The 9 Most Spectacular Travel Experiences

An excerpt from my latest blog on some of the once-in-a-lifetime travel experiences :-)

Gorilla Trek in Uganda
I don’t like animals. I don’t think puppies are cute and I am of the belief that birds are evil and conspiring to take over the world. But I do like gorillas. In fact, anyone who has seen the movie Gorillas in the Mist has to have a bit of a thing for them. I think they’re fascinating. They seem super hardcore, like they’ll rip your head off, but they’re actually quite peaceful. And kind of cute, in a leathery, scary, hairy sort of way.

In Africa you can go on safari in just about any country. Check out the lions and elephants, giraffes and zebras. But in Uganda, you can get a permit to trek with the locals, go deep into the jungle, use one of those sword things that I’m sure aren’t called swords but rather some sort of awesome local name, and cut your way through overgrown tracks to meet up with a family of mountain gorillas. You have to be fit, okay with getting lost in a jungle, and ready to take on a gorilla at any point, but I don’t think there would be anything like it.
http://www.gapadventures.com/trips/uganda/?order_by=duration

Antarctic Expedition
It’ll be cold, very cold. But how many people do you know have been to Antarctica? Who even goes to this giant obscure piece of ice just chilling out at the South Pole? What do you do there? It’s not like you can sun-bake on the beach or go to the local for a beer.

It’s the end of the earth. Literally. And perhaps the fact that it’s not dominated by cheesy tourist gags is its major draw card. Aside from that though, you can sail through the quiet, eerie ice-berg passages, witness penguins and seals and glaciers. It’s like the last frontier, the undiscovered, it’s empty and inhospitable and mysterious. It’s beautiful and dangerous and… well, just very white I guess. To feel like you’re at the end of the earth would be like being in a different world altogether. Though, you might not want to eat for about five years so that you can actually afford it.
http://www.gapadventures.com/trips/antarctica/

Pompeii
In the year 79 AD, Mount Vesuvius suddenly erupted and froze the entire city of Pompeii in time. Showering the city in ash and pumice, it rendered Pompeii lost until its rediscovery in 1749 AD. Of course archaeologically, this was a gold mine of information and insight to Roman city life around that time, preserving artifacts, buildings and bones in a way no other archaeological site had. But for us regular citizens, we go back in time and come face-to-face with people who were stopped dead in their tracks and almost instantly mummified, turned in to eerie statues in ghostly streets. Some of them look to be praying, others look to have fallen, while some huddle together. The last time these “statues” were alive they were running from the end of the world.

Ski Down a Mountain in the Desert
The United Arab Emirates. One of my favorite places ever. This place is both historical and radical. Here you have a country steeped in tradition with a history going as far back as civilization. You could get lost in the desert dunes and the souks with their exotic spices and belly dancers. Or you could simply go to Dubai or Abu Dhabi and shop at the world’s biggest and most modern shopping centres and spend all of your money on label handbags (that’s what I did).

Everything in Dubai is over-the-top. From the second you arrive at the airport it feels like the whole country is on alert and offering you exceptional customer service. From being ushered into a pink, scented taxi designed only for female passengers (and driven only by female drivers), to skiing down a man-made mountain in a shopping centre, or witnessing the tallest building in the world, I had the time of my life. Oh, and for just 25 million dollars, you can buy your own “country” in the man-made islands shaped like the world. It’s like they don’t know what to do with their money…

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