Travel Diaries

When the first tour description reached us and I read the term guest farm, I first thought of a vacation on the farm and was not exactly thrilled. But the consultant from Umfulana was quickly able to convince me that the farms are an important part of Namibia and that it is absolutely worth living there.

We planned overnight stays on three guest farms and first visited the Immenhof near Omaruru. The farm has been owned by the Seydlitz family since 1913 and has been operated as a guest farm for several years.

Our second destination in Lithuania was the Curonian Spit.
Extract from my travel diary:

Shortly before 1 p.m. we were at the ferry. About 15 minutes later we crossed over to the island for 11 euros there and back.

The first time I visited Africa, my expectations were not very high. The descriptions about watching the animals in the parks always seemed a bit exaggerated to me. But just 10 minutes after we passed the Krugernational Park entrance gate, everything changed. A huge elephant crossed the street. Only a few minutes later we saw the first giraffes. By the time we got to our overnight camp, we had seen a lot of animals and were absolutely thrilled.

In Hawaii we often saw a bright red bird that kept thrilling us. When I found a red feather, it immediately went into the diary.

There are black lava beaches on Lanzarote and if you look closely and are lucky you can see small olive-colored stones: called olivine - also seen in my travel diary.

Argentina is certainly one of the longing countries. Many immediately think of the tango, the sun and Patagonia with its high mountains and its everlasting wind. Our first destination was the Valdes peninsula.

Getting there was a bit of an effort. Flight from Buenos Aires to Trelew, further by taxi to Puerto Madryn and a rental car to Puerto Piramides.

When we were planning our trip through South Korea in 2016, it quickly became clear that some of our desired destinations were best reached by car. The decision to take a rental car was easy for us - we already knew illegible traffic signs thanks to our car tour through Japan and after all, in Korea you turn right. So two cars were booked for Jeju Island and the South Korean mainland.

The express trains in Japan (Shinkansen) are fast, but you still spend some time on the train on the long routes. The rows of seats are laid out like in an airplane - but you have significantly more legroom. Someone regularly comes through the wagons and offers food and drinks. It is popular to stock up on provisions at the train station. There are corresponding stores that offer, for example, a large selection of bentoboxes (see Fig. 1). A bentobox is a box with several compartments, in which different dishes can be found.

Travelling by train in Japan is really fun. As a tourist you have the opportunity to buy a credit for the Japan Rail Pass outside of Japan. In Japan, the Rail Pass will be issued. Now you can drive as much and as far with the Japan Railway as you want. Other lines cost extra.