Even we can’t beat this slow pace in our Land Cruiser: 1300 kilometers in 7 months; an average of 6 kms/day. Yet, even if they wanted to, these people couldn’t travel any faster, for you see, these 9 tropeiros and 1 woman have to lead 1376 cows from the breeder to their new owner.
Here, slow living isn’t a modern concept; it’s an age-old way of life.
We arrived in Manaus with a list of places I wanted to visit, but Providence ruled differently. In the past I might have had a fit. I had made a list, damn it, and we were going to stick to it. We had to visit Manaus properly.
After all, wasn’t that why we were here?
Tiger footprints. We stop in our tracks. Excitement rises. Our guide kneels and studies them, and concludes they are old ones. Disillusion comes with a hidden sense of relief.
There is a gun-carrying guard with us, but still.
Amidst a crowd of typical, T-shirts-and-jeans-wearing Brazilians, a black woman stood out. She wore an intricate, white, lace bodice covered with necklaces above a dark-blue, billowing skirt and a white piece of cloth artistically wrapped around her head. She was deep-frying some sort of snack.
Meet Salvador da Bahia’s famous Baianas de Acarajé.
In the 1960s-1980s, North Korea dug tunnels under the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) into South Korea in an attempt to surprise attack their neighbors from underground. Depending on the size of the tunnel it could funnel 10,000-30,000 soldiers an hour and some are big enough for vehicles as well.
Unfortunately for North Korea, the tunnels were discovered.
Living-root bridges? Bridges made of natural materials that last hundreds of years?
Yes, they exist!
It was Sunday, late afternoon. The weekend vacationers from Manaus had returned home and peace reigned once more over the small tourist town of Novo Airão. I was the only one to go swimming with dolphins.
What a stroke of luck!
On the northern side of South Korea is the Peace Dam and next to it are a Peace Park and a World Peace Park.
What’s this ‘peace stuff’ all about?
Amidst the flooded forest of Anavilhanas-Archipel, I am looking up at a meters wide trunk of a tree. It splits into three immensely thick branches that reach high into the sky, as if they are on their way to heaven.
I feel as if I am looking at a scene in the cartoon of Jack and the Beanstalk.
One of the most unexpected sites I ever did in our 16-year journey was visiting a soccer stadium and actually watching a soccer game. Traveling is full of surprises, and here I stood in what ‘everybody’ considered to be the most famous stadium in the world:
The Maracaña Stadium in Rio de Janeiro.
Thick traffic and having to watch my back had made me wary of Rio de Janeiro. But after a leisurely walk up the Sugar Loaf I took in the view and suddenly understood the spell that visitors as well as Cariocas (Rio de Janeiro’s residents) fall under.
And I wondered, what’s there not to fall in love with Rio de Janeiro?
With only another 120 kilometers, the days suddenly pass very, very quickly. The western section of the Datça Peninsula is one of the remotest sections of the 850-kilometer-long Carian Trail.
Few villages, mostly footpaths meandering through forests and traversing headlands that divide dozens of secluded bays.
“Never be so faithful to your plan that you are unwilling to consider the unexpected. Never be so faithful to your plan that you are unwilling to entertain the improbable opportunity that comes looking for you.”
~Elizabeth Warren
Hiking the Datça Peninsula and rolling up your sleeves to get your hands dirty in a greenhouse?
How do those two activities match?
