I still have few months to go till my 28th July 2012 deadline for the 100 countries, but given that my next trip in march will take me to 99, I only have one country/trip left to plan. So far pacific island archipelago of Samoa seems to be the one with most brownie points.
It is independent country and member of United Nations (unlike New Caledonia, Cook Islands and other pacific bad boys); it has direct flights from Sydney that take 6h each way (do not need to take lots of holidays) and do not cost a fortune (600d return), plus it actually seems like a pretty interesting destination, both culturally (Samoans are curious bunch) as well as geographically (i.e. beautiful beaches).
I’ve spent quite a few hours researching the most exiting destination for the final country, but so far nothing beats Samoa. My ideal destination for the 100th country would have been one of the many special spots I’ve not seen yet, such as hiking in Nepal, playing with Gorillas in Rwanda or getting lost in Canadian wilderness, but those all are big trips that deserve special planning and attention, not something that is worth compromising for over few holidays left before July. Have a look at my country list, and may be you have better ideas, any suggestions welcome. Over and out.
Archive for the 'Travel' Category
Will Samoa be the One?
Published February 8, 2012 Life , Travel Leave a CommentTags: 100 countries, last one, samoa
If the road is not challenging, it’s not worth going
Published January 24, 2012 Life , Travel 4 CommentsTags: 100 countries, big trip, challange, middle east, Travel
I’m preparing for my last big trip of 100 country challenge coming up in March, a trip that will cover 7 countries and take me to the total of 99, I can smell the finish line, but I’m not there yet.
I knew it will not be easy or cheap when approaching the end, what I did not know was that I’ll be living in Australia, upss.
In march I plan to go to Sri Lanka, several Middle East countries, such as Qatar, Kuwait, Oman and on the way back finish up in Maldives. This trip will be by far the most expensive short term (less than a month) trip I’ve ever taken, not only flights are ridiculously expensive, I have no close by countries left, and those who are left are not only far but also require visas, which unfortunately are needed for Latvians in most Middle Eastern countries, even UAE (Dubai). There was a point when I regretted not getting UK citizenship and staying proud Latvian, after having that opportunity living 5 years in London. But that weakness is over, you’ve got work with what you got.
So now my focus for next month is to get 4 tourist visas via quite complex requirements to ensure the trip runs smoothly. Wish me luck, I will definitely need it. Will keep you posted how my preparation goes. And keep traveling, world is such a beautiful place.
Tasmania without the Devil
Published January 4, 2012 Travel Leave a CommentTags: australia, devil, island, Tasmania, Travel
Prior to going to Tasmania, a tiny island (actually Tasmania is slightly bigger than Latvia, 68k vs. 64k square km, so not that tiny) off Southern Coast of Australia, the only thing I knew about was the famous little animal – Tasmanian Devil, that only lives on this island. After 7 days on the island that remained the only thing we did not see in the whole trip. Funny how it works. But here is what we did see:
Amazing beaches – Wineglass Bay, Binalong Bay and many others, white sand and deserted most Tasmanian beaches are as good as they come, with a little bit of sunshine they are the perfect place to be.
Amazing wineries – we visited 3 or 4 of them, most offer up to 8 wines for tasting free of charge, my favorite was Bay of Fires winery. Also I totally changed my opinion about Riesling. In Tasmanian cooler climate they do it very fresh and dry, nothing in comparison to sweet stuff you’d normally expect from German/Austrian ones.
Lots of animals – dead and alive. There is so much road kill in Tasmania that it makes me sad, but that is just a further proof how healthy the eco system of this island is, as animals are everywhere. On our hikes and early drives, we saw plenty of wombats, wallabies, opossums and other random things, crawling, jumping and just sitting lazily around in the wild, its definitely their territory and we are just the visitors.
Art – MONA art gallery in Hobart is privately owned and definitely in my top 3 in the world, probably only Saatchi gallery in London would come close. If you like modern art, this alone is worth a visit to Tassie.
Food – there are some top notch eateries for foodies. We had steak from Black Cow in Launceston and it honestly is as good as any top NY or London eatery.
So that’s that, I can highly recommend visit to this far out place, if you get a chance to come to Australia. Here are a few pics for the trip. Hope you’re having good start of the year!
What do you do when you need to change a passport?
Published October 23, 2011 Travel Leave a CommentTags: 100 countries, 92, armenia, challange, georgia, new passport, south korea
If you are are a Latvian living in Australia, you spend $2000+ on tickets and sit on a plane for 25 hours (each way) to go home. My latest trip was triggered by very practical reason of not having enough free pages in my passport to travel, so I had to go home to get a new one. You see, passports are normally issued only in the country itself or its legal offices of representation – embassies. Slight problem with being Latvian citizen is that we only have about 15 embassies around globe, most of them in Europe, and from Australia, the closest embassy is, wait for it, Japan, only 10 hour flight away. I figured if I have to fly to Tokyo to get a new passport, I might as well go home and on the way add some new countries. So I did, result – 2 week holiday, 7 flights, 3 new countries and a new passport.
I already posted about South Korea stop-over, this one is about more detail on adventures in Georgia and Armenia, where I was lucky enough to spend 8 days. Georgia gets my vote, super easy to get in (no visas, quick customs), great food (khinkali, khachapuri, lobio), welcoming people (60 year old dude on marshruthka sharing his headphones with me to listen to some Georgian dance music) and amazing nature, such as Kazbeki mountain range that I explored a bit, not to the top at 5033m, of course, only to about 3000m or so, here’s a complimentary snap.
I thought Latvia has had bad run in 20th Century, but look at Armenia. Not only had they endure Genocide from Turks that resulted in death of more than 50% of Armenian population, they lost most of their territory, and now have no access to sea, no minerals underground, little arable land, two aggressive neighbours with locked borders and Armenian pride and joy, mount Ararat, sitting on the Turkish side of the border. Look but don’t touch, how cruel is that, here is a picture from Yerevan, Armenian capital with Ararat in the background.
Full set of pictures from the trip are here.
Seoul for a day
Published October 7, 2011 Travel Leave a CommentTags: 100 countries, korea air, number 90, seoul, south korea, stop over
Friend of mine and self confessed avid reader (yes you Liesma) reminded me today that I’ve neglected my blog and my regular post is few days late. No excuses, being back home and catching up with friends is so exiting that I’ve lost track of time. So here we go.
This one is about my brief stopover in Seoul a few days ago,on the way to London. Actually Korea Air offer from Sydney to London via Seoul is amazing value and quite comfortable way to get through 22h of pure flying time. As part of ticket and 20h layover in Seoul, Korea Air gives you free hotel accommodation, transport to and from airport, plus dinner, breakfast and lunch, not bad perks.
Normally I do not count transit stops as country visits, but considering the fact that it was with overnight stay and I did actually went out at night and into town centre the next morning and explored it for a few hours, its good enough for me, so here’s a tick for country number 90.
Seoul is a funny beast, with high tech infrastructure and efficiency next to centuries old shabby buildings and tiny street labyrinths in the old town it reminder me of Tokyo a lot.
At night I hooked up with some fellow travellers and we hit a local karaoke bar, needless to say they did not seem to get many foreigners, also as we were the only costumers in the early evening, bar hostess sat down with our table to chat and otherwise entertain us. Within minutes I was called Jesus Christ, only to be renamed Orlando Bloom moments later, my other two fellow travellers were given less glamorous anime character names, lucky me Jesus. They all seemed to be multi talented as other dude from behind the bar appeared with electric guitar and mic in hand and started punching out heartfelt Gary Barlow ballads in broken English, only for us, just surreal. Ough, did I mention the sweet grandma who was so impressed with my Vibram five finger shoes that she leaned down, touched and tickled my fingers and then she insisted to hold my friends jacket for a duration of 30 min metro journey, some kind of bonding I guess, we did not resist.
So that’s my 5 minutes in Seoul, hope you’re having fun too, where-ever you are.
Fair trade of goods
Published August 28, 2011 Travel 1 CommentTags: 89, country, exchange of goods, getting stuff for free, Photography, travelling, vanuatu, zeev
Meet Zeev, he’s from Israel, but lives in Melbourne. Our paths crossed in Vanuatu, where he invited me to drink some jasmine tea and talk about stuff. We were two of the four visitors present at Blue Pango motel, a place with lovely Korean owners, that has seen better days.
Back to Zeev (I was told it means wolf in Hebrew), at first I thought he’s just nuts, he had this stare and kept on talking and talking randomly, what he does, how he does it and why he likes it. ‘it’ is giving guitar lessons and taking nude photographs, I presume, not at the same time. The more tea we drunk and the more we talked, I realized he was no nuts at all, just weird and curious, like me, so that put me at ease.
We discussed his days in Israeli army, playing jazz for 15 years, travelling to random places, why Australia and Pacific is so expensive, how to get free stuff and meet local people when travelling. Tip: almost always you have knowledge or services, that someone will want to trade or pay for, you just have to find out what it is e.g. Zeev took local wedding photographs and gave speeches about Israel in local churches, in exchange people opened up their homes, invited him to stay, fed him, and allowed to take pictures of real Vanuatu, for free, voilà.
And then we exchanged goods, I drank his tea, he ate half of my papaya and grapefruit, he gave me 8GB of rock and roll, I gave him two Hollywood and two art house movies, and finally he left me his jar of peanut butter, but took my Dove Men body wash bottle, both were half empty. I think it was a fair trade of goods, what do you reckon?
P.s Here is sweet little island where I spent my weekend, getting sunburnt (no accessories = no sun lotion).
Me talk long time
Published August 1, 2011 Life , Travel 2 CommentsTags: 100 countries, 2, birthday, second, Travel, two, years
2 years and counting, my blog just had a 2nd birthday, it was a quiet one, slowly chucking away, one step a time, no big announcements to make, but plenty of little actions on the list. I’m getting around 1000 monthly views, up from 6-7 hundred last year, which is not bad.
After 3 months not leaving a country (very unusual for me), I’ve finally booked in some trips, heading to Vanuatu in Pacific for a long weekend, and then hitting Europe in Oct, via South Korea, visiting Armenia and Georgia on the way, so exited. So I should be at 92 countries by end of this year. Will take plenty of snaps to keep you entertained. The coveted 100 is now in sight.
With Sydney’s winter at its best, lingering above 20C, I’m very exited doing more local shoots as well. I’ve had plenty of cancellations lately, but keeping the spirits high, in the long term it will all work out.
On the third point on my list, exploring and getting to know Sydney, I’m doing much better, in last week alone I’ve been to several cool bars had some amazing sushi, couple of great parties, visited Manly beach, Cronulla and Bundeena, sweet.
Now that I’m back from my mega trip and sharing all the travel experiences with other avid travellers, one particular topic comes up regularly. Who are the most interesting and who are the most annoying people that I’ve meet on the road. Of course it often boils down to specific persons, but there are certain similarities among the nations that give you quite clear indication if you are about to have lots of fun or will you run and hide (this is rarely and option) and prey these people don’t find you or god forbid try to start a conversation or otherwise engage you. After all, nobody wants to be poor donkey by the pink wall.
Lets start with most annoying travellers and here I have a clear, undisputed winner – Israelis. Some of you will nod in silent agreement whilst others might ask WTF. But that is my point of view, in general, the likely-hood that fellow travellers from Israel will be extremely annoying, is very high. They tend to travel only in large groups, are straight out from the army (both boys and gals), totally oblivious to their physical surroundings, only willing to get high and sing (loudly). Its OK for the first 10 minutes, but then it starts to get really annoying, especially when it happens at 3am on the overnight bus, or a peaceful garden where everyone else is trying to read a book or relax otherwise. Of course, I‘ve meet couple of non-conformist wonderful people from Israel, but unfortunately they are minority. To make this write off more fun and interactive, I’ve included a quick poll where you can cast your vote, so go ahead and lets see the results, may be its me, the annoying Latvian after all.
Now to the fun side, time and time again all the Swiss people that I’ve met whist travelling, happen to be extremely polite, informed and curious to have a conversation with. At first I thought its the small country factor, but that goes in stark contrast with the other side so I guess it must be some other ingredient. I’ve also found most Swedes really engaged and there are many other great examples of people from all over the world. Please cast your vote what you think are the perfect travel buddies to meet on the road. Hope the polls work, shout if something crashes and, above all, have fun!
p.s. please note that purpose of this post is not to entice national hatred or finger pointing, its about sharing the travel experiences and learning from them.
To the moon and back
Published May 3, 2011 Life , Statistics , Travel Leave a CommentTags: antigua, Caribbean, island, rtw, sailing week
My trip around the world is over, I’m back in sunny (but windy) London, Prince is happily married and things are back to normal, sort of. The trip went pretty smoothly, it was on budget, I managed to visit 3 more countries than initially planned and had no serious issues or injuries, kind of boring almost, but the little things kept me entertained along the way. Here are some statistics from the trip, you know I like numbers:
Time on the road: 7 months
Countries visited: 33
Total trip cost: £10,300
Flights taken: 30
Things broken: 1 pair of flip flops
Things stolen: 1 pair of swimming shorts
Monies lost: £60
Strange foods eaten: shark, snake, crickets, lama, cactus, frog
Muggings, robberies: 0
Medical help needed: 0
New friends: 100′s around the world
Talking about the little things, I often get asked, what’s my favourite place I’ve been to, and I always have to stumble through with some semi-answer, as the truth is, I don’t have favourites. Just as I don’t have a single favourite author, singer or a movie. When I travel, it’s the little things that excite me, like interesting local foods or a good conversation with new couch-surfing friends or monkey stealing my breakfast. Every single country I’ve been to has its bright side and its dark side. I love beaches and night life of Rio, but transport is expensive, city is overpopulated and dangerous. I love the natural wonders of Bolivia, but its cold out there, most places lack even the most basic infrastructure and people are often rude. For me its the sum of things, good and bad, that I experience during travels, that keeps me going, exploring and learning further. And this trip was no different.
For me travelling is like an education you can not get at university. I just spent 10 grand travelling, which is quite a lot of money. You can by a new car or put it towards down payment for a new mortgage, but I choose to invest it in travel as I believe in the long term, the experience and memories that I get from my travels will be much more valuable to me than things I can buy in the shop.
On the trip like this you realise just how little of the stuff you really need. I’ve been living out of 30 litre back pack, no mobile phone or TV and the truth is, I missed very little of the stuff left at home (stuff here refers to things only, not to friends and family who I missed dearly), things that make our daily lives comfortable. We surround ourselves with things that we feel are important, almost necessary to lead a decent life and then, when you don’t have them for a while, you realise just how irrelevant most of them are.
Ask me again in 3 months if I feel the same, I’ll probably be back in a rat race, acquiring and accumulating, comparing and consuming, thinking that my current philosophical approach is total bullocks. But then again, I’m only human.
Mr Holiday and Mr Travel
Published April 26, 2011 Life , Travel Leave a CommentTags: caracas, holiday, mr, Travel, venezuela, worlds cheapest petrol
Meet Mr Holiday, he’s short on time, but flush with cash. He stays in 4 or 5 star hotels with roof-top pools and 7 kinds of cereal for breakfast. He takes taxis to get around and eats out in good restaurants. All in all the good life. It’s a self indulging break from reality, a getaway that feels nice, but can not last forever. Also the margin for error is very small as everything has to be perfect, things have to be on time and to his liking, after all he’s paying for it.
And now meet Mr Travel. His cash is short, but his mind is open. He does not mind waiting 30 minutes to catch a public bus from the airport. He stays in hostels with squeaky double beds or couch surfs to make new friends, he talks to locals, eats where the locals eat and goes where the locals go. Its not always pretty and its often downright difficult, but its damn interesting and definitely always a memorable experience.
Take my recent visit to Venezuela for example, with the worlds cheapest petrol, you pay so little that it is almost for free. The title photo shows that you can get 10 litres of petrol for 1 Bolivar, which is around 15 pence or 25 cents, meaning that you can fill a full tank of petrol for less than a pound. All petrol-heads should go to Venezuela and drive to their heart’s delight. Probably not tourist worthy per se, but definitely interesting.
Holidays are really nice and everyone should have them. I like holidays myself and have had plenty of them in the past. But I prefer travel over holidays. My travels in recent years have taken me to places that I would not have otherwise visited. Places like Kosovo, Albania, Burma, Honduras or Venezuela. They are not on the typical holidaymakers radar, but have offered me the most amazing experiences, I’ve met some very interesting people in authentic environments. If you get bored of your holidays, try out travelling.
