Hidden treasures on the Balkans

As a teenager and in my early twenties I traveled a lot to the Balkans. In today's post I will share some hidden treasures from this region with you: places that not that many people know about, but that are still very much worth a visit. Enjoy!

Peleș Castle, Transsylvania, Romania

The first places that comes to my mind when I think of such hidden treasures is Peleș Castle in Romania. This may not be the most special castle, but its location on a hill within walking distance from the train station in Sinaia makes it worth a visit if you ever find yourself in Romania. I really enjoyed my short visit to this castle. In fact, I love this place so much that the following picture is on the wall of my living room:

Actually the entire region of Transsylvania is one big hidden treasure. The region is mostly famous for being the home of Dracula, but it has so much to offer. The region is scattered with lovely castles and beautiful (mountaineous) landscapes. The region's main city - Brașov - the region's capital - is a lovely city with a very calm atmosphere and on the countryside you can still find many people who use a horse and carriage as their main form of transportation. In short: this region has it all.

Mostar, Hercegovina, Bosnia & Hercegovina

Mostar is famous for the old bridge (Stari Most) right in the center of the old town. In fact the city was named after the bridge keepers (mostari) who guarded the bridge during medieval times. This bridge was one of the must-sees for me in Europe and I visited it in 2013. Even though the bridge was bombed during the war in 1995 and reconstructed afterwards you still get the feeling that this is a really special old bridge. Combined with the blue waters and the old stone buildings around it, this bridge really is a treasure. And even though not that many tourists will visit Bosnia & Hercegovina, the bridge can still be quite crowded in high season because it's such a small place.

Mostar itself may not be so much a hidden treasure, as it is quite well-known. Few people know however that the are around it (called Hercegovina) is also worth visiting. There is Međugorje, a Catholic pilgrimage after the Virgin Mary was spotted here in 1981, a medieval town called Pocitelj and some very nice waterfalls called  Kravice Falls. If you hire a car or book a day trip via your hostel, all sights can be seen in just one (long) day.

Should you be inspired by my blog post and wanting to visit Hercegovina now, I recommend to stay at Hostel Majdas in Mostar. I have visited many hostels over the years, but this place really is one of the best places I stayed at and the owners are also very kind people.

Kotor, Montenegro

Montenegro is a relatively new country and therefore it's still relatively unknown as a tourist destination. This small country does have its beautiful places though. While capital city Podgorica may not really be worth a visit, the small town of Kotor does have the potential to become a major tourist attraction. Located on day-trip distance from Dubrovnik, Kotor has a lot to offer: a lovely old town, a beautiful bay and a mountain next to the old town that you can climb for a great view over the entire bay. A perfect place for a perfect picture.

Travel plans for the future

People often ask me what will be my next destination. To be honest, at the moment I don’t know yet what will be my next big trip. I prefer to travel in low-season because in summer the weather in the Netherlands is nice enough too and there is enough to do. And I got a weekend in London planned as well for the end of this month. So my next big trip will not be very soon. I can tell you about the countries that are still on my must-see list though.

South Africa

Recently I started to be more and more into South Africa as a travel destination. More than 5 years ago I had a penpal from there who invited me over and kept on sending me pictures of the most beautiful places in South Africa, but I never went there and am not really in touch with him any more. Maybe it’s high time to revitalize this friendhip and start making plans for a trip to South Africa though. I am very curious about both the language (as you may know, Afrikaans is very similar to Dutch and when it’s written down or spoken slowly I can understand almost all of it) and the beautiful places this country has to offer, so I am quite sure I want to go here within the coming 5 years. I just need to find an appropriate time for it.

Thailand and Vietnam

They say that a true traveler will never finish his to-go-list. Whenever he crosses off one country, he adds two more. And that’s also the case for me. Usually when I talk to other people who traveled a lot I ask what has been their most beautiful destination. Often I get the answer that Thailand is a true paradise. I was never that curious about this country, but the more people recommend it to me the more my curiosity is provoked. Vietnam has been on my to-go-list for a long time already though, but after I was in Arashiyama at a place that reminded me a lot of Hoi An I really want to go to this special country. And there are signs that Vietnam will loosen up its visa policy, so hopefully I can even go there in the near future without having to go to the embassy first to arrange my visa.

Australia, New Zealand and Fiji

One might say that I am too much of an ambitious person for wanting to visit Australia, New Zealand and Fiji in one trip. But nothing is impossible. I already have a plan to save up enough holidays for a 6 week trip Down Under. Although with those distances and the amount of things to see in both Australia and New Zealand even 6 weeks may not be enough… And I just remembered I would also love to see Bora Bora, which is also in the neighborhood. Gosh, there are too many amazing places on this planet...

Argentina and Brazil

Argentina and Brazil: the two largest countries in South America. So far I have not visited many countries on this continent yet (only Peru and Bolivia), so I would love to visit these two countries. I can’t wait to see Rio de Janeiro and those smaller colonial cities in Argentina that look just like a Spanish city of 200 years ago. Some day…

Cruise through the Caribbean

For several years I have been saying that I want to have a honeymoon on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. It would be the perfect way to combine romantic moments with lots of traveling and exploring, wouldn’t it? Now I just need to find that one amazing woman who is willing to marry me and make that enormous sacrifice of going on a cruise to the Caribbean for our honeymoon…

You know what the best thing about making such a list of dream destinations is? A few years from now I will be able to look back at this blog post and hopefully see that I visited most of these countries already.

The most and the least...

Whenever you are abroad, you may notice a special common character trait that a lot of people in a certain country seem to have. Today, I will share some of the observations about the countries I have visited. Some of them may be a bit of a stereotype, but some stereotypes are really true.

Here's the list:
Most beer-drinking people: Czech Republic
Most digital: Sweden
Most well-organized: Japan (even beats the Netherlands)
Most beautiful women: Ukraine
Most over-the-top country: United Arab Emirates
Most burocratic: Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan
Most friendly: Tanzania (on the countryside)
Least friendly: Bolivia
Most patriottic people: France
Least patriottic people: Lithuania
Best national cuisine: Greece and Peru
Worst national cuisine: Kazakhstan
Most quiet: Oman
Most noisy people: Spain
Most surprising region: Transsylvania, Romania
Most annoying salesmen: Morocco
Most talkative people: Italy
Only country where I ever paid a bribe: Bulgaria
Most surprisingly delicious drink: Inca Kola in Peru
Most large country (in almost every possible aspect): USA
Most beautiful country: impossible to say; every country has its own charms

The most impressive places I have seen so far

Last month I visited my 50th and 51st country, which has been my goal for a long time. Regular visitors of my blog will know by now that I love to make lists, so of course I also have a list of all the countries I visited. You can find it here:

Create your own visited countries map or check out the JavaScript Charts.

Now it’s time to look back on all those trips and share the highlights with you. In this blog post, I will share the top 5 of the most impressive places I have been to. I will present them to you in reverse order, to build up some excitement. :)

5. Old town, Chefchaouen, Morocco
I suppose that most of you have never heard about Chefchaouen. In fact, I had never heard of it too before I started planning a trip to Morocco. Chefchaouen is a small town in Northearstern Morocco where all the houses in the old town are painted blue. I arrived in Chefchaouen at around 6pm in winter time. I will never forget the combination of twilight, empty narrow streets without traffic and blue houses everywhere that was my first impression of this town. I fell in love with this place instantly and even bought a blue painting from a local artist that is currently still displayed in my home to remind me of this lovely place. If you decide to go here someday, do watch out for touts who will try to sell you drugs. And just so you know – my enthousiasm about Chefchaouen was not influenced by any drugs. ;)

4. Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia
It’s not as unique in this world as I initially thought, but Salar de Uyuni is certainly the biggest and most impressive salt plains in the world. At many places there is salt as far as the eye can see, which gives you the feeling as if you are on another planet. On some days the weather conditions are in such a way that the salt is actually reflecting the sky above it, which should be even more impressive. This wasn’t the case when I was there, but it was a very impressive place nonetheless.

3. Registan Square, Samarkand, Uzbekistan
For years I had been looking forward to visit Uzbekistan and in 2015 I finally did it. The main reason why I wanted to visit Uzbekistan was because I had seen images of a magical place called “Registan square” in Samarkand. When I was there, there were some people on the square, but it was still not too crowded, like most of the big tourist attractions in Europe. And the next morning from the bus I got a view of an empty square, which was absolutely astonishing. Even though I was unable to make a picture from the bus, this view justified a third place in my top 5 of today.

2. Grand Canyon, USA
No need to provide an explanation about this place. My parents took me to the eastern part of the USA when I was 16 (?) and I am very grateful that they did. It was my first time outside of Europe and we saw so many beautiful places during our roadtrip from Los Angeles via Las Vegas and San Francisco back to Los Angeles. The Grand Canyon was certainly a highlight in that trip. Although it did ruin every other canyon I visited afterwards. Nothing is as impressive as the Grand one.

1. Petra, Jordan
Without a doubt I consider the “Treasury” of Petra the most impressive place I have ever seen. The way there adds a lot to the experience: first you walk 2 km through a path between two large rocks (called the Siq). This path gets more and more narrow until at some point out of nowhere you reach this amazing place. Unfortunately this moment was ruined for me a bit because I was distracted by a small girl who wanted to sell me something, but the moment when I first saw this place in all its glory was still a very memorable moment. A big piece of advice: go to Petra in low-season and on your own (I can tell you how to get there), then you will have the place all to yourself like I did and you will be able to take pictures like this:

Quite interesting that I realized only after I finished the list that all places in my top 5 are outside of Europe. I guess you always consider the things that are close to you more “normal” and less impressive.

In the coming weeks I will write more posts related to this theme. I will try to post something every Sunday. So see you next Sunday!

Trip to South Korea and Japan, part 2: Japan

After a few days in South Korea it was time to move on to Japan. Before I share my photos and experiences, I will first share some observations about Japanese culture.

1. Bowing is an important part of Japanese culture. For example, a train conductor will always bow before entering or leaving a carriage. But it happens everywhere. One time I ended up in a bowing ceremony with a cashier at a supermarket who just kept on bowing for me each time I was bowing for her. After bowing about 5 times I just said bye and left, otherwise we would still have been bowing right now.
2. Japanese people are incredibly disciplined. Unlike in any other country I have visited, all pedestrians will stop for a red traffic light, even if there is no traffic in sight. Moreover, they love to stand in lines when waiting for a train, bus or metro. And they actually wait for people to get off first before they enter the train. It was a nice change compared to the chaotic rituals I experienced during my trip to Africa in January. :)

3. Japanese food is truly delicious. Even though I still don't like sushi (the most famous Japanese food internationally, but it's not as common as noodle-based dishes in Japan) and seafoods.

Hiroshima

On 9 May I exchanged sunny South Korea for rainy Japan. My first stop was Hiroshima, where I visited the beautiful castle (see the picture below) and the Peace Park, which was founded at the place where the atomic bomb was dropped in 1945. It was one of those places where you can actually "feel" the history. Especially the ruins of a bombed house are quite confronting. The whole park was actually a cry for world peace, which is more current than ever these days...
The next day I visited Miyajima, the island where one can find the famous Otorii gate that can be found on the cover of almost any travel guide for Japan. Unfortunately it was raining the whole day, which ruined my picture of the gate and my plans to climb the mountain for a better view. But overall, I am always quite lucky with the weather during my trips, so I can't complain. In fact, a Slovak who I met in the hostel told me it had been raining the whole week in Japan already and the day after this it became 26 degrees and sunny again, so I was quite lucky during this trip as well.

Nagasaki and Battleship Island

After Hiroshima I went to Nagasaki by Shinkansen. Nagasaki is far away in the southern part of Japan, but in such a fast train it still takes only a few hours. In Nagasaki I had my first Couchsurfing experience since November 2014. I stayed with a student named Taiki. Unfortunately he had classes all day long and when he got home he studied till 2am (Japanese discipline again), so we couldn't do much other than have some nice conversations at home.
The main reason why I went to Nagasaki was to visit Hashima. This small island, that looks like a battleship, was very densily populated with workers from the coal mine under the island up until the 1970s, but when the mine was closed everybody left the island. Today the island is abandoned and has an atmosphere that must be a bit like the atmosphere is in downtown Chernobyl. To visit the island, you have to join a tour (with a guide who speaks only Japanese). You are only allowed to visit 3 viewing points on the island and it's not possible to explore anything on your own, but it was still cool to visit such an abandoned Island.

The final days in a nutshell

The next few days I visited the old capital Himeji-castle, Kyoto and Arashiyama: a quiet green suburb of Kyoto.  After visiting so many cities it was nice to be in nature again. Near Arashima they have a lake that for some reason reminded me a lot of Vietnam and made me want to go there really soon. You see, when I travel my list of countries I still want to visit doesn't get shorter but it only gets longer. :)

After this, I went on to Takayama: a small touristic town in the Japanese Alps. This was a nice change of pace. In Takayama I visited a nice folk village and I made a walk through the mountains. It was a lovely area and I was a bit sad I didn't have more time to explore it, because I needed to go to Tokyo the next day. I had agreed to meet up with Kyoka, a friend from Interpals.

On the first night she took me to a game hall near a shopping center and showed me some Japanese entertainment. We took some pictures together and after that we had the opportunity to add all kinds of crazy stuff to those pictures. It was really funny. It was a pity though that at the last moment I pressed a wrong button and the photos came out very small. Luckily we still got the digital copies.
The next day we explored two districts of Tokyo together and talked a lot, which was fun. We even cooked okonomiyaki (Japanese dish) together in a restaurant, because in Japan it's common to cook your own food in a restaurant. It wasn't as good as the okonomiyaki I ate in Hiroshima though.
On my final day I decided to buy a day-ticket for the subway and go see all the places in Tokyo I still wanted to see. It was a heavy day, but I did it all. I went up to the 45th floor of a high building to get a great view over Tokyo, visited several other high towers, some more temples and shrines plus a tourist market where I bought some souvenirs. I was a bit tired in the evening, but it was no problem, as my trip was over anyway and I didn't need to do much more the next day than just sit in a plane and watch movies. Here is one last picture of a pagoda, which is a very common building in Japan, from Tokyo:

As mentioned at the beginning of my previous post, I have visited more than 50 countries now. This will be the theme of my blog posts for the coming weeks. So stay tuned if you want to know some fun facts about the countries I visited or hear the top 5 of the most beautiful places I've been to!

Trip to South Korea and Japan, part 1: South Korea

I've done it! I have finally visited my 50th and 51st country! Will I continue and try to reach 60 countries before I reach the age of 30? Or try to visit 100 countries in my life? I don't know yet. But I do know that I'm proud of this accomplishment. Below you can find the stories of my recent trip to South Korea and Japan. When I return from this trip, I will post a new post, looking back on all the countries I have visited in my own way.

Staying with the monks in South Korea

I didn't know much about South Korea to start with, other than K-Pop and rumors that Korean food tastes very good. So I went to explore this country and see for myself what life is like over there. In my first few days I did a templestay: I would stay in a temple and live like the monks for 24 hours. This means getting up at 3am for a chanting ceremony and we were also asked to do 108 prostations (kneeling down and bowing for Buddha - my upper legs were hurting for 3 straight days afterwards). At the end of those 24 hours, we had a tea ceremony together with a monk. With the help of a translator I had a very interesting conversation with him about how in his opinion we are basically all nothing important and therefore should try to live a life free of anger, greed and arrogance. In fact, the monk thought I said such wise things related to these topics that I must have studied Buddhist texts in my previous life. I took everything he said with a pinch of salt, but it was an interesting experience nonetheless. Below you can find some pictures of the temple complex and a tea ceremony we had with one of the monks.

An interesting hotel

A stay in South Korea is not complete without a visit to Seoul of course. However, since all good hostels were fully booked I was forced to stay in Cheongju - a city close to the temple I was staying - for one night after the templestay. I had no information about hotels so I walked to the first modern-looking hotel close to the bus station that had pictures of decent-looking rooms in the window. The hotel was neon-lit on the outside, I got a complimentary kit of toiletries and a room with strange purple walls with hearts on it, but I didn't really think about this. Nor did I think anything weird about the fact that when I switched on the tv it was automatically on a channel that was showing Asian porn. Finally, when I heard some Korean girl screaming/squeeking at night I thought back about what my friend Jose had said about how I had to try a "sex hotel" while I was in Asia. All the pieces of the puzzle came together and I realized I was in one right now. And besides those few sounds during the night it was all a very good hotel, so no complaints there.

Finally I also spent some days in Seoul, visiting the palaces and a parade with lanterns. Below you can find some more pictures.

Stories and pictures about the Japanese part of this trip will follow soon. I promise that they will be even more beautiful than the pictures in this post!

Top 30 of masculine songs

As you may know, I love to make lists of everything. Just give me a theme and I will make a list related to this theme. This time I made a list of 30 songs that make me feel like a man! I only spent a few days preparing this list, so I may have forgotten a couple of songs so the list may be a bit random, but not every list I make needs to be perfect. :) The list has become a cool mixture of classic rock and modern indie rock, mostly from the period when I was a student and still had enough time to actively search for new music very often. I also added some comments related to the song, to explain why I picked this song or just for your entertainment.

Do you have any suggestions for songs that I forgot to include in this list? Or suggestions for another list I could make in the future? Let me know!

Rank	Artist	Song	Year	Comments
001.	Bruce Springsteen	Born in the USA	1984
002.	The Fratellis	Chelsea Dagger	2006
003.	Genesis	I can't dance	1992	Because real men can't dance.
004.	Ryan Star	Right now	2008
005.	Status Quo	Roll over lay down	1975
006.	Liquido	Narcotic	1999	That poor goldfish I used to tease by playing this song very loudly…
007.	Kings of Leon	Sex on fire	2008
008.	Biffy Clyro	The captain	2009
009.	Orson	No tomorrow	2006	I used to think this song was so cool when I was a teenager.
010.	Status Quo	Whatever you want	1979	This is what they play in the stadium before a game of my favorite soccer team.
011.	Golden Earring	Radar love	1973
012.	My Chemical Romance	Na Na Na	2010
013.	Deep Purple	Smoke on the water	1973	One of the best intros ever.
014.	Chris Rea	Road to hell	1989
015.	Gob	Oh! Ellin	2003	Soundtrack of the computer game NHL 2004: loved it!
016.	Maxïmo Park	Our velocity	2007	The singer of this band made me buy a hat just like his.
017.	Fountains of Wayne	Stacy's mom	2003	Every man my age should understand why. :)
018.	Bon Jovi	Livin' on a prayer	1986
019.	Bryan Adams	Summer of '69	1990	Isn't Bryan Adams a bit too young to have had a wild summer in 1969…?
020.	Steppenwolf	Born to be wild	1968	Thanks to my dad for suggesting this song!
021.	Meat Loaf	Paradise by the dashboardlight	1977
022.	Air Traffic	Never even told me her name	2006
023.	Ryan Star	Start a fire	2010	"Is this love or just sexual desire?"
024.	AC/DC	Highway to hell	1979
025.	Europe	Final countdown	1986	Because it's such a manly thing to make lists of everything. :)
026.	The Pigeon Detectives	Everybody wants me	2008	Because men believe all girls want them, while girls are like "eww…".
027.	Ryan Star	Breathe	2009
028.	Slade	Merry Christmas everybody	1973	A very masculine Christmas-song
029.	Bruce Springsteen	The river	1981
030.	Bowling For Soup	Running from your dad	2002	The nightmare of any young man: a father-in-law with a shovel in his hand.