Why I Travel

Happy New Year!

I want to start the year sharing somewhat of a testimony and the reason why I travel so much (according to friends and family lol, personally I think I’m an average traveller but well..). I actually wrote this post back in October but I have been hesitant to post it until now

So I’m sitting here in Nice waiting for my delayed flight back home to London. I’ve been contemplating why I love travelling and I feel blessed to have visited so many beautiful places and for some reason I can’t let go f the thought that I need to put this into a post so here it goes.. Stay tuned to the end where I will share some tips on money & planning

I remember back home in Ghana, I was either 10 or 12 years old and my mum had sent me to get some stuff from the market. It’s about a 10 min walk from home to market. As soon as I stepped out, I remember looking down and for rest of the journey my head stayed down. I felt ashamed that I was going to the market alone because I was thinking people would look at me and say she doesn’t have any friends. I would see people laughing and think oh they must be laughing at me. And that feeling of been alone stuck. Been the overthinking child I was (and still am) I thought of the future etc etc. If I would be alone, get a job etc etc and it’s funny I should feel like that because in school I was actually very popular and a teacher’s pet.

Fast forward to ages 16 to 20 and a lot of things happened to me  I moved from Ghana to London when I was 13) which forced me to actually be alone. From failed relationships to realising personal truths, I had to be alone and in those moments I sought God. In those moments, when I could do nothing but cry,  I began to learn a lot about God and myself and I began to love been alone! I didn’t see it as a negative anymore. At 20 I decided to step out of my comfort zone and travel, on my own to Thailand! I decided to volunteer for 1 month in Thailand teaching English. I met so many people that after two weeks, I decided to go travelling. Again by myself made my way from Phuket to Bangkok by bus at night, I couldn’t speak Thai AND I had no internet. But I safely made it to Bangkok. The very next day I met Jess a fellow traveller from Australia and we decide to go travelling together through northern Thailand. Just like that.

Me?! someone who couldn’t even leave home by herself

Chiang Mai, Thailand

Post on Thailand here

I came home and a month later in the same year, I found myself in Madrid Spain, on a year away from uni, where I was working and studying (I always had this dream where I would do this but only remembered after I came back home after the year was done). I have been to so many other places since then and now sitting here in Nice, after a really good weekend with my friend’s family (a friend I met back in Madrid and we kept in contact). I’ve been blessed and sometimes I take it for granted but in conservations, with other people, I realise it’s not that easy for some to travel even though money and timing is not an issue and they actually want to travel. I guess it’s hard to step outside your comfort zone esp if nothing has forced you to be out of it.

I guess I’m writing this to anyone who feels they will be alone forever or feels they need the validation of others’ company. God has a way of getting through to you, in a way you would understand and know it’s Him. That thought of loneliness or dependence on others is a lie straight from hell. It could be that your very calling is the exact opposite, to stand or minister to millions but if the devil could get fear in first he knows he could stop you from reaching your full potential. Why else would an 11/12 year old feel so lonely when been sent to the market when literally I knew a bunch of people in the neighbourhood? I am also reminded of the story of Moses, how he wasn’t an eloquent speaker and this made him afraid when God called him to work however his calling was literally to speak to kings to free a nation!

So Why Do I Travel?

I travel because I want to continually prove to that 11-year-old me that I can do anything I put my mind to, even if it was impossible to me at one point.

I travel because I see my life as a bank of experiences and in those experiences I try to seek God in them. Travelling gives me new experiences to add to that bank. And every new country allows me to see the variety of God’s workmanship.

I travel because I don’t want to settle. In routines, same knowledge same experiences. I want to push myself to seek new and exciting experiences

And I travel because after catching the travel bug and buying a map, I now want to cross every single country on that map! My personal challenge is 3 new countries/cities/places every year

 

Now that’s out of the way, I want to share some tips on travelling. It’s actually not as expensive as people think

  1. Incognito mode is your friend. Google is very smart and after a quick search of a place on your laptop, you will begin to see things related to your search everywhere else e.g. phone and even on Instagram! Have you ever noticed you randomly search for something on Google and in the next couple of days, you begin to see it as ads on other websites you visit? This is because of cookies. When you google hotel/flight prices I believe it increases with every search because it thinks you are thinking of visiting there hence an increase in prices may force you to purchase because you want the cheapest deal. girl, I search for all prices relating to travel in Incognito mode, that way no cookies are placed on my device and the true price comes up every time

 

  1. If you can, sign up for the airline’s email newsletter so you are kept up to date on sales/discounts going on

 

  1. Flexibility- try as much as possible to be flexible with dates and destinations and be open to visit countries off the beaten track! For me, I want to visit every single country so it’s just a matter of where I go first and price

 

  1. Travel buddies- I believe there are some places that are safer and easier to travel with a buddy. Choosing the right travel buddy is super important because it can make or break the trip. Finding someone with similar interests and budgets is super important e.g. imagine you want to eat local mid-range food on holiday but your buddy just wants the full blown 5 star restaurant experience? Hotels? You may want a cheap and cheerful one, they want a 5 star hotel with room service?

 

  1. Sites like TripAdvisor is your BEST FRIEND!

That’s all I will share, for now, I don’t want this to be a super long post! I hope this has inspired someone to travel and just get out there and do something you have always wanted! I will bring back my travel posts- I stopped due to pure laziness lol but I will bring them back from onwards! I think I will do it itinerary style as I find posts like that super helpful when I am researching a new destination!

Happy New Year once again and I hope your 2018 is your best year yet!

Xoxo

Paris

Post birthday celebration post!

I actually never realised it’s been 5 years since I started talking about going to Paris! I just don’t know why I left it that long. So this year I made it my prerogative to go there and what better time than my birthday?!

Paris is hella expensive lol but it’s a beautiful city, it’s not called the most romantic place for nothing, I mean did they really have to have seats in pairs in the park? Lol

The food! The baguettes! The croissants and that hot chocolate with loads of cream! Lool! It’s also the only country I have been to where they prioritise wine over water lol, how can wine be the 1st thing I saw when I went into the convenient store and water was downstairs lol. It’s also the only place that has a whole building dedicated to women shopping lol and the thing is every floor was busy.

Paris is that European city you just have to visit and it’s also worth mentioning it will probably be better to speak a bit of French if you do. I am so lucky my girl was French lol. I took LOADS of pictures, too many maybe but hell my Galaxy S7 camera is the BOMB! I finally shopped in Sephora! I went to one in Madrid but the hype wasn’t real back then lol.

But anyway I am super happy I finally went and I don’t mind going back! (I don’t like to go back to places I have been to before because I feel I can use that money to discover a new place( my goal is to visit every country so if you want to sponsor just holla at me lol however Paris and Thailand are places I will definitely go back to). I stayed in the Mercure Gare Du Nord which made transport SO easy. I went to most of the usual touristy places, two thing I really wanted to do was river tour and go to Disney but that can be done another time!

For now this 23rd year can start probably!

 

Germany travels: Munich

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Welcome back, let’s get straight into it. Check out part 1 for my travels in Dusseldorf (http://wp.me/p1uQOd-vm)

So Munich did NOT play! It was so hot, 28 degrees (Why?) lol. It’s surprisingly different from Dusseldorf (But don’t I say this every time I travel to different cities in the same country lol), it seems the buildings were more historical. Anyway my friend picked me up from the station and we made our way home, gurl I was too tired to go out that day after traveling all day. Does it count we went through Cologne? I can say I was there too LOL. Next day we made our way to the center, Marienplatz after seeing more beautiful cars and us thinking which one we would like lol ( I swear I have never seen so many mini’s in the same road before until I went to Munich lol, now I know God wants me to get a mini lol, so if you want to bless me or add to my mini cooper fund I plan to get it for my 25th birthday so we got time, I would greatly appreciate it J and I also saw a lot of Toyota Yaris’s hmmm). Let me say at this point my hair is wavy and I couldn’t be bothered to put on makeup (again something I do so often, as the days go by I reach for makeup less and less, especially if I am in a hot country lol). Anyway, walked about, got some ice cream and went shopping- I think they like their H&M stores? I have never seen so many of them in one shopping center lol. They even had separate H&Ms for women, men and children.

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The next day, we went to the botanical gardens. If you love flowers and colour this place is the one for you! After walking around there for a while we headed back to the center for. We also planned to go to the Olympic park but damn after walking in that sun for a while lol I was soo tired I went back home (LOL)

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I thought these were fake lol until it moved/
I thought these were fake lol until it moved/

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How beautiful are those? …  I loved the colours and I would have liked to take more buut the bees were in full force lool

I went for a walk around my friend’s area (Max-Weber Platz) later in the evening when it was much cooler and found the street Albert Einstein was born on (and all this while I thought he was English lol).

On Wednesday, it was time to head back to the UK and start work lol. I really enjoyed my time in Germany, thanks to all my hosts and I hope you enjoyed my presentsJ. Next time around I will be going to the other cities I didn’t get time to go to (I’m so serious about that deal if  you wanted to sponsor me lol), although I have always said I don’t see the point of going to the same country twice when there are others waiting hmm. My goal is to go to every single country. Every single one! I also want to do 15 countries before I’m 25. That’s in 3 years and 7 to go! Not bad huh? I’m already planning my next adventure! But for now it’s time to start work! And back to hair updates! lol

That’s all folks, I hope you enjoyed this post and if you did please subscribe for more. Hope everyone has a blessed week.

Love

Sarah