Tag Archives: must see

I’d heard many good things about Sochi on the whole, and Krasnaya Polyana in particular, but still: nothing beats seeing it for oneself. That’s right: for some odd reason I’d never properly visited Sochi. Ok, I was here briefly two years ago for the Formula-1, but I only got to see the racing track and Olympic Park.

This time, despite a typically busy business schedule in the city, I got to take in the sights and sounds of the place, and even got a bit of hill-trekking in. And, ohhhh boy, was I glad that I did! For here in Sochi I was pleasantly surprised astounded by how cool the place is. I simply couldn’t believe this was a Russian seaside town on the Black Sea. How things have improved been transformed!

Krasnaya Polyana also bowled me over with its spaciousness, modernity, shininess (newness), wide embankments and contented pedestrians strolling along the riverbank.

Read on: ski and palms…

Hi all!

Altai ranks up there as one of the most fascinating and magical places on earth.

It’s not only beautiful – there’s something about the place. It might be some sort of special energy in the rocks there or something else unbeknown to us. Here the colors are brighter, the water tastes better, the grass is greener, and the mountains contrast more with their surroundings. This year I was lucky enough to spend three weeks in Altai with a group of like-minded adventurers. We hiked, choppered, and rafted (down the Katun River).

In all we walked about 70 kilometers to Lake Akkem and then around it, flew around mount Belukha in a helicopter, flew up to the headwaters of the Katun and rafted down to the lower reaches of the river – almost 400km (four HUNDRED kilometers!!) in all, and descending over a kilometer along the vertical axis. This was my ‘summer holiday’.

Reaв on: And this is what it all looked like…

Volcanism. It’s one of my hobbies. I just love getting up volcanoes all over the planet. Something about their beauty, power, hooliganism, infamy, aliveness, hotness, lava, craters, calderas, lakes… you get the picture.

But there’s one thing about volcanism that can be a bit of a pain: you normally need a good few days – if not weeks – to engage in any properly. This is because volcanoes of course tend to be massive, inaccessible, and often there are several in one spot that demand conquering. But then I heard about Mount Aragats: the quintessential ‘weekend volcano’.

Here she is. As you can see, she’s not far from the Armenian capital – so there’s the ‘inaccessible’ point crossed off as a volcanism-hindrance. She’s big and has more than one peak, but there is just one of her. All that is to explain its ‘weekendness’ :). But enough words; check out the pics:

Read on: Ruined over the millennia; but that’s half its charm…

Oakie-doakie. On we march front-crawl, to the next stop on the worldwide swimming bus – Europe.

6. Hot Sea, Santorini.

Santorini is a volcano-island, or island-volcano. It’s actually a ring of islands, which are the remains of the caldera of a huge volcano of yester-millennia, with a fresh volcano growing up inside the ring in the middle, which every now and then erupts and grows bigger. I was on Santorini not long ago, and wrote plenty of words about it here on this blog.

The only hot springs in the world that are situated in the sea reside here. At least, the only ones in the world known to me. The hot water spurts up from the seabed through the sea, making said sea the warmest sea you’ll ever know :).

There are quite a few spots around the islands where you can partake in hot-spring-sea-bathing. The one in the above pic isn’t the best; others are deeper and hotter, I’m told…

Read on: summer holidays on the White Sea islands…

As promised yesterday, here come a LOT of photos…

So get the popcorn in plus your beverage of choice, and we’re off…

Read on: 500 thousand tons of ice per hour …

Back on Tenerife. Terrific! And since we’d scheduled in a full day to acclimatize before the business part of the trip, it was high time to get behind the wheel and off around those hairpins and up them volcanoes. Naturally!

Now, normally to get to the top of a volcano your need to trek, climb and clamber up it, sometimes for several days (Kilimanjaro, for example). There are a few exceptions, one being Mount Etna, which can be scaled via first a ski-lift then specially equipped buses. Another is Mount Teide on Tenerife. This one’s for reeeaaal lazy tourists.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BHRVkrVh5nD/

Read on: A gentle touch from altitude sickness…

Χαίρετε folks!… From sensationally sunny Santorini, Greece. A spellbinding place…

Santorini is magnificently mind-blowing in all sorts of different ways simultaneously: touristically, climatically, volcanically, archeologically… But wait… I’ve been here before and aptly raptured before too. So I won’t repeat all that here – especially since nothing has really changed since last time – in 2013. The beauty’s all still here (if looking from up above), the sun’s still as bright, the sea’s not receded, and the volcanoes haven’t wiped out their surroundings…

I’ve said it many times before – as have many others – and I’ll say it many times more… pictures are worth a thousand words, so without more of a do…

https://www.instagram.com/p/BGxJ2dSOicX/

Read on: So, what am I doing here? Working! …

Next up on my Greek travels – Athens. I had one day off between business meetings to have a quick glimpse of the city.

Though I’ve been practically all over Europe down the years, for some odd reason I’d never made it to the ancient center of Athens. What makes that especially odd is the fact that I go mad for historical ancientnesses. And as we all know, Athens has those in Hades spades…

To me there’s something infinitely fascinating about the fact that these temples, houses (rather – their ruins), stone bridges, and the huge stone ‘bricks’ that make up the constructions… all of it was created thousands of years ago by folks just like us. Ok, without the smartphones and reality TV, but very much with eternally human features like having problems and experiencing joy and sadness and birth and death. They walked here, loved here, hated here, envied here, got their thrills here, built here, destroyed here. Thousands of years ago. Here in Athens, at places like the Acropolis and the Parthenon.

Read on: Ancient gems…

Oh no! I need to turn my Top-100 List of Must-See Places in the World into the Top-101 List! Not exactly a round number is it, but what can I do? Needs must…

So what’s so special that needs adding? It’s the Meteora in Greece – a ‘formation of immense monolithic pillars and hills like huge rounded boulders that dominate the local area’. Sheer cliffs stretching 600 meters up, all in different shades of grey, with monasteries atop some of the peaks of the rocks.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BGjzAc0uiUa/

Read on: Oh my Greek! …

Copenhagen, Denmark. Hadn’t been here in quite a while; last time was in February 2011. Back then, as could be expected in this Nordic capital, it was cold (and windy). This time though – suitably summery: sunny and warm and with long light evenings. Very ‘euro-cool’ too: folks lounging languidly at street cafes and restaurants, cyclists seeming to take direct aim at unaccustomed (non-European) pedestrian-tourists, and boats leisurely carrying folks about to and fro along the rivers and canals. Euro-cool? Euro-paradise!

As per the usual MO, after having finished our business in the current locality, it was time to head out for some micro-tourism. Scratch that. Nano-tourism: just three hours’ worth! I’m sure three days would be a more suitable length of time to check out this city more appropriately, but what could I do? I had to be back on the road come evening. Accordingly, the tourism-tempo was decidedly up…

Read on: Mermaids Seize Boat!…