Skaftafell to Seydisfjördur – part 2

To avoid the rain in Skaftafell we drive another 8km and pitch our tent in Svinafell, another nice campsite and without rain. The weather is very local here, especially close to the glaciers. Luckily it stopped raining in Skaftafell overnight and we get back there in the morning for the walk to the Skaftafellsjökull glacier […]

Skaftafell to Seydisfjördur – part 1

To avoid the rain in Skaftafell we drive another 8km and pitch our tent in Svinafell, another nice campsite and without rain. The weather is very local here, especially close to the glaciers. Luckily it stopped raining in Skaftafell overnight and we get back there in the morning for the walk to the Skaftafellsjökull glacier […]

Seljalandsfoss to Skaftafell – part 1

Seljalandsfoss to Skaftafell In the morning we visit the interesting Eyjafjallajökull visitor center (almost as difficult to write as it is to pronounce it) where they show a movie on how the 2010 eruption impacted the farmers living right below the volcano. We eat an excellent carrot cake at the glacial tongue of Sólheimjökull and […]

Landmannalaugar to Seljalandsfoss – part 2

Landmannalaugar to Seljalandsfoss Starting the day with a morning hike and then another ride on the F roads back to the main Ring Road. Lunch is a pot of soup between the two front seats, too cold and windy to eat outside. We visit Skogafoss and Seljalandsfoss, and after a short look at both campsites […]

Landmannalaugar to Seljalandsfoss part 1

Landmannalaugar to Seljalandsfoss Starting the day with a morning hike and then another ride on the F roads back to the main Ring Road. Lunch is a pot of soup between the two front seats, too cold and windy to eat outside. We visit Skogafoss and Seljalandsfoss, and after a short look at both campsites […]

Iceland – Keflavik to Landmannalaugar – part 2

 8 days of Iceland, almost 2000km in our rented 4WD car with the unpronounceable name, spectacular landscapes with geysers, so many waterfalls, moss-covered lava fields, ice capped volcanoes, glaciers and in the highlands, desert-like plains of ash. One could point out that later can get a bit boring though…   We started with the classic […]

Iceland – Keflavik to Landmannalaugar – part 1

 8 days of Iceland, almost 2000km in our rented 4WD car with the unpronounceable name, spectacular landscapes with geysers, so many waterfalls, moss-covered lava fields, ice capped volcanoes, glaciers and in the highlands, desert-like plains of ash. One could point out that later can get a bit boring though…   We started with the classic […]

Madagascar, Masoala, September 29 – October 3, part 1

Masoala, September 29 – October 3 With Air Madagascar generally flying only in the morning, not flying on Sundays and then rescheduling our flight to Tuesday, we get to spend three nights in Tana. As the weather and Tana both aren’t that great, we mainly hang out in our nice hotel room or the food […]

Madagascar, Tsingy de Bemaraha, September 21-25 part 2

Tsingy de Bemaraha, September 21-25 part 2 Tsingy itself is an Unesco World Heritage Site, its jagged limestone pinnacles have been shaped by centuries of water and wind erosion. To cross them, we climb the via ferrata (fixed-cable routes) with its viewing platforms, rope bridges, ladders and suspension bridges. Visiting the Small Tsingy seems to […]

Madagascar, Tsingy de Bemaraha, September 21-25 part 1

Tsingy de Bemaraha, September 21-25 With Air Madagascar changing the times – and as an extra challenge, once even the date – of every single flight we have booked with them, we got to Morondava earlier than planned, although via Tana and not with the now no longer available direct flight. Morondava is our starting […]

Madagascar, Isalo, September 18-19

Leaving behind the rainforest in Ranomafana, we enter the desert plains of Southern Madagascar. It’s a flatter, hotter landscape now, with less people and covered in yellow savannah grass. The two-storey mudbrick houses and paddy fields of the highlands change into little mud huts with straw roofs and small herds of zebus. In the middle […]

Madagascar, Ranomafana, September 16-17

Ranomafana, September 16-17 After a morning driving through the dry rocky valley of the highlands, we take a side road from the NR7 to Ranomafana. Suddenly there is forest, the air is fresh and cool and the road is the only good road in the whole country. The whole 30km of it. Ranomafana is another […]

Driving, September 15-16

On our first real driving day, we learn that this is one of the countries where you don’t ask how far but how long. 100km can easily take three hours driving. We keep on congratulating ourselves for choosing a 4WD despite the agency telling us a regular car can do it as well. As LP […]

Madagascar, Andasibe, September 13-14

After a full day of flying we arrived late in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar. Tana is not the most picturesque city of them all and we happily left the next morning with Monsieur Mamy, our driver for the first week. Andasibe is our first destination to look for lemurs. And some other wildlife but […]

Cuernos del Paine

this is the final post of the patagonian trip. We hiked for 121km with a total ascent of 6’000m, can’t wait to go back. unfortunately i didn’t get the light i was hoping for but i’m pretty happy with these results

Mirador Torres del Paine

end of the hike was promising the second best view of the cuernos. we arrived up there after a steep hike, rather windy, took my time to find a location and this is the only picture i managed to take before a sudden mist follow by snow kicked in. it snowed all night long till […]

Torres del Paine – the W hike

the famous hike around Torres del Paine , the “W hike” due to its shape is about 90km long, takes 5 days of moderate hike, sure it could be done in 4 as well. the treks are so nicely marked i really cannot understand why some hikers had a guide with them. anyone that likes […]

Torres del Paine

i’ve been obsessed with Torres del Paine ever since childhood when i read “Toate panzele sus!” (sails up) with Speranta crew’s(Hope’s) adventures around the Tierra del Fuego, the name was just inspiring. some years later when i’ve seen a sunset picture of the cuernos i knew i will end up there sooner or later, even […]

Fitzroy and Cerro Torre

time to say goodbye to El CHalten, the nicest mountain village i’ve ever seen, yes a swiss said that, 2nd class swiss as some say 🙂 on the way out still clouds, what else, but at least this time the view was far better than few days ago. Coming back to El Chalten and drop […]

Laguna Los Tres

the trail from El Chalten to Laguna Los Tres is the most popular hike in the region. the hike is pretty decent, 5 hrs each way with a total altitude difference of just little over 1’000m through an amazing landscape…that’s how is advertised, when you have to do the hike in pouring rain that even […]

Patagonian landscape

close to the entrance in the national park Los Glaciers lays this amazing farm. we stopped there for lunch an will definitely spend some night next time we’ll be there

Perito Moreno and Los Glaciares National Park

home to 47 big glaciers and 200 small ones Los Glaciares National Park is a must see in Argentina. we took a ferry ride, full day to see some of the biggest glaciers and what a sight that is. The size of these glaciers puts the european ones i’ve seen to utter shame. the most […]

El Chalten

the home of the Fitz Roy and Cerro Torre hikes, El Chalten lays few hours away from El Calafate. along the route you get to see the Fitz Roy closer and closer driving the last kilometres in a agonising slow speed, believing after each next curve the famous view will lay ahead. the weather hasn’t […]

La Boca

a long overdue post…the start of the Patagonia series. Patagonia is far…very far far away…it took us about 38hrs of flying, including an 11 hrs layover in Buenos Aires. I wish i’d have more to say about Buenos Aires but we haven’t seen too much of it as on 25th December everything is closed. As […]

Mythen (grosse und kleine)

last weekend was the first hike of the season and when reached this place i thought it would make a nice picture, luckily the farmer was kind enough to let us camp on his ground. It was a rough night with a…hmm…best described as dry storm, now we know the tent can take heavy winds

Goodbye Rio

The last post takes the most time, with us being back home and at work, never getting around to write it. After a couple of relaxing days on Ilha Grande, we are now back in Rio. Our last stop before flying back home. We decide to give the Pão de Açúcar another chance to see […]

Lençois Maranhenses scenic flight

On our last evening, Jeff from Fly Ava takes us up in the air for a thirty minutes scenic flight. It’s an amazing way to see the dunes, only now we realize how big the area is and how much is currently filled with water. Jeff upgraded us to the bigger plane, a seven seater […]

Lençois Maranhenses part2

On our second day, we take a boat tour down the Rio Preguiças, between jungle, mangroves and dunes, to the ocean beach at Caburé at the river mouth. The tour is nice and if we had learned some Portuguese ahead, we would now know a lot about palm trees, the different types of palm trees, […]

Lençois Maranhenses part1

Next we travel further up north, to the dunes of Lençois Maranhenses. Of all Brazil’s landscape spectacles, the most unexpected has to be the Lençóis Maranhenses – a 70km-long, 25km-wide expanse of high dunes resembling lençóis (bed sheets) spread across the landscape. From March to September the dunes are partnered by thousands of crystal-clear, freshwater […]

Pantanal part2

Pantanal

After getting super excited about having salad for dinner (Sabine), thanks to still being jet lagged we went to bed early and up even earlier, at 3.30am. Taking the hop-on/hop-off plane to Cuiabá with no less than three stops along the way. Arriving in the Pantanal, it still rains and we see only a few […]

Iguaçu the wet one

So it is true what all the travel books say, you will get wet at the falls… so much rain, the only difference during the day is that from time to time it rains even more. While our ponchos keep us dry and get jealous views all around, our shoes don’t. Still, we are here […]

Iguaçu Falls

The Iguaçu Falls are located on the border of Argentina and Brazil and consist of approximately 275 individual falls over 2.7 km. Not that we counted them ourselves – too busy looking at them – but many they are. And stunning! After an early morning in Rio – jet lag, and a very early breakfast thanks […]

Rio de Janeiro

As described by LP, Rio really is the Cidade Maravilhosa! Planted between lush, forest-covered mountains and breathtaking beaches, the Cidade Maravilhosa (Marvelous City) has many charms at her disposal. We love it. The busy beach of Copacabana, where everyone is keeping active. Running, biking, surfing or using the outdoor gym. Latest at lunch we realize […]

Makgadikgadi’s bush men

before hurrying to the airstrip (the advantage of charter flights: they have to wait for your) we spent an educational morning about survival in the desert, is amazing how easy is to them to extract water from plants or start a fire.. their version of rock-paper-scisors, didn’t get it… 80 and still strong and this […]

Makgadikgadi’s meerkat experience

they move all over the place, not more than 10 seconds still , it took forever to get this picture after a while you start to see the pattern part of the meerkat experience is to wait till they climb on you for a better scouting view, unfortunately Sabine’s jacket had something about it… THAT’s […]

Makgadikgadi salt pans – a night to remember

is amazing when you see nothing but salt pan everywhere you look our ATVs after about 50min of riding THAT’s what i call a sundowner when there’s no city light polution is amazing how visible milky way is sleeping in the pan was amazing, i just gazed at the stars for almost 1hr till i […]

Makgadikgadi salt pans

San Camp is just a dream, with a very bedouiny feeling they know how to look after you.

Okovango Delta – finally: Leopard!

finally my Big Five check list is complete. in Sri Lanka i refused to believe the still exists after lots of visits in the Yala Park, in Masai Mara someone in our car claimed saw a tail (boohoo), in Namibia we had to turn around before the leopard destination, but in Botswana we had 3 […]

Okovango Delta – wild dogs, baby cheetah and lions

what a morning! Botswana lays on a plateau about 1000m high meaning in the mornings is mighty cold, we were told in the winter times frost sometimes freezes; during the morning safaris till the sun warms one up you cover with blankets and the last thing you need is the driver going like mad off […]

Okovango Delta – hippos

lots and lots of hippos but not one yawning…

Okovango Delta – delta safaris

still wondering who was more scared, us in the boat or the elephant that suddenly saw us from around the corner gunning straight at him Cute old lady

Okovango Delta – Malachite kingfisher

absolutely the cutest king fisher

Okovango Delta – Moremi reserve

Sawuti park 2

that’s what i call a school trip

lions of Sawuti

and the dinner

Sawuti park

Isn’t this the coolest balcony view? zoomed in…

Chobe park 2

Chobe park has the highest elephant population in Botswana, about 200k strong. seeing families with 60 members is quite the norm Elephant kindergarten male giraffes fighting…the most elegant i’ve ever seen, it was like watching capoeira

Chobe park

Victoria Falls