Author Archives: Jan De Roeck

Paradise… lost?

Posted on by
9

Raiatea 19 RAs we arrived in Tahiti, I realized this the furthest I have ever been away from home. It is actually about as far away as one can get from Europe. If we fly any further westward we will be closing in on Belgium from the east. So why would anybody want to travel that far to visit some small islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean? I suggest you google ‘Bora Bora’ and choose ‘images’. A number of gorgeous pictures of a lush green island surrounded by a lagoon in all diffent shades of blue; from turquoise, over indigo to navy blue. It does look like paradise doesn’t it? Most budget travellers that come  here only spent a couple of days on the main Island of Tahiti and or the neighbouring Mo’orea, tick the box for ‘French Polynesia’ on their ‘travel CV’  and quickly hop back on a plane that will take them to either New Zealand, Australia or Chile/Easter Island. Why this rush? This has all to do with the reputation of French Polynesia of being a ‘high end’, ‘super expensive’ destination.

Continue reading →

Notes from the mystery island

Posted on by
4

As a kid I once saw a picture of one of the huge Easter Island statues and I got really intrigued. The picture was part of a scientific article dealing with all the mysteries surrounding the island, its people and the statues. I remember my mom made a summary of the article but unfortunately, I had a lot more questions than there were answers in the article. When some time later I saw those intriguing statues appear again in my then favourite Belgian comic book (Suske & Wiske: De Windbrekers), I decided that someday I would travel to the island to find some answers.  A look in my world atlas slightly tempered my enthusiasm as this little island seemed to be a bit further away than let’s say Switzerland where we spent our summer holidays and which already seemed to take ages to get to. But some day… Continue reading →

Last days in South America

Posted on by
2

Chile has been the biggest surprise of our travels in South America. Until about a month ago  I would not have been able to name any highlights apart from Torres de Paine and the desert regions near the border with Bolivia and Peru. As our time in South America was limited, we had from the start decided that we would not explore Chile further north than the capital of Santiago. However during our stay in the Chilean Lake region aka el Chico Sur ( the small South) we became aware that there was way more to this part of the country than we had imagined; national park after national park, the island of Chiloe and great surfing at the pacific coast. Moreover due to our unexpected trip to Antarctica the time we could spent in Chile was reduced by almost 2 weeks. With only a couple of days left, some though choices had to be made and in the end we decided to make a beeline for Middle Chile; the region of its capital Santiago de Chile.

Continue reading →

Of fire and water

Posted on by
2

The region around  Bariloche in Argentina and across the border in Chile  is known as the ‘lake district’. But that only tells you a part of the story. There are indeed a lot of gorgeous lakes in all kind of shapes  from small lagoons  to huge ‘inland seas’ and in all kind of colours. But more interesting there are also the mountains and volcanoes. And who says mountains says hiking. And so we put on our hiking boots once more and got out there…and we soon found out that this region has way more to offer than we had time for. Continue reading →

Last minute to Antarctica!!!

Posted on by
16

Although I try not to overdo it, I know I have been throwing some superlatives at you in previous blog posts but I think this post might be the mother of all superlatives because our trip to Antarctica really was the best thing we have ever done. Looking back at it all, you really wonder if life will ever get better than those couple of days we spent cruising through the Antarctica. Ever since I read an article of a Belgian reporter visiting Antarctica on one of the first ‘tourist expeditions’ many years ago, it has always been my dream to one day be able to do the same. Unfortunately these expeditions are really, really expensive.

Continue reading →

Kicking off 2013 in Rio!

Posted on by
8

First things first: all our best wishes for 2013 to our loyal followers. I’m not the biggest fan of big New Year parties. Except for a couple of memorable parties during my student times these parties usually turn out to be a bit of a let-down, much ado about nothing. But a year must end someday and we wanted to be in a ‘special place’ for this trip. I guess the most famous places to be for New Year are Sydney, London, Berlin, New York and Rio de Janeiro. 6 years ago I was in Australia for New Year but on purpose avoided all the craziness (and high prices) of the party in Sydney and spent the night with friends in the middle of nowhere in the Australian bush. Although we had a great time, I regretted not having been in Sydney when I saw the fireworks on TV afterwards. So this time I wanted to be in the middle of the action. Continue reading →

Ending in style: a wedding in South Africa

Posted on by
3

When I started to plan this trip, I originally would go straight to South America. However in April of this year at our “Karavaan Generation 7” (aka G7)* reunion, one of us, Tom, announced that he would be getting married with his South African girlfriend in South Africa at the end of the year and  we were all invited. When a couple of weeks later three of the guys (Koen, Kris and Nick) decided that they would go over there, I also started thinking about introducing an ‘Africa leg’ on this world trip. As you have probably understood from my previous posts I have not regretted  that decision for a second and the wedding would prove to be a real nice climax to this Africa trip.

* a bunch of friends, all tour leaders that were selected  in 2007

 

Continue reading →

Brushing off ‘traveller’s burn out’ in Mozambique

Posted on by
3

I know this will sound strange or pretentious to a lot of you hard working people at home but when travelling for longer periods, every once in a while you need to take “a holiday from travelling”, if not you risk to catch ‘travellers burn out’. On my previous trip the ‘traveller’s burn out’ hit me really hard after 4 months travelling in South East Asia. I remember being in Kuala Lumpur and being really tired all the time, apathetic to whatever the place had to offer and hardly being able to get out of the hostel. Too many impressions and experiences in a short time and the fact that there is no routine whatsoever (having to look for places to stay and eat and things to do and see every day) makes travelling rather tiring after a couple of months. When you start dreaming about a cupboard to put your clothes in, it’s time to take a break. Continue reading →

Victoria Falls and Zimbabwe: when the going gets (a little) tough

Posted on by
5

“At dawn and dusk wild animals  such as lions and elephants roam the streets of the centre of town, take a taxi at these times”. At last an original warning in  the ‘dangers and annoyances’ section in my guide book. And they were not joking. Just a month ago a number of people from some church congregation that were doing an evening ‘open air mass’ on the edge of Victoria Falls town in Zimbabwe were chewed up by a couple of lions. Continue reading →

Lower Zambezi Canoe safari

Posted on by
5

“The best thing we did in Africa “, “A real safari!”, “A must-do in Southern Africa”. In preparation of this trip I had been reading the reports of a number of ‘long time’ Africa travellers. A lot of them had been raving about this canoe trekking safari. The pictures I saw looked spectacular but nothing compared to what awaited us on the Zambezi river. There was however also a number of reports on accidents that had happened on the river. Continue reading →