Last week I have hosted my very first event at Knot Churros in South Kensington. Some of you probably remember my very first visit to Knot Churros this spring. I have fallen in love with this cosy cafe and their incredible pink churros (what a dream). I continued coming back to this place regularly and quickly became friends with Knot Churros team- I honestly feel like at home when I am there. Everyone’s so lovely! And the place itself is SO FLAMINGO! After I published this photo on my Instagram they even decided to use it on the cover of their menu!
When Knot Churros asked me to host a Christmas event with them – their very first Christmas party I was beyond excited and said yes straight away! I have invited my closest friends and been counting the days down.
When I got to the venue on the day of the event I couldn’t believe my eyes…It all looked soooooo magical, like a fairytale! Honestly- I had tears in my eyes. Look how much effort they put into decorating the place for my very first event! I was SO happy!
We had so much fun with my girls! We all absolutely loved the churros. The choice is so big – from classic signature churros with cinnamon or dipped in Belgian white chocolate, glazed with fruit Pebbles. So YUMMY! They also created a very special Christmas Flamingo Shake! It was delicious!
A special thank you to the Knot Churros team for creating such a magical Christmas event, to Miniso UK for the cutest goodie bags, to Diana – a great London based photographer and for snapping these beautiful photos and GurpreetKaur for filming the whole experience. You can watch the full video from the event here. We honestly had the best time! I am so grateful for this wonderful opportunity and a bunch of supportive girls! My heart was full! If you ever visit- send them my flamingo love again!
As some of you already seen on my Instagram, couple of weeks ago I’ve surprised my mum with a plane ticket to London. She has been to London quite a few times already, but this year she visited me during the summer for the first time ever. I’ve planned to show her the best things to do in town in the summer. We’ve spent few days visiting my favourite parks, coffee shops, rooftop bars and restaurants, but there was one thing I really wanted myself (and never had a chance to do it), so I thought it would be a great idea to do it together- Afternoon Tea experience on famous Brigit’s Bakery Bus.
As my mum visited me during Notting Hill Carnival weekend, they’ve prepared a special menu and decorations.
Image source- Brigit’s Bakery Instagram
You can probably imagine my reaction when I walked in to the bus full of palm trees, flamingos and Caribbean rum- I literally felt like I am back in the Caribbean that as you know – I absolutely love. It looked just so fabulous!
As soon as we’ve sat down we were offered a drink and a little savoury sandwiches and the tour started. The bus headed from Victoria station through all the most important London’s landmarks. I honestly think it’s a great way to see the city if you’re only in town for a little while! They’ll make sure you won’t miss anything! During our tour we’ve had such a beautiful and super hot weather- London looked honestly prettier than ever!
After the starter we’ve been served Caribbean style lunch – rice & peas, Jerk chicken wings & Coleslaw- everything was freshly prepared and delicious. My mum absolutely loved eating and watching London’s vibrant life through the bus window. We’ve continued admiring the views, while chatting, taking lots of selfies and sipping chilled Prosecco.
And then the time for desserts! I had almost no more room after the lunch I am not going to lie, haha but everything looked too good to be missed. We’ve tried Caribbean tart with banana & Dulcey chocolate (my personal favourite!) , chocolate cupcakes, Sablé Breton and Choux vanilla and Rhum followed by traditional scones with clotted cream and jam. So delicious!
We couldn’t finish it all but we were offered a take away box. After the tour we’ve been also kindly gifted the prettiest coffee mug- it made it a perfect London souvenir for my mum.
Here’s both of us after too much food and bubbles
We’ve absolutely loved the tour! We definitely ate too much but had so much fun together! I think I was great way to see London’s landmarks too. If you’re planning to visit London and looking for a fun thing to do you should definitely check out Brigit’s Bakery Bus Tour!
As I have been here for a week already I have decided to put together a couple of tips and things you should be aware of when planning your trip to Tulum.
Seaweed
Sadly many people who reviewed Tulum on Social Media didn’t mention this problem. I think it’s super important to mention it especially if you’re planning a beach holidays. We visited in May and in Tulum we were not able to swim in the ocean. The seaweed was everywhere and water looked seriously dirty. While luxury hotels are trying to clean their private beaches and it they were looking a bit better, we still haven’t managed to have a swim. Of course there’s many other things to do and see in the area. You can drive to other beaches ( car is essential) or swim in local cenotes but personally I wouldn’t recommend Tulum as a beach destination. We’ve been told by locals it’s not like this all year long- they advised the best time to visit Tulum and avoid the seaweed is between October and April however I heard from other travellers who visited during this time and the seaweed was there aswell, however less than it is now.
London prices
This is not what you probably expect from Mexico but Tulum is extremely touristy and prices are pretty much the same like in London when it’s about food and drinks. The prices of cocktails in the beach clubs vary between £10-£17, for lunch/ dinner for two between £70-£200. Scooter rental per day is about £20 plus 5000 pesos deposit. Car rental with full inscurance starts from £40 per day ( the most basic car) plus £500 deposit. The only thing we were quite lucky with, is that in May Tulum was pretty dead. Beach clubs were pretty empty so there was not such a thing like queues or no space. Few times ( in the weekend) we were told there’s a minimum spent. Normally it was around $60 US dollars per person in places like Nomade or to the bar at Azulik ( to get to the bar there was a minimum spent of around £25 per person)
Drugs
Another thing that really surprised me. I mean, I was aware that there’s lots of parties in Tulum but drugs were sold literally everywhere even in the day time. When walking around in the evening you are literally bombarded!
Extreme poverty
While most of the people showcase Tulum as luxurious, trendy destination full of chic restaurants, boutiques and 5* hotels to me it was only one street. Outside of it ( also in Tulum) the poverty is insane. It actually made me super sad. Once we were eating in the restaurant in Tulum downtown and i stood up to take a photo of something. In the meantime, a little boy (3-4 years old) came up to our table. He saw that I left a cherry on my empty plate and asked my boyfriend if he could eat it. When he told me I wanted to cry. We bought him a crepe with nutella and I swear I’ve never seen so grateful eyes and big smile in my life. The contrasts in Tulum are crazy and while I loved all the chic places on the ocean front, I was also trying to spent some money in downtown and support local businesses rather than only 5* chains.
Tips
In Mexico, similar to US they expect you to tip for everything. Sometimes optional service charge will be added to your bill. If not, they will kindly suggest you should tip even at places like petrol station, parkings etc It’s good to have some change on you at all times. In the beach clubs they will expect higher tips even though in most of the places the service charge is added to the bill already. Waiters in some places like Taboo were very pushy and rude about it.
Parking
Once again – we’ve visited Tulum in a low season but sometimes in the weekend it was not easy to find the parking space which would be free. Sometimes they let you park as a guest of the hotel/ beach club but most of the times these spaces are reserved for the guests who actually stay at the hotel. There was few parkings around but I have noticed the prices were not really fixed. Once there was a sign of Parking 15 pesos while when we got there it turned out to be 200 pesos. Also in some of these private parkings they were changing the prices depending on what car is coming in. We were asked for 300 pesos and the better looking car after us 500 pesos.
Slightly different post than usual, but today I would like to talk about something that was bothering me a lot recently and decided to share these thoughts with you. If you’re planning to become a travel-blogger this post will definitely help you to understand how it all works and make you more aware about how it all looks like and what to expect. As you already know, I have quitted my full-time Social Media career last year in June. It’s been almost a year of working as a full-time blogger and decided to share my thoughts and feelings.
Where to I start? Well, first of all I would like to say how extremely difficult this whole year was. It was very exciting and beautiful too, but apart from all these incredible travels, trips, all the wonderful people I’ve met and things I’ve experienced ( I am forever grateful for all the opportunities and will never ever take it for granted!) I’ve also experienced many unpleasant situations and this is the topic I’d like to touch today.
First of all- jealousy. Since I’ve left my full-time job I have experienced a lot of that. I had people questioning me and my earnings wherever I said what my job was. Even people I used to really like in the past, were talking behind my back and were trying to find out how much money I make, how can I afford living in London from “just a blog”, how can I travel so much if I “don’t work”. There were comments back home that I must be a prostitute in London, because “how can she afford places like Dubai, Seychelles and Maldives”. Then my favourite- “she must have a rich boyfriend”. Well, here I would like to add- my goal was never to find a rich boyfriend to rely on. I am probably one of the most independent girl on Earth and it would never cross my mind, no matter how hard the life is, if you need to build everything on your own from the scratch. I’ve always wanted a man who would love me, respect me and support me. A man who would be right next to me and help me fight for my dreams and be ready to work hard to build the empire together. And here we are- myself and Salvatore, fighting for our dreams, working on our careers and building this dream life since we’ve met in our early twenties and both came to London with nothing but a dream. So just to make it clear -he is not my sugar daddy ( I wish, HAHA,ok I am kidding!)
I am also not a rich kid, who was given everything from the parents. As I have already mentioned in the past, I came to London 6 years ago with £600 in my pocket, that I have saved while working all summer as an animator in Kos Island, Greece. So nope, nothing came easy and nothing was given to me- it was all determination, patience and hard work. If you’re planning to be a full-time Influencer/ blogger you need to be prepared for this sort of comments and I want you to be aware of that. To people who don’t understand this industry, it will look like we don’t actually have a job and we’re always on holidays. With the time you’ll learn to ignore these inappropriate comments and continue doing your thing anyway.
Second thing I would like to talk about are press trips as I get a lot of questions about them too. It’s truth, that we do get a lot of opportunities. We get paid to travel, create content (photography + blog advertising). Especially when you build the relationships with PR’s and travel agencies, you’re more likely to get more opportunities – if they were happy with all the deliveries before of course! However, do I only go on press trips and accept every single proposition? Of course not! I wish I could tell you how many I decline every month!
The truth is, running a travel blog full time is a constant and never-ending investment, no matter how “big” you are on Social Media. No matter how many invites come though my email, I only accept projects, destinations and hotels, that both – myself and my audience will benefit from. Also I always have my own bucket list of places I’d like to visit and blog about anyway, so I will always invest my own money in plane tickets, hotels and restaurants – NO, THEY ARE NOT ALL SPONSORED. Sometimes I even prefer to pay for a hotel, to have more time shooting content outdoors, exploring the place, rather than being kind of “stuck” shooting the hotel. I love beautiful hotels stays- don’t get me wrong, but I always try to find time for exploring the places to be able to really write about them. Not everything I do is “for the gram”. I am always trying to travel the way that I’m able to really recommend stays ( luxury and affordable luxury) places to drink, eat and things to do- and yes I do pay for all that to be able to really call myself a “blogger”and have something to say about the place rather than just write a hotel review and come back home. I don’t go to places just because the trip is sponsored. I am trying to always fit the destination into my brand and I analyse if it will be worth it for days before I say “Yes”. As you have also probably noticed, I often ask you, where’d you like me to travel next and I always keep your answers in mind, while planning my trips, to make sure I deliver to both- my audience and my clients.
So if you’re planning to become a travel blogger as you think that this way you can travel for free, as everything is sponsored – you’re wrong and this is not what you should think of when planning to turn your blog into a full-time business and a long-term career. You need to be prepared, it will always be an investment- no matter how many followers you have and how long you’ve been doing it for. Personally I’m investing almost all the money I make into next destinations and content to make sure my business keep rolling.
Next thing which is super hard in this industry- a lot of brands will ask you to work for free. I find it upsetting sometimes, as being a blogger really means being a photographer, graphic designer, Social Media and Marketing expert, video editor, a model, a creative director- all I one person. I don’t think it’s fair to be asked to work for free. It’s a job like any other. Creating content end editing takes me days and building this blog and other Social Media channels took me years. Also it was (and still is!) a huge time and money investment, so I now simply refuse working for free. However, if you’re only starting to build it, you need to be prepared, that you may be asked to work for free or in exchange for a product and I think it’s ok at the beginning as you’re starting to build relationships with brands and PR’s, but you need to learn and understand your value so you’ll know when to start charging for your work and services offered. After all, it’s hard to pay the rent with free make up and clothes 🙂
I hope this article helped you to understand how the “behind the scenes” looks like and what you need to be aware of when thinking to go blogging full-time.
I’m finally back after a little break! Recently I have been feeling a bit down and uninspired so I gave myself some time to rest and recharge the batteries. But spring finally came to London, yayyy! I am finally feeling better! It’s definitely my favourite time of the year here in London. My favourite place to stroll it’s Notting Hill! I love this vibrant, trendy area full of cute coffee shops, restaurants and beautiful boutiques. I also adore all the little streets with all the white-washed houses, currently surrounded by blooming Magnolia trees, ahhh! I went for a photoshoot with my friend Alex and we’ve shot some magical content! Hope you’ll like it!
