Inspire Travel Goals: Easily Add Trip Pics to Your Phone Background

How do you fulfill your travel goals to travel more? You’ve gotta remember your why and one easy way to do that is by adding travel photos as your phone background. Photos that you see everyday and every time you use your phone. When you see yourself gliding through the canals of Venice in a gondola, exploring the pyramids of Egypt, or hiking in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, you are inspired to plan even more adventures, trips, and vacations. Your photos are not only Instagram-worthy eye candy on your Phone, but they also help you to picture yourself traveling. More.

If you love to take photos as you travel, use your photos to inspire yourself to travel more. Clearly visualize your travel goals as you create your own photo wallpaper.

How to Remember Your Travel Adventures?

I spend a lot of time on my iPhone (and iPad) blogging, posting to social media, wasting time, and doing blogging STUFF. Let’s face it, I bet you do too. According to Forbes, we all spend time on our phones.

IMPROVE your phone experience with personalized travel wallpaper that is perfect for your HOME screen and LOCK screen. PLUS, if you are dreaming of travel, adding travel photos to your phone background will inspire travel wanderlust, encourage you to create the travel bucket list of your dreams, and remember your why when you wonder how you can make it all happen.

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Create Your Own Photo Wallpaper

You have the option to create your own photo wallpaper using YOUR own inspiring travel photos for your LOCK SCREEN and your HOME SCREEN.

• Lock Screen – This is the screen you see when you “wake up” or turn on your phone. The photo in the background can be customized.
• Home Screen – The home screen appears when you add your code or use facial recognition to unlock your screen. Here you see all of your APPS overlaying a background photo on your screen. The background photo is what you have the option to change.

There are even options for setting dynamic or live photo wallpaper. The options for personalizing your lock screens are growing all of the time.

If these photos are not already in your phone’s camera roll, you will want to save photos to your iPhone or upload them to the phone itself. If you don’t already know, I’m going to tell you how!

If you need similar instructions for adding photos to the wallpaper of your Android phone, Google offers some easy-to-follow instructions.

1. How to Add an Image to Your Photo Library

If you want to download the picture of Lake Haiyaha in Rocky Mountain National Park (below), it is easiest if you are reading this blog post on your phone.

Hold your finger on the photo until a box pops up on your screen prompting you to Share, Save to Photos, Copy.

Save the image to your camera roll by clicking “Save to Photos”.

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2. Save an Image as Wallpaper for Your iPhone

Now, find the image in your Camera Roll—see the Photos App Icon below.

Click the icon on the bottom left side of your screen that looks like a document with an arrow pointing up (It is circled in red with an arrow pointing to it).

You will see on your screen, a horizontal list of people you regularly text. Below that is a list of services such as: Air Drop, Messages, Mail, Messenger, etc. Scroll down a little more until you see a list that gives you the options to: Copy Photo, Add to Shared Album, Add to Album, AirPlay, and then “Use as Wallpaper”. Select Use as Wallpaper.

You may wish to adjust the photo on your screen USING TWO FINGERS TO PINCH OR CROP. Due to the varying nature of screen sizes, you may need to adjust the photo to the right or left, up or down, or zoom in or out to make the photo fit your screen just the way you want. Then click “Done”.

You will have the option 1) “Set as Wallpaper Pair”, meaning the photo will be used for BOTH the Home and Lock Screen background, or 2) “Customize Home Screen”.

Choose “Set as Wallpaper Pair” if you want it for both the Home and Lock Screen.

If you want to have different backgrounds for both screens, click the “Customize Home Screen” button to change either the Lock Screen (on the left) or the Home Screen (on the right).

Add another photo by clicking the “Photos” button at the bottom of the screen (see pic below). Unless you like the blurred look, be sure to TURN OFF “Blur” so that you can see the picture clearly. Crop and move the photo until you are happy with the position.

Click “Done”.

This is the background photo that I have added to my home screen.

Enjoy! Now, when you hear people talk about the wallpaper on their phone, you know they aren’t really talking about wallpaper used to hang on a dining room wall. It is the background photo on your phone that can inspire you to follow your dreams.

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3. Adding Travel Photos to Your Phone That are Taken with Another Camera

When I travel, I usually have my phone and DSLR camera ready to capture the amazing scenery that I see.

To use your own travel photos taken with your camera you will need to follow these steps:

1. Upload your photos to your computer once you return home from vacation. I upload to Adobe Lightroom.
2. Create a system to catalog your photos. I use Lightroom to organize, tag, and adjust my photos. One of the main things I do in Lightroom is fix my photos, ie., straighten, remove objects, and enhance.
3. As you create folders in Lightroom, these same folders are created in your default file manager on your computer where you can search, manage, and access your files and folders. On a Mac, this is the “Finder”. On Windows, this is called the “File Explorer”.
4. Open your Finder or File Explorer and find the picture that you would like to upload to your phone. Double click on the photo and it open in “Preview”.
5. Click on the icon in the top bar that looks like a document with an arrow pointing up. It will bring up options to send to: Airdrop, Messages, Notes, Add to Photos, etc. If you access your photos using a desktop computer, choose AIRDROP. Make sure that your phone is nearby and unlocked.
6. A small box will pop up on your computer screen. Choose your phone from the device options given (Again, your phone needs to be unlocked in order to show as an option). The photo you are trying to copy from your computer will now appear in your phone’s PHOTOS. Click “DONE” on your desktop. Access the photo on your phone following the instructions given above.

Camera and Lens Options for Great Travel Photos

• SmartPhone
• Canon 6d Mark II DSLR
• Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 L IS USM Lens for Canon
• Canon Powershot G1X Mark III

>> Related: 15 Popular Photography Gadgets

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15 More Ways to Inspire Your Travel Goals

If you are looking for additional ways to inspire more travel when creating your travel goals, consider these ideas:

1. Create a Travel Vision Board – Pinterest is a perfect way to do this, but you could also create a physical vision board that hangs on your office wall or somewhere that you can easily see it every day.
2. Add travel photos to your bathroom mirror as a great way see your goals every single day.
3. Collect travel and adventure quotes.
4. Create and post family travel goals on your fridge.
5. Create an adventure bucket list.
6. Learn a new language.
7. Explore close to home to inspire you wanderlust. Go on road trips.
8. Create a vacation savings fund.
9. Ignore people who don’t encourage you.
10. Follow influencers on social media: Pinterest, Instagram, Flipboard, or LinkedIn
11. Learn how to use public transportation.
12. Sign up for travel rewards for hotels, rental cars, and airlines.
13. Find a travel buddy if you don’t already have one.
14. Embrace new adventures.
15. Find ways to display your travel photos: photo book, wall art, postcards.
16. Sign up for a travel-themed credit card.

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Be Inspired with These Adventure & Travel Quotes!

• 103 Romantic Instagram Quotes for Couples Who Love to Travel
• 109 I’m Loving the Beach Quotes for Instagram
• 105 Inspiring Hiking and Mountain Quotes for Instagram
• 101 Best Travel Quotes for Instagram to Inspire Wanderlust
• 300+ Incredible Travel Content Ideas for Instagram
• 100 Inspiring Instagram Travel Captions

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Final Thoughts on Inspire Travel Goals: Easily Add Trip Pics to Your Phone Background

I hope that you find a picture or two that you love from from your travel photos. More importantly, I hope those pictures inspire you to create a bucket list, to plan travel, to post and share your photos and to set travel goals for more travel.

Your friends might just marvel at your phone lock screen. If they do, point them to this post so they can learn how to add a little travel inspiration to their phone too.

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