Mindie Burgoyne is a storyteller from a long line of storytellers. She uses that capability today as a travel writer, blogger, author, tour operator and speaker. Her focus is traveling within the context of a story to mystical – magical places that stir the heart, mind, and spirit. Her tour company, Travel Hag Tours, LLC has two subsidiaries –Thin Places Mystical Tours provide group and individual travel opportunities to mystical/sacred sites in Ireland, Scotland, Brittany and the USA; and Chesapeake Ghosts – a trail of 8 regional ghost walks on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Travel Hag Tours – provides group packages and tours for women, girlfriends and true Travel Hags.
Mindie is the past president of the Eastern Shore Writers Association and the current President of the Beach to Bay Heritage Area. She has written six books on regional travel. Her writings and photographs have been featured in the Washington Post, Baltimore Sun, CBS News, National Geographic Television Network, USA Today, the Today Show, Maryland Life Magazine, What’s Up? Magazines, Coastal Style, the National Catholic Reporter, Guideposts, the Vancouver Sun, Metropolitan Magazine, and Notre Dame Alumni Magazine as well as numerous business and travel websites.
Writing Has Led Her Success
Starting as a pastoral musician, writing music for Catholic liturgies, Mindie eventually became the publisher of an international religious publishing house with over 200 titles in Washington, DC. When Mindie and her husband, Dan moved to the rural Eastern Shore of Maryland in 2002 she began travel blogging and writing copy for websites. In 2009 after the publication and success of Haunted Eastern Shore, Mindie started a ghost tour business that grew to cover 10 towns, with 8 ghost tour guides, six of whom are Nationally Certified Interpretive Guides (NAI). That company, Chesapeake Ghost Tours is now in its eleventh year and has become the largest connected trail of heritage tours in the USA. Mindie also went on to write three more books in the Haunted America series published by The History Press.
In 2011 after her writing on mystical places became popular, Mindie started the company, Thin Places Mystical Tours, offering group tours twice a year to mystical places – also known as “thin places” in Ireland and Scotland. The company still thrives and Mindie continues to write about the Irish landscape on her Thin Places blog.
Mindie states. “Writing about places of mystery whether they are haunted sites, ancient monuments, or images in the landscape that stir memory and intuition is my focus. I’ve only used social media to promote my writing and tours.”
Mindie admits that while she loves the tours and speaking, writing is her passion. It’s where all the “newness” happens. She is, however, not fond of the writing process. “Crafting written work is art. It’s making something out of nothing, and that creation is seen only in the reader’s imagination. It’s hell. But the sense of accomplishment that washes over you when you discover people are reading your work and being changed by it is the addictive element that drives you to do it all over again.”
Life on the Eastern Shore of Maryland
Mindie makes her home on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. Though she still feels like a native Washingtonian, she’s been on the rural, unpopulated Shore – where tidal water is never more than 20 miles away – for the last 21 years. It’s home and the landscape of Chesapeake Country ignites her creativity.
WRITER / AUTHOR
Mindie is the author of six published books –Her next book, Thin Places: Celtic Doorways to the Otherworld, is about mystical places in Ireland – or places where the veil between this world and the eternal world is thin.
BLOGGER – Mindie blogs
The Travel Hag
Thin Places Mystical Tour of Ireland
Chesapeake Ghosts.
Thin Places Podcast
CBS NEWS Travel and Outdoors
- Maryland Wine Trails; Scenic, Cultural, and Homegrown Fun
- Annapolis: Government Up Close
- Best Cold Weather Fun in Maryland
SPEAKER / TRAINER / STORYTELLER
On Travel – Mindie speaks on a variety of travel topics and does “virtual tours” from the podium for travel groups, conferences, community colleges and non-profits associated with travel and outdoor recreation. Subjects include travel to haunted and sacred places, mindful travel, and travel for women.
TOUR OPERATOR
Chesapeake Ghost Walks
Thin Places Mystical Tours
FREE NEWSLETTER – Mindie has free monthly / quarterly e-newsletter called the Travel Hag News. In it she highlights travel, family, business and mystical places.
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