Coming home from my trip to the Maldives was like someone waking me up from a dream. I exchanged the paradise beaches for a cold and stormy Holland. I had 5 days at my parents’ house in the South of Holland to recover from my adventure in the Maldives and damn I need that badly!
Tired from Maldives
Of course I understand that you guys cant phantom that I felt exhausted from my trip in paradise. Most people assume it must be boring to spend 3 weeks in Maldives and that is a complete misconception. Yes relaxing is an important reason to travel to Maldives but there are so many activities and excursions that can be booked during your stay that there can be a complete new schedule for you every day again. Take a look at my article: A Week In Paradise and you will see I did not sit still. There is only daylight between 6am and 6pm so in that time frame you want to squeeze in all the cool things to do in Maldives. I am not an early morning person but somehow I really enjoy getting out of bed as early as possible when staying in paradise. The outside temperature is perfect, the ocean is calm and there is a little sea breeze to slowly wake you up. Walking around in the resorts where everything looks so clean and tidy, perfectly arranged and all you hear is the wind in the trees is the best feeling ever. No one is in a rush and everyone will greet you with a big smile wishing you a great day ahead. I tell you in resorts in Maldives is it a blessing to wake up early!
That said I am not the one who can go to bed before midnight so basically after a fantastic day full of exciting activities I only slept for a couple hours every night. I didn't mind my rhythm was killing; I wanted to make the most of my days in this dream destination and would catch up with sleep those days I was back in Holland.
Quick visit to Holland
It was good to be back on solid ground though and prepare my own sandwich in the morning, I was getting too spoiled after being pampered for 3 weeks. I love my resort life and I can't wait to get into it when I am back in Maldives next year, but it also creates a lot of work so basically all I did while back in Holland was updating my social media and writing articles about my adventures like for example Trouble in Paradise. You should read that as I wrote about a resort collaboration that went from bad to worse. On a more serious note I also wrote about me speaking at The World Travel Writers' Conference and of course all the amazing resorts I stayed in.
Being woken up by my little cousin was big fun too although way too early! :)
Preparing for my trip to Greece
As I was invited by Lesvos Tourism to come and explore their island I was flying out to Athens a couple days later. I requested to stay overnight in Athens for a bit as I had never been there. More about my trip to Lesbos in my next weekly adventures blog… or for a complete island guide for when you travel to Lesbos Greece click on the picture below.
Travel fails
1. My GoPro drowned
Unfortunately I made a big mistake in Maldives. While recording footage to create a video for my stay at Naladhu Private Island I strapped my GoPro to my chest and walked around the house. I swapped the waterproof housing for a standard housing and while recording I thought it would be a cool shot if I would walk into the pool and swim underwater. It took about 2 seconds to realize that this was a stupid idea, but of course too late. My GoPro was soaked, bye bye travel buddy. I traveled around with my GoPro for many years but this was it! Stupid me… I will soon write a blog post with my best GoPro pictures from the last years!
2. Powerbank died
As a gift from Indonesia Tourism Board for taking part of the Trip of Wonders Culture Trip I was gifted a power bank, something I cant live without anymore as I charge my phone about 20 times a week. I gave away my old one and no I didn’t bring the new one into the shower or anything else similar to what happened to my GoPro, it just stopped working a day before I left for my trip to Lesbos Greece. Bye GoPro, bye powerbank.
3. Forgot my Macbook
I had to be at Eindhoven Airport at 6.30am so I had to leave around 4.00am from my parents place. On my last night in Holland one of my friends threw a big birthday party and I said to myself I would just show my face and go home early. Big mistake! I should know I cannot act like that. I have a hard time leaving earlier than other people. I got to my bed at 2.30 in the morning so I could still sleep for 1.5 hours. When my alarm rang at 4.00am I literally jumped out of bed, dressed, brushed my teeth, grabbed all my luggage that I prepared and jumped in the car with my mom and drove to Eindhoven Airport about an hour away. I checked in my big Rimowa suitcase and went through security. As the line was insanely long I asked for priority otherwise I would have missed my flight. ‘Laptops out’, said the security guy! As soon as I opened my daypack I was in shock! NOOOO did I forget my Macbook? I closed my eyes and checked again: no Macbook! Wait no this cant be true. I can not live without a Macbook. How will I write my articles for Maldives? How will I edit photos? How will I update my website? Too many questions going through my mind. Is something wrong Sir? F*ck yes mate! Something is totally wrong! He looked pretty concerned at me and at the same moment realized I should act normal and tell him what happened. Airport Security aren't the friendliest people, definitely not at 6am.
4. No electronics/chargers
Damn it how in the world can a blogger forget his Macbook? That is like a fireman without a fire extinguisher. I felt so stupid but what could I do, there was no way I could change it so I laughed at myself and while boarding the plane for Greece started to think about what now. I really needed my Macbook as soon as posiible! I could go without for a little bit, but not too long. My trip to Greece was sponsored by Greece Tourism and I would go to Bulgaria, Romania, Albania, Montenegro, Macedonia for some projects as well before I would fly to London for WTM. As I agreed on a couple partnerships on those trip I was afraid I had to disappoint a couple people. That is a problem for later I thought, because the first issues I had to deal with was that all my electronics were packed with my Macbook. Basically I had no charger for my phone, no SD card for my DSLR, my powerbank just broke and my GoPro died! An amazing start of my trip around Eastern Europe…
As soon as I landed in Greece I connected with my portable WiFi device and started researching what was the best sim card for tourists in Greece, then later borrowed a charger from the hotel and all I did was planning about what to do next.
This was one the most stupid travel fails in 6 years traveling but by far not the only one. Things like this happen all the time. When you travel constantly things happen. I started collecting them all and will soon write a blog post about it. Sign up to be informed when it goes live!
How could I be so stupid!? LOL :)