been able to publish my tips and insights into successful language learning in another eBook (available here, however for now, published in German language only).

Since 2015, I have published five books altogether:

• The Creative Traveler’s Handbook, a handbook crediting the global trend for creative travel in a how-to advice style book, published as both print-on-demand and as an eBook on Amazon
• #CreativeTravel #inCostaBrava, an eBook I’ve published together with the Costa Brava Girona tourism board
• Sprachen Lernen Sprachen Leben, an eBook I’ve published together with the Austrian branch of the language travel company EF Education First.
• Die Abenteuer von Fina und Liam – Volume 1, a children’s book about friendship, adventures, travel and languages!
• Die Abenteuer von Fina und Liam – Volume 2, which continues the story along the lines of Volume 1.

Out and about with my first book, “The Creative Traveler’s Handbook”.

I just love getting creative and becoming inspired by my trips, by the people I meet and the stories they tell. It’s a gift to be able to share them here with you on my travel blog. The next book (or eBook?) is also already in the making, likely on “Family Travel Tips“, as my young son Liam and my husband Georg have opened up an entire new world for me recently. We have taken Liam on trips with us since he was seven weeks old. On my blog, you can find more about my stories, tips and advice on how to travel with young kids and babies here.

As an entrepreneur, I am furthermore happy to assist you in your lectures, speaking gigs, translations and language workshops, cultural tourism projects and content creator campaigns.

Nearing my eleventh anniversary of being self-employed, there is virtually no business situation to me that cannot be resolved using a good deal of wit, creativity and hard work (of course). Over all these years, I have researched religious heritage tourism in Greece, written Social Media Guidelines for cultural tourism providers as part of the EuropeTour learning platform, developed countless content creator strategies and campaigns with national and international tourism authorities, done translation and language training work and stood in front of students times and times over so as to talk about the #LifeOfATravelBlogger, professionally speaking. I furthermore teach at the University of Applied Sciences FH Joanneum in Styria, and love to make myself available for guest lectures and seminars at international universities and conferences around the globe.

If you wish to read even more about my “work in progress”, you may head over to my blog section called “Work With Me”. It includes a great many articles on travel insights from all over the world, structured according to:

• PR & Social Media
• Speaking Gigs & Conferences
• Language & Translation Projects

Curious? ReachMe@CreativElena.com!