#1 Before going on a trip together, compile a themed playlist

It’s a proven fact that music tends to remind us of the places we heard it for the first time. 

How to do it: If you’re going abroad, find the Top 40 most popular current songs as well as some evergreen classics. When you arrive, listen to a local radio station in the car or on your smartphone. Use song recognizing apps (like Shazam) to see the artist and the name of the songs you like on the local radio. Later they will bring you back to your trip.

#2 Trust a friend to organize your trip

Set a budget and leave all the organization to a close friend. It could be a surprise – you simply receive an envelope with reservations, GPS coordinates, and a list of the necessary luggage. You can in turn organize the next trip for a friend.

#3 Sunrise and a morning picnic

Get in your car and drive at night. Go to the beach or another beautiful place to watch the sunrise. Watch the sun coming up with friends. Have a picnic in the morning and then take a short nap on the blanket.

Discover more: 9 fun picnic ideas for an unforgettable day

#4 Spend a day at a theme park

Try everything, no exceptions – from cotton candy to a merry-go-round and shooting games.

#5 Enthuse a friend with your hobbies

If you’re into rock climbing, take a friend to a beginner’s class. If you like skiing, invite a friend to the slopes for a weekend to show them the first moves. If you enjoy traveling alone, get on the train with a friend and sit in different compartments. When you arrive, each of you can see the city on their own for an hour (or two, or three). After that you can meet and discuss your separate experiences.

If you like running, you can invite friends over for a recent long-distance running race. 5K, 10K, and even a marathon are fine. Running allows us to temporarily let go of the pressure of reality and feel the joy of our bodies and minds.
You can start with a relatively easy 5K competition, persevere in running, and work hard towards first place. If you both get 5K medals, that’s something to brag about too.

Read more: Why everyone must travel alone at least once a year

#6 Come up with new names to use while you’re abroad

Stephanie and John become Stefana and Johann in the Netherlands, then Stefania and Ion in Romania, and Stefania and Giovanni in Italy. The names could be completely different from your own. For example, after passing the border, Peter automatically becomes Stewart, Ana is now Martha – only the customs officers checking your passports will know the truth.

If you’re camping or in the mountains, come up with funny scout names according to your personality – The Big Berry, The Quick Hatchet, The Eagle Eye, etc.

#7 Print a photo of the person who can’t join you on the trip

If someone in the group can’t come on the long-planned weekend trip… well, you’ve got nothing else to do but print their head on a piece of cardboard and glue it to a stick. Then take a picture of the friend who stayed behind (of their hapless printed head, that is) in front of every attraction and beer, and send them the pictures in real time.

#8 Do a good deed together

The world is full of people and animals who need help, and the Internet is full of information about them. Choose a cause that is important to you, get organized and visit a place where you can do a good deed. You will see a new place, meet new people and feel satisfied all at once. The people you’re helping will feel refreshed and optimistic to see not one but a whole group of people willing to help out. 

#9 Hitchhike to see who will arrive first

Choose a final destination and split up to hitchhike alone or in teams. The first to arrive wins, the rest – well, their treat.

#10 Vote the best pizza (steak, burger)

Include an important mission in your trip – to find the most delicious pizza, steak, burger, etc.

How to do it: You can create a strict evaluation system including different criteria (taste, aroma, service) and everyone gives a score from 1 to 10. You can divide Rome into neighborhoods and split up to look for the best gelato (ice-cream) until you find it – or catch a cold.

#11 Ask a friend to challenge you to do something at the place you’re going to

Make your trip even more interesting by asking your friends to come up with a challenge. In Brazil – play football with the locals on the beach, take a picture with a toucan, drink coconut water with a straw right from the coconut; in Cuba – have a cigar at the sea boulevard Malecon… Take the list of challenges with you and don’t come back until you’ve completed them all. Trying to fulfill them will introduce you to interesting people and will put you in unexpected situations (tested on a number of occasions by the author of this post).

#12 Take a picture at the same place every year

It’s a wonderful tradition which maintains friendships, reminds you to travel and gives you a reason to see your friends more regularly (even when different things in your life separate you for longer periods). You can pick a day that is important to everyone – somebody’s birthday, New Year’s Eve, etc.

#13 Take a friend on a surprise trip

Organize an unforgettable trip for a friend – for their birthday or just because! Here’s my elaborate guide How to plan a surprise (birthday) trip in less than 30 minutes.

#14 Visit a friend without being invited

Bring something to drink and the ingredients for a recipe to cook together. It’s enough to call and check if your friend is home and if they have a couple of free hours. The rest is a surprise.

#15 Travel by unusual means of transport

Choose a means of transport you haven’t traveled with before and see the world differently. You don’t have to buy anything, just hire it for a day. Travel in a group. And for a truly unique experience, consider exploring the picturesque landscapes on horseback. You can find some of the best places for horse riding at https://www.thailandnomads.com/best-places-for-horse-riding-chiang-mai/.

A couple of ideas: A bike, electric bike, scooter (you can see scooter guide here), motorcycle, convertible, carriage, boat.

#16 Create a short movie from your trip

Make videos of yourself, of landscapes or of interesting people you’ve met. Then compile all the videos in one short movie. If you’re very much into it, add the songs you listened to on the road. There are plenty of free and easy to use programs to help you compile movies.

#17 Send a paper postcard by post

Do you enjoy receiving postcards? One of those old-time cardboard postcards you need a stamp for, not an internet connection. The next time you travel to another city or abroad, send a real paper postcard from a real post office.

How to do it: Write down your friends’ and relatives’ addresses in advance. Sign the postcards and send them by post. Even if they arrive after you’ve already come back, the gesture will be appreciated.

Pin this amazing list of ideas to your travel board:

The post 17 creative and crazy things to do with friends on a weekend trip appeared first on 203Challenges.

#1 Ditch your camera at least for a day of your trip. It’s been proven that taking too many photos impairs your ability to remember details of the trip later. But how many is too many? Read here.

#2 Get a local guide. Locals know the secrets.

#3 Don’t stop traveling even if you have just a few dollars left. There are so many travel options when you’re broke. Here’s our list of places to go if you have no money.

#4 Enjoy an unplanned detour.

#5 Send a paper postcard home. Very few things are as exciting as spending two weeks checking your mailbox every day (the real one, not your email) for that card you are expecting from Sri Lanka.

#6 Accept an invitation you would normally decline. 

#7 Travel solo at least once a year to recharge your inner peace.

#8 Learn how to skip the lines at the most visited attractions. Here’s how to beat the crowds in Paris and at Angkor Wat.

#9 Sleep in the car.

#10 Learn to enjoy rainy days and make the most of them. If you can’t keep still, but the weather outside is frightful, here’s a list of 20 fun things to do on a rainy day.

#11 Read a book about the place you visit and then follow the steps of the main characters. Here’s a list of books to read before you visit London.

#12 Get out of your comfort zone.

#13 Forget about Facebook when you’re abroad. A week without Facebook has been proven to make you happier.

#14 Organize a surprise trip for someone you love.

#15 Use all the available free resources to organize your trip.

#16 Sleep in the wild on a weekday. Here’s how last summer I slept in a hammock in the forest on weekdays while still continuing to go to work. 

#17 Break the law but make it fun. Here are 15 unusual ways to be a lawbreaker around the world.

#18 Dine alone. It’s not such a big deal. Treating yourself to a nice meal in a nice place alone is about as good for your wellbeing as doing the same with the company of friends. Plus, it allows you to observe and romanticize the atmosphere around you, making you feel like you’re in a movie – and who doesn’t like to feel like that?

The post 18 things every traveler should try at least once appeared first on 203Challenges.

How to do it:

1. Find a local

Who’ll teach you to prepare a better tiramisu than a 55-year-old Italian lady who’s been serving it as a dessert every Sunday of her adult life? If you know someone, or know someone who knows someone abroad, make sure you get a dinner invitation. Or, better yet, ask to go over earlier with a bottle of wine and offer to help with the cooking. This way you’ll get a first-hand glimpse of all the secrets that often remain unexplained in online recipes.

2. Find a local snack bar

If step one is not applicable, look for a local snack bar. Not a restaurant. These unpretentious food bars are a source of the most authentic recipes that locals probably learned from their grannies. If you can’t guess what’s in your dish, express your admiration to the cook and ask to have the ingredients of the meal written down. No need to understand everything; you can translate the recipe later.

3. Join a cooking class

Almost every destination around the world will offer some sort of finger-licking good cooking classes. Put on your chef’s hat and master some local recipes like a pro!

4. Shop away

If any of the ingredients you’ll need are difficult to find in your home country, don’t forget to drop by the local market and buy those special ingredients before you leave.

5. Cook

Here comes the sweetest part: when you get back, invite your friends over for dinner and cook the recipes you brought back with you. It’s the perfect occasion to see each another, have a bite together and share some interesting stories about hunting foreign delicacies. If dinner doesn’t work out the first time, fear not – your culinary failure will just be another story to tell!

How to make it better:

If you and your friends have traveled significant distances together, why not gather from time to time to enjoy a themed dinner and look back on funny pictures from your trips? The time spent going through old photos and reminiscing about the stories behind them will be refreshing. You can also have a themed dinner devoted to a destination you haven’t yet been to but would very much like to visit (Polynesia, anyone?). Just google it!

Read more:

How to organize a surprise (birthday) trip in less than 30 minutes

7 things mindful travelers do differently

Stop buying souvenirs: 6 better alternatives to bring home instead

Pin this idea to your travel board:

The post Intangible souvenirs: Take home a recipe instead of an object appeared first on 203Challenges.

Sending paper postcards is not as old-fashioned as it sounds. Of course, these days you can make a video call and show your friends where you are in real time, but few things are as exciting as spending two weeks checking your mailbox every day (the real one, not your email) for that card you are expecting from Sri Lanka.

So, here are the best reasons to send postcards from every trip you take:

1. To surprise someone who expects nothing but bills in their mailbox.

2. To tell yourself something you’d love to remember from this trip (yes, you heard me right; send a postcard to yourself).

3. To help someone who’s at home feel the country you’re visiting. You can take the ‘feel’ part to a whole new level if you add something small in the envelope, even if it’s just a pack of local chewing gum, a few tiny seashells or a pack of extra hot chilis.

Postcard collections | Dan Gold/Unsplash.com

4. To express your poetic soul. Do you feel a sudden need to pour your soul out in a poem dedicated to the Taj Mahal? Don’t risk losing the vibe! Write it down and send it immediately.

5. To remind someone you love them wherever you are.

6. To keep as a memento of your travels. One day your grandkids may find these cards and imagine what a glorious, adventurous life you once led.

7. To let your parents know you are alive (or at least that you were alive as of the moment you mailed the postcard!) and stop them from worrying.

8. To make new friends around the world. Have you heard of Postcrossing? It lets you send and receive postcards from random people from around the world. What’s more, if you have a whimsical obsession – like Soviet cars for example – you can actually put it on your profile and receive only themed postcards.

Pin this idea to your travel board, but not before you have messaged all your close friends asking them to send you their exact postal address.

The post 8 reasons why you should always send postcards when traveling appeared first on 203Challenges.

It happens: a member of your travel crew can’t come on your long-planned Oktoberfest trip because they are penniless, ill, or heading on a last-minute business trip to Japan…

What to do: Well, you’ve got no other choice but to print their head on a piece of cardboard (life-size and in full-color for maximum effect), cut it out and glue it to a stick. Then take the hapless printed head of your friend with you and take photos with it in front of every major attraction, beer mug, and Bavarian girl they missed out on.

Strangers are prone to collaborate by posing in bizarre scenarios once they hear about the challenge and your miserable friend staying at home (or in Japan) and missing all the fun. Girls will allow the printed head under their skirts, bartenders will thrust it under their shirts and you might even score a free beer (which you should drink on your friend’s behalf, of course).

How to make it better: Send the pictures to the missing pal in real time or share them on your social media profiles, tagging the person in as many unexpected spots as possible.

How to make it unforgettable: At the end of your trip, you can print all photos and arrange them in an album named “Tom’s unforgettable trip to Oktoberfest 2018”.

If Tom weren’t your friend, he would hate you. But that’s what friends are for – public humiliation without consequences.

Read more

How to organize a surprise (birthday) trip in less than 30 minutes

Oh, no! It’s raining on my birthday. What should I do?

What to do on a rainy day – 20 ideas with friends 

Have you done this? What was the most unexpected thing that happened?

Pin this post to your travel ideas board:

The post A friend can’t join you on a trip? Print him out! appeared first on 203Challenges.

Challenge #1: Catch a free live music act

Brisbane city hosts City Sounds, a free music program where you can catch performances from a diverse range of talented local bands and musicians throughout the week in Queen Street Mall and a range of other locations, including everything from folk and blues artists through to jazz and electro acts. 

Challenge #2: Grab a sky-high cocktail 

Hit up one of Brisbane’s impressive rooftop cocktail bars where you can take in the glittering lights and views of the CBD while indulging in a tasty creation concocted by one of Brisbane’s many mixologists.

Challenge #3: Hit up one of Brissy’s markets

From the Brisbane City Markets to the South Bank Young Designers Markets, Suitcase Rummage, the BrisStyle Indie Twilight Markets, The Collective Markets or the many local farmer’s markets, there’s no shortage of options to choose from.

Challenge #4: Indulge in some Asian street food 

Like the idea of a matcha soft-serve or some Japanese barbeque? Head to the Elizabeth Street FudoDori Asian food laneway to sample a unique and tasty range of Asian flavours.

Challenge #5: Book in for a helicopter pub crawl

A pub crawl is always a fun experience, but have you ever done it by helicopter? You can do it while in Brisbane through Pterodactyl Helicopters, where you’ll be able to take in the sights of Brisbane from up above while making a few stops along the way for a bevvy or two.

Challenge #6: Go kayaking in the city at twilight 

What could be nicer than heading out for a relaxed paddle along the Brisbane River as the sun goes down? Watch the city make the transition from day to night with from your illuminated kayak while basking in the lights and reflections of the surrounding buildings. You can book through Riverlife kayak adventures.

Challenge #7: Take a dive with Manta Rays

If you’re in Brissy during summer, pay a visit to the famed Manta Brommie dive site near North Stradbroke Island where you can get up close and personal with manta rays, as well as plenty of other marine life including leopard and guitar sharks, turtles and octopus.

Challenge #8: Enjoy a drink beneath Story Bridge

Story Bridge is a major landmark in Brisbane so it’s only fitting that every visitor to the city should pay it a visit—but the best way to do it would have to be while sipping on a cold drink at the overwater bar at Howard Smith Wharves where you can also take in the view of the bridge, river and CBD.

Challenge #9: Wander through the Brisbane Quarter

If you don’t mind a little glitz and glamour, take a stroll through the Brisbane Quarter which is home to a range of premium restaurants, bars and retailers where you can get a taste of the high life.

Challenge #10: Explore Brisbane’s surrounds

No visit to Brisbane is complete without venturing out of the city itself, so why not find a motorhome hire company in Brisbane and head out on the road for a few days. With plenty of nearby destinations and attractions to explore including the Glasshouse Mountains, Lake Wivenhoe, the Sunshine Coast, the Gold Coast and Lamington National Park, it will be an adventure that’s hard to forget!

The post 10 Fun Travel Challenges to Try While in Brisbane appeared first on 203Challenges.

One of my favorite challenges from the book 203 Travel Challenges: Travel the World. Explore Your Inner Self is:

“Celebrate a traditional holiday in a non-traditional way”.

It’s not that I don’t like family reunions, but it’s diversity that makes life interesting. So why not escape tradition for a change and do something you like for Easter, while still keeping some of your favorite aspects of the holiday?

Here’s a quick DIY guide based on our most recent non-traditional Easter.

Ingredients:

1 hiking destination with a place to stay for the night.

2 Easter hikers.

2 medium backpacks packed with your favorite Easter food, water, and warm clothes.

2 train tickets to your starting point.

lovely spring weather.

>>> Read more: 17 creative and crazy things to do with friends on a weekend trip

Instructions:

1. After arriving at your starting point, hike for almost eight hours up the mountain, stopping only for a quick food and beer recharge at an old-time mountain lodge (complete with a huge portrait of the country’s former dictator on the wall).
2. On the way, ask yourself, breathless, at least 10 times why you had to be such a non-traditional nerd instead of organizing an egg hunt at home.

3. Reach your super-basic mountain shelter for the night. Light a fire in the fireplace and realize that it was worth all the buckets of sweat.

4. Wake up to see the sunrise on Easter morning.

5. After brewing your morning coffee on the fireplace, indulge in a fierce egg-tapping contest in the truest spirit of the holiday.

6. Take a lazy hike down to the tiny village you could see from your window and catch the train home. On the way, pick a bunch of flowers.

7. Repeat next year with a new destination.

All photos: © Maria Angelova/ 203challenges.com.

>>> Find more cool and unusual things to do in Bulgaria.

The book 203 Travel Challenges. Travel the World. Explore Your Inner Self is available on Amazon:

The post DIY: a cheap and unusual Easter travel idea appeared first on 203Challenges.

First of all, keep calm. You are now a year older, a year wiser, and you should know that some rain can’t stop you from having a wonderful birthday. Here are some ideas to help you make that rainy birthday even better.

Have a spa day

If you can’t pamper yourself on your birthday, then when can you? One option is to shield yourself from the elements in your raincoat and rain boots, then head to the nearest spa center and put your well-being in the hands of professionals.

The other option is to turn your home into an equally stress-free space: play some relaxing music, light some scented candles, try some DIY face and hair masks, or meditate. This is your chance to do whatever gets you into that Zen state of mind.

Your complete relaxation emergency kit – Shawnee Wilborn / unsplash

Organize a movie marathon with movies from the year you were born

Watching movies while it’s raining outside is a cliché for a reason – it just makes you feel cozy, or to use the proper term: hygge. That’s why a movie marathon is the perfect rainy birthday idea. To make it more appropriately themed, choose movies from the year you were born. I bet you don’t know who won the Oscar for the best picture that year, do you?

Bonus challenge: learn how to make rainbow popcorn so you can enjoy it on your special day. Because, as science has proven, calories don’t count on your birthday…

Fact: calories know when it’s your birthday and have agreed not to make you fat on that day – Toa Heftiba / unsplash

Plan a trip

What could be a better birthday present than the exciting feeling of imagining yourself in foreign places and experiencing new things? Immersing yourself in that daydream is therapeutic, especially with all that pesky rain in the background.

Plan your trip from A to Z, from choosing the destination to looking for accommodation, budgeting, and selecting possible dates. If your friends know you well enough, there is a high chance some of your birthday presents will actually help fund that trip.

>>> Here’s a guide: How to organize the perfect surprise birthday trip!

Do images like this ever fail to trigger wanderlust? I think not – Rana Sawalha / unsplash

Learn how to make your favorite cocktail

Get the ingredients, print the recipe and practice throughout the day. By the time evening comes, you should already have the confidence that you’re the best bartender in the world. Now it’s time to throw a house party and let your perfect mojito transport your friends away from the rain and off to a sunny Caribbean island.

Add the ice and voilà, your favorite cocktail is ready – Wine Dharma/unsplash

Practice some outdoor sports – but indoors

If you’re lucky enough to live nearby an indoor ski slope or wave pool, then you already have the perfect rain sanctuary. If not, then you have the perfect chance to get creative.

Find a relatively large covered space and fill it with as many balls, rackets, boards, bats and nets as you can get your hands on. Now it’s time to create your own game with the most absurd rules you can think of (and an even more absurd name, of course!). Who knows; if your bizarre sport is good enough, it might one day make it to the Olympics!

Read more: What to do on a rainy day: 20 ideas with friends

Pin it for that future birthday when rain isn’t forecast and the bad weather catches you unprepared:

The post Oh, no! It’s raining on my birthday! What should I do now? appeared first on 203Challenges.

There are many ways to make your trip memorable and very few of them include taking photos. What makes our adventures around the planet truly special are all the unexpected, exciting or silly things we get up to when we decide to do something completely different.

If you’re in search of crazy things to do on your next trip, here are a few ideas sourced from myself and several other travel bloggers.

#1 Fill the tank of your car to the top and then drive until you run out of gas.

#2 Spend the night in a truly unusual place like a stilt cabin, a tree house or a Neolithic-style abode.

#3 Sign up for a unique course – candy cane-making, anyone?

Candy cane-making course, anyone? | raw[ixel/Unsplash

“When my planned trips with friends kept getting canceled last summer, I rummaged through several Facebook groups to find people organizing a relatively easy mountain climb. Yes, I trekked Mt. Pundaquit with strangers. Traveling with people you barely know poses real dangers such as getting scammed, robbed, or physically harmed, especially when you’re going for a trek or camping in the wild. Having said that, traveling with people you just met gives you a certain kind of high. Not only you have the opportunity to meet lifelong friends, you also get to realize that people, strangers even, are not that bad at all. You get to have renewed faith in humanity as you observe how the initial awkwardness develops into the cozy exchanges or laughter as you traverse a difficult terrain,” says Noel from the travel blog Ten Thousand Strangers.

Travel with strangers | Kevin Delvecchio/Unsplash

#5 Organize a restaurant crawl. „Whenever I’m doing research on a new city, I always find too many places I want to try. So to knock out as many as we can, we’ll do a “crawl” and try different dishes and drinks at a bunch of different restaurants in one night. We try to start with apps and move our way to dessert, but sometimes a churro just looks too good to pass up at your first stop – this works particularly well in walkable neighborhoods, like Zona Rosa/Zona T in Bogota!“, shares Dorothy from the travel blog Oz and Other Places.

#6 Join a dance class. I love to dance, but am in no way whatsoever a “dancer”. However, I think learning about a local dance is so interesting and includes a lot about the history/culture/music/attitude of the locals. We took a Casino (similar to Salsa) class in Havana, then got to go to a club that night with our teachers. It was by far a highlight of the trip. Learned a lot and laughed at ourselves even more,” suggests another idea Dorothy from the travel blog Oz and Other Places.

Join a dance class | Adrian Lumi/Unsplash

#7 Trust a friend to organize your trip. Treat your friend like a mystery tour company and let them choose a destination and activities for you. Take it to the next level by keeping your destination a surprise until you arrive at the airport and your friend gives you the tickets.

#8 Choose an unusual means of transport. Why not take a kayak, a donkey, or hitch a ride on the side of the road? You can even take thumbing it to the next level – organize a hitchhiking contest with your friends to see who will arrive first at your designated destination.

Choose an atypical means of transportation | Caleb Stokes/Unsplash

#9 Rely on your luck instead of bus schedules. If you have time and want to spice up your travels, try sticking your thumb out and hitchhiking to your next destination instead of taking more “standard” transportation. “I once had to head from Leh to Manali, India, earlier than planned. To make light of the situation, I decided to hitchhike down the mountain highway! Rather than a banal bus ride, I ended up riding atop eggs in the back of a pickup truck, singing to Backstreet Boys atop a 5,000-meter+ mountain pass, and being taken in by a gang of boys led by a cheerfully transparent—and filthy rich—son of a corrupt Indian politician”. This story shared by Alex from the travel blog Lost With Purpose might inspire you to try this out.

#10 Dip naked in an onsen… with strangers. “Some of my most unforgettable trips are the ones where I took steps to indulge in the culture and traditions of the area I found myself in, especially if they forced me to step out of my comfort zone. In Japan, I tried going to an onsen, or hot spring, as it is a common practice. Doing so meant that I would be bathing naked with several other naked women. As an American, it was super strange for me at first, but I got an appreciation for why Japanese like onsen so much and actually came to enjoy the experience,” suggests Kiyoko from the travel blog Footsteps of a Dreamer.

#11 Visit a famous attraction at an atypical time. Some attractions – like the Colosseum in Rome – have special days when you can visit them at night. Others are less crowded in the morning before the cruise ships/tourist buses ruin the atmosphere by spitting out thousands of loud, sweaty visitors.

Visit a famous attraction at an unusual time | Bence Boros/Unsplash

#12 If a stranger invites you over for a coffee, don’t instinctively decline. Accepting invitations on the road can lead to amusing situations, like that one time when two friends (a couple) and I were in a remote village asking for directions. An old man helped us and invited us to join him for coffee, but only 15 minutes later he was busy trying to set up his grandson with the other girl (you know, the one whose boyfriend was in the room with us). He even called his grandson and asked him to quickly come over and meet his wife-to-be. To this day the story still makes us smile (and cringe a little bit). 

#13 Guide people into a forest and pretend you are lost. Some people want to step out of their comfort zone but are too nervous to ever do it themselves. That’s when a brave adventurer like you has to take charge! So, encourage some of your friends to join you in a forest to pick mushrooms, or even just for a hike, then start acting like you don’t know where to go (I pretended that I lost my compass). Ask people for advice; my companions proposed hilarious solutions as I pretended to be more and more panicked. It’s important that you choose an area with no network coverage so your friends can’t cheat using Google Maps.

Make sure you don’t do this with people who won’t get the joke. The friends I tricked have quite a dark sense of humor, so they enjoyed the prank. This was the conversation when we got out:
– “Oh, I think I just put my compass in the wrong pocket.”

– “You asshole, you made the whole thing up!?”

Suggested by Alexander Popkov from Engineer On Tour, who has started putting all his ridiculous stories in a designated “Random Jackassery” category.

#14 Drive one hour from your city and stop at the most boring, unappealing place next the road. Spice it up by playing board games there.

#15 Meet locals to find the best off-the-beaten-paths. A great way to make a trip memorable is to participate in any kind of class where you can meet locals and ask them to show you some off-the-beaten-path spots in their city. “This is a great way to interact with locals, especially when you travel solo. I took cooking classes in Mexico City which really helped me interact with the locals and thereby navigate such a large metropolis,” says Jack from the travel blog Find World’s Beauty.

#16 Get naked. “Driving down a deserted highway in Namibia is beautiful on its own, but you’ve driven down highways before. Want to make this extra fun? Pull over, take your clothes off and jump into the middle of the road for a couple pictures. There is nothing quite like standing in the middle of a desert anticipating a car at any minute while trying to get that cheeky shot… Our naked escapades (or escapes?) have led us down some really funny rabbit holes of adventure.” This piece of advice comes from Natalie from the travel blog A Pair of Travel Pants.

Get naked on the road! | Free-Photos/Pixabay

#17 Find a stunning vantage point over the city you’re visiting, then climb to the top with a bottle of wine, nibbles and wine glasses (if you can’t find the real deal, get a pack of those picnic-style plastic glasses). What better way to organize a last-minute DYI romantic dinner under the stars, or just a memorable evening with friends. Simply Google “[name of the city] rooftop views” and choose your spot!

#18 Sleep in a hammock outdoors instead of in a regular hotel room.

Read more: 17 creative and crazy things to do with your friends on a trip

The post 18 non-banal ways to make your trip memorable appeared first on 203Challenges.

Sleeping under the stars is the best way to get new energy and ideas for work. You can do it after you finish work and go back to the office the next day on time. If you find the idea adventurous and absurd – it’s only because not everybody does it. But I guarantee you will have а broad grin spread across your face the next morning. I live in a busy capital and I practice this weekday escaping every summer.  

THIS MIDWEEK ESCAPE IDEA IS PERFECT FOR:

> seasons: summer, late spring, early autumn

> types of travelers: couples, friends, solo

How to do it in 10 easy steps

Here is our usual scenario: 

#1 Choose the closest mountain, forest, hill, camping site or another wild location you love. It’s important to choose a place that is within a reasonable distance from your office (personally I prefer it to be no more than an hour drive away). 

#2 After work on a summer Tuesday take the bus to the the closest wild place where you can put up a tent. If there is no public transportation, go by car or by bike.

#3 Set up the tent before dusk. It’s proven that sleeping in a tent gets your biological clock back to normal.

#4 For a boost of courage and to keep bears at bay, take a vodka/whisky shot or whatever medicine you have against bears.

#5 Start a fire and grill some sausages. Alternatively, take a look at my favorite camping recipes ready for under 10 minutes. 

#6 [Optional] Some locals from the near village come to visit, you have a drink together and they leave, and you go to sleep in you bed under the stars.

#7 Get up at 7 am, have breakfast and pack your stuff. If you have a Sherpa around, give them your bags. If not, carry them yourself, awaiting better times.

What a glorious place to be on a weekday morning!

#8 Take the bus back to the city and take a quick shower.

#9 Enter the office on time, a broad grin on your face.

#10  Everything works out even better if you happen to have a shower at your workplace. If you happen to be camping near a waterfall, you can take your morning shower there. 🙂

Here you can read a detailed story of how I swapped my bed for a hammock last summer (all done on weekdays).

All photos: © Maria Angelova/ 203challenges

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