Travel stories, quotes and fun facts

Vilnius has a self-declared republic

The artists' quarter of Uzupis declared independence in 1997 and has its own constitution, posted on a wall in dozens of languages.

We are all travellers

We are all travellers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.

Chernobyl became a wildlife refuge

Wolves, lynx and wild horses now thrive in the exclusion zone, where the absence of people outweighs the radiation for many species.

The migration crossing

We waited five hours at the river. Then, with no signal we could detect, four thousand wildebeest decided at once and the water turned brown. It lasted eleven minutes.

The Faroes have grass roofs

Turf roofs insulate Faroese houses against Atlantic wind and rain, and sheep sometimes graze on them.

Little by little

Little by little, one travels far.

Svalbard stores the world's seeds

The Global Seed Vault inside an Arctic mountain holds over a million seed samples as a backup for the planet's food crops.

Matatu music

Our matatu had a sound system worth more than the vehicle and a hand-painted portrait of a footballer on the back. The conductor hung out of the door collecting fares in traffic and never miscounted once.

Japan has more than 6,800 islands

Japan is an archipelago of over 6,800 islands, though four of them hold nearly all of the population.

Travelling is a brutality

Travelling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort.

Tokyo's rush hour has pushers

Station staff known as oshiya are still employed on the busiest Tokyo lines to help commuters fit inside the doors.

Slow to the summit

The guide said pole pole about four hundred times in five days. On summit night, walking at half the pace felt absurd until we passed the fast group sitting down in the dark.

Japan's vending machines outnumber people in some towns

With roughly one machine for every 30 people, Japan sells everything from hot corn soup to fresh eggs on the street, day and night.

Zanzibar at low tide

The sea went out nearly a kilometre and the whole village walked out onto the flats with buckets. Children raced the incoming tide back to shore as if it were a game invented that morning.

Kyoto was spared the bomb

Kyoto was removed from the atomic target list partly because of its cultural importance, which is why 1,600 temples still stand.

Two kinds of travel

There are only two kinds of travel: first class and with children.

Cherry blossom has an official forecast

Japanese weather services publish a sakura front each spring, tracking the bloom as it sweeps north from Okinawa to Hokkaido.

The dhow builder

He was making a boat with no plans, using a stick with notches as his only measuring tool. His father built the boat next to it. His son was sanding a rudder and complaining about it.

Mount Fuji is privately owned above 3,360 m

The upper slopes of Fuji legally belong to a Shinto shrine, a claim confirmed by Japan's courts.

A journey is best measured in friends

A journey is best measured in friends rather than miles.

Japan has a rabbit island

Okunoshima was once a secret poison gas factory. Today hundreds of feral rabbits hop across the ruins.

Salt and pink water

The collectors work waist-deep in water saltier than the sea, coated in shea butter to protect their skin. They fill a pirogue by hand and it takes most of a morning.

South Korea is mostly mountains

About 70 percent of South Korea is mountainous, which is why its cities build upward and its hiking culture is enormous.

The griot's version

We asked about the history of the town and got a song instead of a date. It lasted nine minutes, named six generations, and was more accurate than the guidebook.