Instagram: More than Pretty Pictures?

Good morning from Ireland! I know I know, yesterday I was talking about surfing in Norway and when you read this, I’m most likely surfing in the Atlantic Ocean off the Irish coast. Or at least building sand castles in the howling wind on the beach with little miss Mini. The theme for Thursdays for the past few months has been Instagram and travel, and today I wanted to share couple of things I never ever thought Instagram would have the power to do when I purchased my first iPhone, solely for sharing pretty pictures online. This was just 68 weeks ago when I for the first time pressed the “share” button and published a picture of me and my little girl learning to make pasta together in Italy at the Casa Artusi. I did have an inkling then, that I would be inspired and awed, but I never thought that I would meet the people behind the pictures or make my travel plans based on recommendations coming from my new virtual friends. Or that I would be featured in a book! The real social social media

You can find me on Twitter, Pinterest, Google+ and soon this blog should be present in Facebook too (although I’m not making any promises about that), but Instagram has been the one social media which has truly and effortlessly felt social to me when it comes to communicating with people I haven’t met in real life.

Through sharing images, I have gotten a closer and intimate look at other Instagrammers’ lives and surroundings, learned what they are passionate about and sometimes even found out what they are having for breakfast. Or dinner. I have also shared my travels, showed my hometown, taken you with me to my favourite mountains with our little ones. And when I mentioned I’ll be traveling to Ireland, I got to meet few of you in person. Who would’ve thought! The above image is from Alison Chino’s Instagram gallery, check out her images on IG and Chino House blog. 

Traveling through Instagram

Instagram is the perfect tool for travel inspiration. But it also comes in handy when making the next step and actually booking travels and making plans. This past week has been my first venture to Northern Ireland and instead of a guide-book, I’ve been guided by instructions, hints, tips and of course beautiful pictures from the Instagram users that I follow and who live in the region. I have also connected with other Instagrammers who have been in the same locations roughly at the same time, and I’m excited to see whether our paths will cross again!

Although I might have become slightly more obsessed about checking my phone and having it with me at all times since entering the world of instagramming, even my husband now agrees that it has been for the better instead of for the worse, as we have gone from one amazing sight to the next on our Northern Ireland adventure. We still have almost a week to explore the coastline and I’m excited to share more beautiful views of my old “home country”.

Come and have a look over at Instagram what the weather is doing in Ireland today, or to be more accurate, what it did yesterday as I’m bit slow in processing all the pretty pictures!

I’m part of the team co-hosting the Instagram Travel Thursday Linky, an initiative started with Skimbaco Lifestyle online magazine to connect travel and Instagram enthusiasts across borders and I would love if you joined us! Read the guidelines on Skimbaco’s site and get to know us co-hosts better by hovering your mouse over the interactive image below. And once you are ready with your own post, please add it to the Linky in the bottom of the page and check out some of the other participating bloggers! All images are from my personal Instagram gallery, you can find me there at @todestinationunknown.