Bad decisions make for good stories - Travel Edition - part 1

After a long day on the bus, we were getting closer to Ho Chi Minh City. I was excited to explore the streets of the former Saigon given its history. But as the bus got closer and closer to the city, we noticed how the scooters around us were struggling in the rain. We looked at them from behind our bus windows and felt sorry for how wet they were getting. There was nothing we could do - except for being grateful for our comfy bus. Once we finally entered Ho Chi Minh City, we noticed the streets were flooded and as we got closer to the city center the water level was higher and higher. Eventually the water level was so high that the bus couldn’t drive any further. We saw cars floating past us, nothing could really make it up against so much water, so we had to get out at the nearest bus stop.

Unfortunately for us, this was not where we were supposed to disembark and our location was still miles away from our hostel. We tried to stop several taxi’s, but they only seemed to take locals. After a while we gave up. It seemed like our only option was to walk. And so we started to wade through the water, which went up to our knees on the less flooded parts. We saw rats swimming in front of us and we hoped we wouldn’t step on any - or worse... After walking for over an hour, we were both wet and exhausted so we started exploring our options. We noticed that the lights were on in a café on our route and decided to go inside. The kind locals gave us a cup of tea. Using our hands and all the language skills we got, we tried to ask them to call a taxi for us in hopes that this time, someone would be willing to drive us to our hostel. We hid ourselves when the taxi arrived and got inside the cab before the driver could say no to us tourists. While he seemed very mad, he did bring us to our hostel in the end.

Wet and exhausted, we arrived at our hostel on the 3^rd floor, which turned out to be… flooded! As if this situation wasn't already the worst! Unsure what to do now, we contacted some of the friends we made earlier on the trip. As luck may have it, some of them were actually staying at a dry hostel nearby ours! We took our bags over there, and were so happy to finally be away from all the water. In the end we had the best party of our entire trip, because we were so glad we had finally made it to Ho Chi Minh City and got to see all our friends again who welcomed us at their hostel! 

I lived in Hawaii for 6 months, me and my roommate we bought a car, a Dodge Durango from 2003- this huge fourwheeldrive car. When we got it, my roommate was enthusiastic about it but I looked at it and immediately thought something was wrong with it. The tires were almost completely flat, and it had all kinds of issues, like the airconditioning not working, and the windows not rolling down - with 35 degrees that was quite awful. One of the tires split open during a trip, and worst of all it would sometimes just stop driving, which on the middle of the highway was quite dangerous. 

On one of my last days on the island before I had to leave Hawaii, me and my friends drove to North Shore which was about an hour driving from where we lived. When we were almost there the car stopped driving, and the wheels got stuck so I couldn't steer the car anymore - and that in the middle of the road. Fortunately no-one else was on the other side of the road, so I sort of drove it into a ditch. We didn't really know what to do, so we decided to leave the car and go see the sunset, to check if it would start and work again when we'd made our way back to the car. Once we got back to the car we couldn't turn it on. We tried for five minutes, but it wouldn't budge. We couldn't just leave the car there, since we bought and registered it so it was our responsibility. After thinking about the situation for a while, we decided to take of the plates of the car and leave it there, since it would cost like 200$ to have it towed. 

Since we didn't have any tools, we started knocking on the doors of random houses to see if anyone had tools we could borrow. One of the guys that opened the door actually went to the car with us, since we also needed to push it off the road a little further as it was close to the road and could be dangerous. The guy helped us push the car further into the ditch, and as he was really friendly, we asked him what happens if we leave the car here. He explained that the police there didn't really have the resources to ticket abandoned cars in situations like this, and he offered to call the police in a couple of weeks time, to notify them of the abandoned car and ask them to remove it. He was super nice, helping us to take the plates off the car and driving us into town so we could take an Uber home from there. My male roommate was pretty mad that we just left the car, but we gave him the plates from the car which he now has as a souvenir. 

When I was in my twenties and backpacking in Peru I was not very well travelled. I had booked something from home called “The Inca trail” to a place called Machu Picchu. I had heard it was a highlight and something you should visit when you were there, but I didn’t really know what it was and I didn't really do any research or read about it.

In my bag I had only packed summer clothing, so when I arrived in Cusco I was quite surprised about the chilly weather due to the high altitude. I didn’t even have a warm sweater, so I had to go shopping for some items in the local market and found a very touristy hoodie with a lama on it. The only shoes I had brought from home were a pair of golden sandals. But I did it! I managed to trek the whole Inca trail with my very special hiking shoes. Here is a picture of me on the highest point on the trail, called “Dead woman’s pass” on an altitude of 4 215 meter above sea level with my lama hoodie and golden sandals. Doesn't it look fabulous? In all seriousness, it shows that you don't necessarily need fancy equipment, and that even if you forget some items back at home you will be fine. There are shops and markets everywhere, or you'll simply make it work with what you have! 

Anyone who knows me, knows that I love cycling trips. I have done plenty, in different locations and some of my favourites were in ''the Stans''. On a cycling trip in Kyrgyzstan, we experienced amazing hospitality. I've met some great people, but this was certainly out of the ordinary.

You have to know, the weather in Kyrgyzstan is not the greatest since in summer there's a heavy thunderstorm almost every day! One one of the days here, we had just reached a mountain pass at about 3700 meters above sea level, when it suddenly started to hail and there was lightning striking around us!

There was nothing around us where we could find shelter, so the only alternative was to keep on cycling ahead. We were blessed with luck, as soon we came across two lonely yurts (a sort of insulated, portable, round tent used by nomadic groups). Finally, a place to wait out the storm! We parked our bikes and went to see if the inhabitants would be able to offer us shelter. Two older people opened the door and luckily they let us in. They offered us a cup of Kummus (fermented horse milk) and we got to heat up next to the fire. All in all, it was a really cosy experience and we were so glad for their hospitality. 

I speak a bit of Russian so we were able to do a little bit of small talk with them, which made the situation more pleasant. When it stopped hailing they rushed of to their horses, as they told us the horses needed to be milked every two hours. If not, the milk would turn bad and it would be unusable. We quickly thanked them for their kindness and said goodbye to our saviors of the day!

Haven't had enough yet? Lucky you - there will be more! This blog is part of a small series we'll be running over the coming months, so if you want to read more of the escapades of our Travel Experts, subscribe to our newsletter and social channels and stay tuned!