Bill Dalton has spent much of his life traveling the roads less traveled. Along the way, he founded a publishing company in a youth hostel in Queensland, Australia, which led to the publication of his ground-breaking Indonesia Handbook which the London Sunday Times called "one of the best practical guides ever written about any country."
In the course of his 17 years as publisher and owner of Moon Publications, Dalton produced a series of 65 guidebooks to countries and regions around the world as well as to a number of U.S. states. The Moon Handbook series became known for its award-winning, well-written and exceptionally informative guides. In 1999, Dalton sold all his remaining shares in the company in order to freelance and consult.
Although the field is now crowded with more than a dozen guides to Indonesia, Dalton’s classic guidebooks to Indonesia still hold a special place. Kal Muller has dubbed him "the dean of Indonesia travel writers." Dalton says, "Although the practical information in my books are now out of date, the cultural and historical material is still very sound."
After graduating with a Candidatus Magistratus degree from the University of Copenhagen in 1970, Dalton embarked on a seven year journey through 67 countries around the world. He first touched down on Indonesian soil in Medan, North Sumatra in 1972 and over the next 33 years Dalton has explored more than 100 of the country’s 17,000 islands.
Dalton has hitched rides on oil company helicoptors, climbed a dozen volcanoes, ridden on top of buses the length of Nusa Tenggara, trekked through mosquito-infested swamps to live amongst aborigine tribes, was arrested and interrogated during the Suharto regime as a trouble-making journalist. "They didn’t like me calling Suharto’s wife "Madame Ten Percent." He is considered one of the world’s foremost travel experts on Indonesia.
For seven years, starting in the early 1990s, Dalton worked as a tour leader for Mountain Travel of California and Asia Transpacific Journeys of Colorado, leading adventure tours all over the eastern islands, Sulawesi, Central Kalimantan and Papua. He has led a total of 16 wildlife and cultural tours to Komodo Island and to the Tanjung Putih Orangutan Reserve of central Kalimantan. "I never thought I’d become bored seeing orangutans and komodo dragons in the wild, but I did." Finally, in 1999, he led a group of New Yorkers who cured him of ever wanting to lead another tour again in his life.
I recently visited Dalton in the mountains of Bali where he lives with his Indonesian wife and four year old daughter. I asked him how he got started traveling. "Travel got into my blood very early. When I was growing up in Massachusetts, just six or seven years old, my Dad used to come into my room in the middle of the night, wake me up and tell me to get dressed. We then climbed into the family Chevy and headed out to California, Florida, or god knows where else - sometimes with me driving on his lap. The next morning, after he sobered up, we would find ourselves blinking in the harsh daylight of Time’s Square or the Maine coastline hundreds of miles from home. When he started taking my younger brother along on these "night trips" too, my mother threatened to divorce him, so he stopped. These nocturnal flights were the first time I ever experienced the ecstasy of the open road, and they never left me."
How did you get started writing? "Handing in a short story in the sixth grade was the first time I knew I had writing ability. The teacher was so threatened by my writing that she took me aside after class, asked me if I believed she could write better than me, then gave me a failing grade."
What do you consider your first "break" as a travel writer? One afternoon in 1973 in a youth hostel in northern Australia, I was typing out some tips on travel through Indonesia for a couple of German guys. A crusty old New Zealand journalist named Noel came up and said, "You shouldn’t just give that information away. You should sell it!" He told me about an art festival that was to take place in Nimbin, New South Wales, the following week. This was Australia’s Woodstock. I had met some girls who worked at the Cairns Public Library and they let me sneak in one evening and use the mimeograph copier. I printed out 800 copies of my travel tips, titled it "A Traveller’s Notes: Indonesia," stapled the three sheets together, and the next day got a ride on the back of a motorcycle down to Nimbin. On the first day of the festival I set up shop on a blanket on the town’s main street and sold my little booklet for 50 cents apiece. I made $150 the first day and sold out completely by the 3rd day. I knew I was on to something. This modest typewritten publication eventually grew into a publishing organisation with over 65 titles distributed in 32 countries around the world."
You’ve worked for over 30 years in the book and magazine publishing industry. What advice would you give to someone who is considering going into travel writing? "That is a complicated question because there are really two kinds of travel writing - travel guidebooks and travelogue. Both are sub-specialties of the travel writing genre. In guidebook writing, because of the ferocity of the competition and the paucity of the rewards, I would recommend not taking up this profession if you can possibly help it. As for real expository travel writing, the finest of which emulates great literature, just go for it because if you’re a natural born writer you will never rest until you have at least made the attempt."
Suggestions for interviews or comments may be sent to pakbill2003@yahoo.com
Copyright@2004 Al Hickey
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