After 320 days, almost 11 months, the long-awaited day arrived when we arrived back home. On the morning of June 8, our plane landed at Tallinn Airport. We were quite zombies as from Turkey we flew home via Norway and had to spend half a night at Oslo Airport (not recommended to anyone since the sleeping conditions at that airport are very poor). However, our morning was awakened by a surprise at Tallinn Airport, where we were welcomed by friends and family. It’s so good to come home when you immediately feel that you’ve been missed and waited.
In this short period, we visited 37 countries and everybody have asked what was our favorite country of what was the most awesome country.
Our answer so far has been similar to most, and inorder to answer properly we would need to know the background of the question? If the asker wants a travel tip, we would definitely need more information about the person’s travel habits and preferences, as otherwise the wrong advice can be given. Or if the inquirer wants to hear about our adventures, then surely these countries would be the others we would be talking about. All in all, we have come to the conclusion that every country we visited was a unique and certainly ideal holiday destination for anyone. However, it all depends on one’s personal preference for traveling, such as is it eating good food, nice beaches and sunbathing or hiking in the mountains.
When we traveled in Europe we were in a new country every other day because we were road tripping and we could move forward quite quickly. But our undisputed favorite in Europe did not change during this trip – we would go back to Italy over and over again. Desperately beautiful beaches, our favorite food, beautiful nature, culture, all in a safe and clean European environment. Also not to mention Portugal where we really liked the city of Porto with its beautiful architecture and nice people. In addition, small mountain villages in Portugal where people living there are like one big family.
While in Africa we were limited to only two countries, these both remained very close to our heart. Both Morocco and Cape Verde have their own charm, although the two are very different. To Cape Verde, we would go back to hike in the greenery. We would visit Morocco a second time to escape from cold European winter and catch the nice warm sun and enjoy the seafood and other spicy flavors.
In the US, we became our undisputed favorite on the west coast road trip. Unfortunately, we did not have enough time to visit the National Parks in the area, but we are certainly planning to visit those in the future. The very powerful and varied nature is what we feel is worth visiting in the US. Noteworthy are also Boston and Washington D.C., with a long and interesting history.
The pearl of Latin and South America was definitely Guatemala, Peru, and Patagonia. We liked Guatemala because the country is still quite authentic and unique. People live relatively modest lives, but they still seemed happy. The special and different nature of Patagonia we did not encounter anywhere else during our trip, so this place was a real gem for us. No less special was certainly our Macchu Pichhu hike in Peru, which was definitely the most challenging hike, but it was worth the effort.
Visiting New Zealand and Australia, we may have had too little time to get to know those countries properly. But we liked Australia’s pleasant climate and the openness of its people so much that if it wasn’t so far from home and family, we would even consider moving there. So we understand very well the many Estonians who have gone there … and stayed …
In Asia, it is quite difficult for us to pick our favorite. In terms of local attitudes, nature, and climate, however, we probably liked Indonesia, and more specifically Bali. Also Sri Lanka in same terms. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to hike there, so we would be happy to go back to do some hiking there as well. Sri Lanka gave us a very good impression, even though the country had recently been hit by a major tragedy. While we were there, we received very good service and perhaps because of the lack of tourists we could quite simply enjoy the tourist attractions that might otherwise be more expensive or less accessible. We seemed to have everything in Sri Lanka – beautiful mountains, beaches, fascinating history and cultural heritage, good food and national parks full of exotic animals.
The most bizarre of the Asian countries was Cambodia where at first place everything looked like chaos, but then we saw the islands of paradise and also learned the difficult and complicated history of the country.
All in all, we think that it will be quite a while before we can truly realize our experience all this in a short period of time. There will be exciting adventure stories for a while and it is also a pleasure to admit that although we missed home very much, we will be happy to make new travel plans while we are in Estonia. Unfortunately, for a while, our travel options are a bit limited, but more on that in the next post.