Category Archives: Uncategorized

Paradise… lost?

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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.

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Kicking off 2013 in Rio!

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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 →

Zanzibar

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After the cold adventures on Mt K we were happy to descend into a warmer climate. And boy did we get what we wished for! The 8 hour bus ride from Moshi to Dar Es Salaam was a killer. The ‘full comfort’ bus did not have any A/C so we basically got cooked and grilled. On the few stretches with not too much dust the windows could be opened which then felt like we were being blown dry with gigantic hairdryer. We had been sitting down for 8 hours but were still completely exhausted when we arrived in Dar Es Salaam.

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About preliminaries and pre-departure stress

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Here we go again! My third long trip since 2001. I guess you can call me a ‘habitual offender’.  The seed of this trip was actually planted during my last trip. As some of you know, in 2006, I was forced to cut my ‘round the world trip’ short due to serious Illness. As I’m not a fan of unfinished business it was written in the stars that I would someday make another attempt to ‘circumvent our planet’. Continue reading →