2023 Travel Recap - The Year That Was

​Posted: January 3 2024

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2023 began in Mexico City. I was with Miss CDMX, at her mom's place, with sisters, nephews, aunties and cousins.

And 2023 ended as the year began in Mexico City, albeit at the house of another auntie with numerous cousins of Miss CDMX, that I had not met before.

And this is what happened in between the two occasions listed above.

In January I flew back to England to sort out bank admin. And then I bummed around the UK. Backpacking as I went.

I got to see more of the UK than I normally do in any year since 2007.

I backpacked London a few times, Oxford, Lichfield, Birmingham, Liverpool, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling and Greenock.

​Tower Bridge in London:

The Black Sabbath Bridge in Birmingham:

Stirling Bridge in Scotland:

I visited 6 Underground Bunkers: Kelvedon Hatch, Hack Green, Western Approaches HQ, Churchill War Rooms, the Battle of Britain Bunker and Scotland's Secret Bunker:

I stepped foot in Northern Ireland for the first time and added the UK to my UN Member States Visited List on the account of ticking off all 4 countries that define the United Kingdom.

I backpacked Belfast, the Giant's Causeway, The Bushmills Distillery,  Bangor, Londonderry, Carrickfergus, Larne, Newtownards and Rathlin Island.

Then I headed south and backpacked Dublin before heading back across the Irish Sea to Holyhead, then Swansea and Bristol.

In June I returned to Africa. Madagascar was my 100th UN Member State.

Madagascar is a tough country to travel in. The roads are in very bad shape. The food is pretty crap. But it made a great adventure. I visited the Lemurs' Park just outside Antananarivo:

I travelled down the East Coast by train and then a cargo boat on the Canal des Pangalanes.

And then the long journey across Madagascar to visit the famous ​Avenue des Baobabs:

After Madagascar, I made an emotional return to Naivasha where I spent 105 days on covid lockdown in 2020:

And then continued as I had originally planned before the pandemic screwed everyone, to Uganda. Top of the Ugandan Bucket List was visiting Jinja, and the Source of the Nile at Lake Victoria:

And then came Rwanda and Burundi. Top highlight in Burundi was visiting the Southernmost Source of the Nile, high in the hills above Lake Tanganyika:

I travelled through Western Tanzania and entered Zambia and eventually made it down Livingston where I walked with White Rhinos at the Mosi-Oa-Tunya National Park and backpacked Victoria Falls from the Zambian side:

I then crossed into Botswana and visited the Chobe National Park:

I finally made it to Katima Mulilo where met up with my buddy Nick before heading back into Botswana, walking across the Kazangula Bridge into Zambia and then to Lusaka and a flight to London via Nairobi.

10 days later I was flying across the Atlantic to be reunited with Miss CDMX in Mexico City.

I spent almost 3 months recovering from the African trip. I had gotten sick in the last weeks in Africa. I took a Malaria test in Livingston but had come back negative and also a Covid test once back in England. That too came back negative. I suspect it was Long-Covid. A hacking cough, weird headaches and no sense of taste nor smell.

We went to Zipolite for 2 weeks to enjoy the sun, sea and sand and the lush fresh food, before coming back to Mexico City for the New Year.

With Miss CDMX in Zipolite. Waiting for the pizza to arrive:

Trying to be healthy with a Yugo Verde at Kelly Ko in Zipolite:

Another awesome breakfast in Zipolite:

Way too much Corona as we lazed the days away in Zipolite:

I wonder what 2024 has in store!

Stats for 2023:

15 countries in total with 8 new countries visited:

1. Northern Ireland
2. Madagascar
3. Uganda
4. Rwanda
5. Burundi
6. Zambia
7. Botswana
8. Namibia

7 return visits:

1. Mexico
2. England
3. Scotland
4. Ireland
5. Wales
6. Kenya
7. Tanzania

Number of towns and cities slept in: 43 (with about 49 different beds)

Night buses: 2

Night boats: 2

Night flights: 4

I wrote over 100 blog posts in 2023 and started running sponsored posts, link insertions and product reviews. Nomadic Backpacker started making money. 

Traffic is on the up, massively. Here are the stats from 2021, 2022 and 2023 according to Google Analytics:

	2021	2022	2023
Total Users	14,105	41,061	94,831
Page Views	33,321	74,788	168,792

Page Views over 3 years, 2021 - 2023 according to Google Analytics:

Users over 3 years, 2021 - 2023 according to Google Analytics:

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