Welcome to Episode 5 of my “Travel Tales From Beyond The Brochure” podcast.
As mentioned last time, I recently went backpacking for 11 weeks. For almost a month of this, I explored several of the islands that make up the South Pacific country of Vanuatu. While I was there, it became clear this was one of those thoroughly enjoyable countries that most people don’t really know a lot about, but they should – it’s definitely ‘beyond the brochure’. To that end, I’ve decided to dedicate an entire podcast episode to my experiences there. Note that this is a longer episode than usual; I guess there’s a lot to say about it.
I talk about:
* My visit to and learnings from the World Travel Market (WTM) in London at the start of last week
* A background to Vanuatu; a little about its colonial history
* Everyday life in Vanuatu: travel, shopping, food, religion, etc
* The less-than-tasteful history of Malekula island
* Hiking across the volcanoes on Ambrym
* Feeling remote on the island of Gaua
* The delights, or otherwise, of the national drink – Kava.
There is no “lesser-known destination of the week” this week, as, to be honest, Vanuatu as a whole is ‘lesser known’.
You can listen via the feed above, or via Spotify, or on your podcast app of choice 🙂 Let me know if it isn’t, by the way, and I’ll see what I can do.
As always, if you have anything to say about the topic, or indeed about my podcasting in general, leave a comment or let me know. There is a Facebook group for my podcast that you’re free to join: Click here!
Smaller contributions in this podcast came from:
* Anna at “Would Be Traveller”
* Larch at “The Silver Nomad”
* Skye at “Skye Travels”,
* Palle at “The Radio Vagabond”, and
* my author friend Victoria Pearson.
A larger contribution was made by Peter and Rachel at RTWReset, who went not long after I did, but to different destinations and thus had different experiences.