Hi,
When I opened our first call for submissions in July, I honestly wasn’t sure what all would arrive. It’s one thing to say that you want stories about the 90% of destinations that people don’t consider as much but should. It’s another thing to ask people to write them down and share them.
We were thrilled to receive over 60 excellent pieces about many different places, each one clearly with a lot of care and thought behind it. I read and looked over every single one of them. In the end, we accepted about 8%. Saying no to some of them was harder than expected, but at the same time, we made the commitment to get back to everyone and will continue to do so.
Since then, you readers have joined journeys to Kaieteur Falls in Guyana, to Kandy in Sri Lanka, through Cairo on foot, and to Costa Rica for a little humor, with another one coming later this month. We want to continue to run your interesting stories told with a sense of place and humor, and I’m very excited to see what’s submitted during this period. I do hope we can run even more stories from even more places.
A lot of you have also become paid subscribers since July, and I want to thank you as well. Your subscription goes directly toward paying the writers you are reading here, and it’s been a pleasure to send these payments.
This is our fall round. It’s open now until November 30, 2026, in three categories and is free to submit:
Essay: 1,000 to 3,000 words. Pays $200.
Photo Essay: 6 to 15 images with 700 to 1,500 words. Pays $200.
Humor: 500 to 1,000 words. Pays $50.
Full guidelines and the submission form are on the submission page. Every submitter will hear back by December 31, 2026. Paid subscribers can submit year-round in every category at the same rates.
Another thing I realized in doing this is that the quality of the work deserves to be noticed beyond being published here, and we want to support our contributors in this way. So moving forward, we will enter standout pieces in awards such as NATJA and Lowell Thomas, wherever applicable, at our cost.
If you’re not able to submit this time, I do hope you’ll follow along, or share this with someone who might have a piece ready or waiting to be told.
Whether you have a finished piece to submit during this call or not, you can also join our contributor network, where we’re assigning stories and taking pitches based off of the regions you cover and places you’ve been.
— Scott