Kiki’s travel bucketlist
Because you might have accidentally missed a magazine: this is one of our favorite articles that you want to dive into. Fire on, warm cocoa in a mug or a bubbly in the glass (that’s fine too) and just enjoy reading.
Kiki has a goal. Within five years, see all the places that make her heart race. Why order the same dish every time when there is so much to choose from the menu of the world? Time to attack. And to check off.
Next up: Costa Rica and Bali.
50 shades of green in Costa Rica
My mother is over the moon when I pick her up from Schiphol. I've never seen her so enthusiastic after a vacation. ‘It was amazing, Kiek, you won't find such animals anywhere else.’ She shows me videos. Capuchin monkeys scampering through the trees, a toucan flying by, and a gigantic sloth crossing the road with a slow smile. Wow. At that point, I realize I actually have no choice anymore. That’s it. I must and will go to Costa Rica someday.
Someday came faster than expected. Suddenly, there’s the question from the Costa Rican Tourist Board if I want to go there for Amayzine. I blink three times as I read the email letter by letter. It’s really there. The only hurdle left is that flight: comfortable is different when you have claustrophobic tendencies on the plane. But as if fate is smiling upon me, we (I’m with a group of journalists) all get an upgrade to business class. KLM, I already loved you, but now even a little more. The legroom, the food, the seat that can lie completely flat, the Delft blue house after
the flight: this is not normal.
Toes in the sand
Eleven hours later, I stand in the promised land of hanging bridges and ‘pura vida’. Literally translated, it means ‘pure life’, but it comes down to enjoying every moment and not worrying about things you can’t influence. A kind of ‘hakuna matata’, but different.
We drive from San José airport towards Puerto Viejo, a small reggae village where you see people walking around with long dreads and a surfboard under their arm. The atmosphere is so laid-back, it’s almost laughable. I pop open a cold white beer, kick off my flip-flops on the beach, and watch the sunset with my toes in the sand. The most beautiful one I’ve ever seen. This is what they mean by pura vida.
In the following days, everything goes in a sort of travel high. I encounter waterfalls that almost make me emotional, they are so beautiful. I think I’ve landed in Freek Vonk’s wet dream. I see animals I didn’t even know existed. Nowhere in the world will you find such an extensive flora and fauna. How often are you woken up at 4:00 AM by the sound of a few wrestling howler monkeys? There’s a good chance you’ll encounter a few sloths, raccoons, hummingbirds, toucans, coatis, snakes, or tarantulas during your vacation in one of the national parks.
Sliding through the jungle
We drive towards Cahuita, visit the Hot Springs in La Fortuna, the Cloud Forest of Monteverde, sleep in jungle cabins, and conquer hanging bridges. We come face to face with an eyelash viper, a snake so venomous that it’s game over within two hours if it bites you. Brrr. With sweat in my butt crack, I brave the seven hundred meter long zipline that zips through the jungle. As a tip, I get: ’Scream as hard as you can!‘ to master the adrenaline in your body. No, that helps, I can tell you. Ha, but I did it anyway. Because that’s what Costa Rica does to you: your boundaries blur.
Happiest on earth
CR, I can finally check you off. Damn, you were beautiful. Suddenly, I begin to understand that the happiest people on earth live here. Imagine it: a country where with every step you take, you see something you’ve never seen before. An animal, or a plant. So many impressions. You experience this country with all five of your senses. For anyone who feels like they are ‘living on autopilot’, I would say: book that ticket. You come back as a different person because there is so much beauty. I’m already jealous of you.
The paradise of luxury ponies Bali
After Costa Rica, it was time in December for a new tick on the checklist: Bali. The island that had been on the agenda for far too long but never happened. On December 10, my love and I excitedly head towards Schiphol. To get straight to the point: the flight time to Bali is quite, eh, long. Bali is over 10,000 kilometers away from the Netherlands, which means you’re at least 16 hours on the road – and with a layover, make it 20 hours. A hefty labor, but once you’re there, it’s worth all the contractions.
Feel like a millionaire
After a day, I already realize: this is the vacation everyone should treat themselves to. Staying in one place is not what you should do here; Bali is the perfect island for traveling around. I had read a little beforehand and decided to book a hotel only for the first three nights to ‘recover from jet lag’ and have full freedom from there. A way of traveling I can recommend to everyone. If you find something boring, you leave after one night. If it’s great, you book another. Simple as that. What does a day in Bali look like? You hop on your scooter (the mode of transport), ride to a nice breakfast spot, and then head back towards the beach. Temple here, massage there, then catch a sunset and come home in the evening to your villa with a private pool.
You wonder what you did to deserve all this. It’s all incredibly cheap. As if: you feel like a millionaire. For three euros, you can eat, for a few tens, you sleep in a nice hotel, and that massage can start from five euros. And yes, you really do lie on that table for an hour.
A sniff of culture, please
In addition, there is so much to do and see in Bali. You don’t know where to start from the craziness. Volcanoes, waterfalls, rice fields, cute villages, beautiful temples: every time you move to a new place, you end up in a totally different vibe. It might also be a bit the Asia for luxury kids, but hey, you’ve never heard me say that I get happy from camping. We started in the surfers’ village of Canggu, where I felt so relaxed that I spontaneously wanted to live there. But you also want to see the artistic Ubud, go to the Monkey Forest, and of course the rice fields with the Bali Swing, the touristy Seminyak and Kuta for shopping and the perfect restaurants, and the high waves and sunsets at Uluwatu. And then there are of course the trips to the neighboring islands Gili, Nusa Lembongan, and Nusa Penida, each a paradise pearl with its own charm.
‘Burn what?’
After three weeks, we feel like we’ve been away for half a year, we’ve gathered so many impressions. What makes the deepest impression is the local population. The people in Bali are quite unique and kind. Wherever you go: you are welcomed with a smile, the customer is king, and time pressure seems to not exist. I asked our driver (in Bali, it’s very normal to have a private driver during your vacation) if they know the term burnout. He burst out laughing. No, they don’t know that. Of course not, Kiek. I have a kind of strange rule that I don’t want to go to the same destination twice (hello, the world is big and we only live for a short time), but for Bali, I would make an exception next year. I can finally check off this beautiful country.
