Megan Singleton: BloggerAtLarge.com writer with her guide to finding hidden gems

People are always looking to make the most of their trips - and BloggerAtLarge writer Megan Singleton revealed how you can find the undiscovered gems wherever you go.

She recommends taking advantage of social media and Facebook community groups to discover what the locals enjoy.

Read more of Megan's tips and tricks here. 

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sunday Session podcast with Francesca Rudkin
from News talks 'b Travel with Wendy Wu tours Where
the World Is Yours.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Book Now, and Megan Singleton, our travel correspondent, joins us now,
good morning, good morning, Good to have you with us.
I like what you're going to talk about today, because
you know what, I always get a bit of a
panic on when I'm going somewhere new about how I'm
really going to get a sense of the place if
I've only got three or four days, and how am

(00:37):
I going to really kind of, you know, get the
out of what it would be like to live in
Hong Kong or Barcelona as you might be going. You know,
I want to have that real experience and find these
amazing spots and places and things.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Yeah, yes, yes, like what's the latest bar that's just opened,
or where's it where's the best outdoor music venue or something.
I've just written up this post my best ever to
finding hidden gems, and this is what I've been doing
for a while now, And to be honest, I even

(01:11):
use this tip to update my blog content because I
can't be everywhere across everything. I know it's alarming to say.
So what I do is just to cut a long
story short, because I know we don't have all day.
Is I've got my questions because I'm heading over to
New York, for example, is the Staten Island fairy worth taking?

Speaker 4 (01:31):
You know?

Speaker 3 (01:31):
How am I going to find that out? I go
to Facebook and I join pages or groups that are
related to the destination I'm going to. So there are,
for New York, for example, there are lots of different
Facebook groups. So then I choose a group that's got
like one hundred thousand members or at least tens of thousands.
And then what you do is you go to the

(01:52):
search little icon on those Facebook pages and you type
in Staten Island Ferry or where to have my fiftieth
birthday dinner or something like that, and you'll if you
don't find the answers already there, because usually people have
asked those questions before, you can then go ahead and
just ask that question, and honestly, you will get so

(02:14):
many great responses from locals, from people who are there
right now, from people who are there last week, from
people who just said, oh, we just sat on the
rooftop of this place over in Brooklyn had the most
amazing skyline view, and it would be someplace you never
would have found without this little intel from the local
basebook group.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
So there is the key though, making sure it's run
by locals, it's not some kind of tourist.

Speaker 4 (02:40):
Driven Yeah, well yea, and most of them are, and
or they might be run by like the ones that
I follow, like they might be run by companies that
take walking tours, for example, So of course they want
to try and sell you a tour, but there's one
hundred thousand people, so they don't.

Speaker 3 (02:55):
There's lots of comments on there, and you can of
course go ahead and say, yep, that sounds great, I'd
like to book your walking photography tour. That's a bit
of me. And so often they are like, I run
a few pages, and ultimately they'll be like, oh, I
hope that they might join me on a tour, or
I hope that they might read some of my content
if they do ask. But generally speaking, the more people

(03:17):
that are on there, the better engagement you're going to get.
And that's what people are all after.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
You see.

Speaker 3 (03:23):
So yeah, so what they won't the Facebook pages won't
be run by tourist boards, but they will likely be
run by people who have some capacity in the tourism industry,
so they're knowledgeable.

Speaker 2 (03:33):
So what's some of the best sort of advice that
you've been given the places you've traveled to? Well, I use.

Speaker 4 (03:38):
Them for my tours.

Speaker 3 (03:40):
So I've got a tour coming up to Thailand right
in July, and we're going to go to Bangkok and
then we're going to go to Kosamui. So I want
to know, I've only got four nights in each where
are we going to go for dinner? So I'm particularly
looking for at Kosamui where to go for dinner with
great views? And that's what I'm looking through on the
Kosamui pages that I'm now part of.

Speaker 4 (03:59):
So this is great.

Speaker 3 (04:00):
So then I write it down. I open a little
note on my phone and I write down the names
of these restaurants and then I can go ahead and
do my own research later and look at them my
pontrip Advisor whatever, and then I can go ahead and
make my booking brilliant.

Speaker 1 (04:11):
Love it.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Thank you so much, Meghan. You can find that blog
at blogger at large dot com.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
For more from the Sunday session with Francesca Rudkin. Listen
live to News Talks it B from nine am Sunday,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio