TRAVELLING the world is an expensive hobby these days. But what if you could travel around the globe for nothing?

That is the aim of two Bournemouth University students who are now competing, along with four others, to win an online video competition.

First year BA Television Production students James Trosh, 19, and Liam Southall, 20, are aiming to win the Hostelworld.com video competition prize of a trip around the world worth £2,000 with £1,000 spending money.

“We heard about the competition through some friends and so we both submitted our videos, which had to be called The Connections You Make While Travelling, and then waited to see if we’d get to the final – which we did!” explains James.

As part of being among the finalists James and Liam were sent on all-expenses-paid trips to one of Hostelworld.com’s top 10 destinations around the world.

“We both received emails saying we were one of the six finalists and that we’d be sent to a major destination to make a four-minute video of the city,” says James.

“New York is in their top 10 so naturally we both wanted to get that but we were happy with the cities chosen for us.”

James was told to fly from Bournemouth to Florence, while Liam packed his bags and headed for Madrid via Bristol airport.

The other four finalists made video guides about Munich, Cusco City in Peru, Auckland and San Francisco.

“We were given 150 euros each as spending money and they put us up in really nice hostels in our cities.”

Watch Liam's Madrid video

Watch James' Florence video

Both Liam and James are intrepid travellers and took gap years before starting their degrees.

James has trekked around Thailand, Japan, Canada and America, while Liam went to Nepal and backpacked across America.

“I’ve always been interested in making TV and travelling.

“They’re my two main interests so it was great to combine the two,” says James.

Before embarking on their make-or-break trips James and Liam read guide books of their destinations cover to cover and planned what they wanted to shoot while they were there.

“Even though we thought we had it all planned, things did change when we were there. We’d think of different things to film or better places to feature.

“I decided to do a perfect day in Madrid, from morning to night, while James did the top 10 things to do in Florence,” says Liam.

So how do they rate their chances of winning that mouth-watering round the world trip?

“I think we have the most interesting videos of the six finalists and if we win we’re going to split the prize two ways and go travelling together,” says James.

When Liam and James know whether their next few months will be spent globetrotting or praying for a sunny UK summer like the rest of us, we’ve snapped them up to start work on making a four-minute video guide to Dorset for the Daily Echo website.

To vote for James or Liam's video, follow this link hostelworld.com/videos/competition/videocompetition.php and click the orange 'vote now' button in the top right hand corner of the video.

Voting ends on Friday with the winner set to be announced on Monday.