Tag: #travelblogger

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The next city

Rotterdam, the Capital of Cool

During my basic education years, I picked up a few facts about what would one day become my adopted home—the Netherlands. Tulips are Dutch (or so I thought, until I later learned they originally came from Turkey), Rotterdam is Europe’s biggest port (and from 1964 to 2004, it was the busiest in the world), and the Erasmus Bridge in Rotterdam is named after Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, one of the greatest scholars of the Renaissance. I learned about Rembrandt and Van Gogh—Van Gogh later became my favorite—and about PSV Eindhoven, Ruud Gullit with his wild hair, and Marco van Basten (my brother was a diehard fan). Read more

Atlas

A Winter Escape in The Gambia – Part 3

Let me start with a confession: I don’t do 5 a.m. wake-ups. I’m not one of those sunrise yoga people. I’m more of a “snooze-button Olympics” kind of girl. On a regular weekday, I wrestle myself out of bed at 7:30 a.m., groggy, unenthusiastic, and half-human.

But then came Gambia. Suddenly, I was springing out of bed at 5 a.m. like a caffeinated meerkat. No alarm. No grumbling. Just me, excitement, and the road. Turns out, curiosity and wanderlust are better than coffee. Read more

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Existentialism

Thirty-five

Postcard from the Airport

Thirty-five! I made it so far.

Here I am—on my way to Paris. Airports have always fascinated me. They’re chaotic, colorful micro-cities where stories pass through like wind. I always feel like an ant in an anthill—buzzing, moving, waiting.

Me and my Starbucks coffee, parked on a chair in Terminal Whatever. Watching people. Observing lives in transit. Everyone here is carrying a story. Some wrapped in silence, others bursting at the seams. The airport is just a pit stop in their life’s journey, but oh, what a diverse parade of humanity! Read more

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The next city, Wanderlust

One Week in Den Helder: Blue Skies, Fairytales and Chocolate Cravings

Saturday morning started the only way any good Saturday should—coffee first, always. (Coffee addict here, remember?) Once the caffeine hit just right, we packed a few bags and headed off on a little adventure to the north of the Netherlands.

Our destination? Julianadorp aan Zee, a charming village just 4 km south of Den Helder, the northernmost city in the Netherlands. We booked a cozy bungalow in Strandslag, nestled right at the foot of the sand dunes lining the North Sea. Read more