bucketlist – Page 2 – Turknoy Travels 100!

COUNTRY 23: Finland and Dreams!

September 27, 2017September 27, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Finland, Why Travel With Kids?

“Happiness does not come from happiness itself, but from the journey towards achieving it.” – Finnish Proverb

Our gateway to Eastern Europe from Middle East is Helsinki, Finland. Making Finland, our 23rd country to explore as family. If you know our family up close and really personal (which will be the case if you read all our blogs because that’s really us! – read on! ), then you’ll know that NO. 23 is a huge life sign for us. Not in a Michael Jordan kind of way. But that huge and enormous impact. We guarantee, that Finland will play part of our family life’s future. We’ll do all efforts, of course, and God wills will pay the wave. Anyway, we are a happy bunch because we are loving our journey.

That moment we landed in Helsinki… it’s like taking a huge breathe of fresh air! Inhale, exhale. We felt we were home in a strange land. Actially, we always feel at ease in Scandinavia countries like Sweden, Denmark and Norway. Although some geography experts will claim that Finland is not part of Scandinavian Region. Oh well, either way, these countries are our true north. (Literally and figuratively!)

Finland and Dreams — When in Helsinki, do what the city statues do

Unique Christian churches, busy people going on their business, convenient transportation system, artistic places everywhere and of course, playground of big and small kids abound.

We stayed in memorable accommodations in this capital city – cabin by the sea and an apartment owned by an awesome artist. You know those phrases we, as traveling parents often say during our holidays, became more surreal —-“People live this way?! Day in and day out? What a spectacular way to live.” Of course, the optimistic family family members will rave and say with conviction – We can live like this, too!”

With this energy and vibes, we started the first day of spring with the biggest bon fire our family has ever seen! And yes, spring coincided with Easter festivities, oh what fun. Easter bonfires in Seurasaari is a Finnish Tradition during Holy Saturdays . According to Finnish folklore, evil spirits, witches and trolls are particularly busy on that day and bonfires are believed to scare them away.

For our family, this actually makes sense more than Easter bunnies, don’t you think? Since Jesus Christ is yet to rise, the Black Saturday is like a fun day for evil spirits, hence, bonfires can help! That’s how our family interpret this tradition. Anyhow, it’s really cool to witness world traditions especially one that we can relate to.

Another highlot of our Finland adventure will be life’s celebrations! I ur eldest kid traveller celebrated her 11th birthday in Helsinki at Linnanmaki, an amusement park we enjoyed way better than Disneyland.

Oh yes, she’s feisty , courageous, determined, gorgeous, visionary and eleven! Her talents, wits, beauty and brain will sure change the world we live in. What better way to celebrate this by pumping the adrelin with adventure and sugar in a very metropolitan city?
We definitely made family memories in this country. True to our vision of living up to the uniqueness and individuality of our family members, up to paving our own family trails. It’s just really fantastic exploring a new place while kids grow… by age and by number of countries visited.

COUNTRY 22: Ethiopia, Land of Origins

September 26, 2017September 27, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Education, Ethiopia, Family Satisfaction, Travel Adventures, Why Travel With Kids?

Do not hesitate or you will be left in between doing something, having something and being nothing. – Ethiopian Proverb

Woohoo! Our 3rd continent and our first African country to explore with kids.

It maybe our love for discovering human history when our family travels that had drawn us in visiting Ethiopia. Our primary goal was to see Lucy, the 3.2 million years old fossil, probably the first evidence of humanity. The continent Africa is known as The Cradle of Humanity, then Ethiopia is its evidence repository.

Ethiopia, Land of Origins — Our Exploring Family with Lucy (model)

As a worldschooling family who sets SMART goals to travel to 100 countries in all continents by 2022. This is our attempt to live life to the fullest with kids. Ethiopia is our first country in Africa (our third continent, 30th country visited, to date.

When it comes to food and accommodation, we had the most unique experience in the country. Barely 4 hours away from Qatar, we were amazed with a totally different world. We definitely had a crash course in archeology and paleontology and how it works in the real world. Our three traveler kids had been to countless of Natural Museums in Europe and Asia yet we were impressed with somewhat “shabby” museum in Addis Ababa containing real human history treasures.

Lucy aside, here are 5 interesting facts about Ethiopia that everybody, yes, including kids, can appreciate:

1. Country History: Ethiopia is the only African country, which successfully fought against the scramble for Africa. It was never colonized, though Italians attempted to occupy it twice.

2. UNESCO Heritage Sites: There are nine, day trips from Addis Ababa possible! Most famous sites are Lalibela twelve-rock-hewn churches. We visited Christian Orthodox churches which gave an interesting perspective for a family with both Islam and Catholic members.

3. Religion: Ethiopia appears in the Bible 45 times both in Old and New Testament.

4. Origin of Coffee. Coffee is Ethiopian’s gift to the world. It was found in the Kaffa Region (South-Western Ethiopia.) Even before the visit, we are non-Starbucks coffee drinkers. Enjoying the real “coffee culture” experience in Addis Ababa with really strong and delicious coffee with local ceremonies

5. Abebe Bikila, a star Ethiopian marathon runner, won Africa’s first Olympic gold medal in 1960. Add in the country’s high elevation Addis Ababa is athletes’ heart’s working out paradise. Made us want to become runners and marathoners.

And oh, more pluses — the Ethiopian women are really gorgeous and almost everybody is kind to tourists. Ethiopia is one of the safest country in Africa to visit. With low costs airlines flying to Addis Ababa almost every day from Doha, Qatar where our family’s currently based, for sure, we would be back for some backpacking with kids.

Baobab Tree in Aspire Park

September 20, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Qatar, Travel Goals, Why Travel With Kids?

“It is a question of discipline. When you’ve finished your own toilet in the morning, then it is time to attend to the toilet of your planet, just so, with the greatest care. You must see to it that you pull up regularly all the baobabs, at the very first moment when they can be distinguished from the rose-bushes which they resemble so closely in their earliest youth…” (5.16).
The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupery

In addition to traveling together as family, we are avid fans of reading aloud to kids. We collect classic books and one of our favorite is The Little Prince. Hence, our fascination to Baobab trees.

Baobab trees are the Africa’s iconic ” Tree of Life.” Kinda like our Asia’s Coconut Tree – we call our high rising coconut trees as Tree of Life as well.

Fun facts about Baobabs:

Baobab trees grow in 32 African countries.
They can live for up to 5,000 years, reach up to 30 metres high and up to an enormous 50 metres in circumference.
Baobab trees can provide shelter, food and water for animals and humans. A lot of savannah communities have made their homes near Baobab trees.
Baobab bears fruit! And based on what we’ve read so far, Baobab fruit is one of the most nutrient-dense foods in the world. Hey, that’s what we say to our coconut!

Soon, we’ll be visiting baobabs in Africa, we know it would be a fantastic experience and family travel bucketlist to tick and enjoy. We also know that we’ll bring our worn out Little Prince book with us. Every time we read that book, there are a lot of realizations in life thay suddenly sparks our minds. Just like traveling.

For the meantime, a more interesting information about baobab tree….

Drum rolls please!!!

Did you know that there are baobab trees in Aspire Park, Doha, Qatar? To touch a real love baobab tree is like meeting Little Prince in person. There’s always a lot of reason to explore Qatar. Or any nearby neighborhood, for that matter. With curious eyes and wandering feet, we’ll never know what we can discover.

Baobab Tree in Aspire Park — Our very own Little Princes and Baobab Tree with The Torch Doha in the Background 💜💙❤️

All Forms of Travel Are Remarkable!

September 19, 2017September 19, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Family Satisfaction, Travel Goals

“Wherever you go, go with all your heart!”

Holiday travel is definitely not weekend travel.

Weekend travel is, of course, not long term travel.

Travelers are different from tourists are different from travel nomads.

Traveling on a budget has different challenges compared to bucket list traveling.

One is not better than the other.

Traveling alone is way different than traveling with friends or with loved one and is way different than traveling with family!

Traveling with young kids is different than traveling with bigger kids!

Every journey gets different results, every single time, different impact all the time!

That’s why let’s just all travel and enjoy to our hearts’ satisfaction.

There should be no comparison nor judgement, but more of inspirational stories from one another!

After all, we are all travelers in this so called awesome life! 😍✈️✈️

Happy travels all!

All Forms of Travel Are Remarkable — Keep on Traveling, Take Who’s Willing ❤️💚💙💞

Dr.Seuss’ House in Bratislava

September 18, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Slovakia, Travel Adventures, Why Travel With Kids?

“Why fit in when you were born to stand out? ‘ – Dr.Seuss

Oh the places we find together, we even managed to find Dr.Seuss House! Or at least, that’s what we call Hotel Galeria! A unique hotel very close to the Main Train Station in Bratislava, Slovakia (our 29th Country! )

Dr. Seuss' House in Bratislava — Look, what our Little Lady Backpacker ran into while exploring Eastern Europe ❤️Congratulations, today is YOUR day!!

The facade of the Hotel Galeria is full of colors, screaming for admiration. The irregular shape and architecture is quite pleasing to watch from afar, much more in a closer view.

The view from the inside of the hotel also never disappoints. The lobby looks like an artist hard-at-work and all wall and table covers look like abstract colorful painting!

This is not a sponsored post. We were just in awe having to experience a hotel like this that our eldest traveller described the hotel in her IG account as “one of the best hotels she has stayed at.” We book our hotel reservation one day before heading to Slovakia from Hungary. It was a reasonable rate for a 2-star hotel.
Yes, it’s a 2-star hotel. We could recommend a lot of improvements on facilities, yes, but we always get what we paid for, right? With this hotel, plus lots of color, art and good customer service!

Dr. Seuss Hotel in Bratislava — Waking up to art in Hotel Galeria ❤️

Hoops, the name of the hotel is Hotel Galleria. However, this hotel will always be Dr. Seuss House for our family. It’s a really unique concept worth benchmarking anywhere. Don’t you agree?

How to Make Your Travel Dreams Come True

September 16, 2017September 16, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Travel Adventures, Travel Goals, Why Travel With Kids?

Make your family travel dreams come true!

It’s easy to make travel wishlists, bucket lists of places we want to go, destinations we dream of! Even those creatures under the rock would want to visit some places they have never been. But most of the time, they do stay under the rock, left in wonderment of what’s like outside their world.

How to Make Your Travel Dreams Come True — May these three global kids find their hearts passion amidst life challenges and comfort zones ❤️💚💙

Why wouldn’t they, staying under the rock, is comfortable. It’s easier to just keep wishing to explore the world than actually travel. Similarly, it’s way easier to make the Eiffel Tower photo (or other places!) the desktop screensaver than actually book a ticket and go to Paris.

But bucket lists are meant to be ticked off, and not to remain list forever.

The secret to realizing going to these destinations are actually pretty straight forward.

1. Faith and Vision go together. A strong vision is backed up my breakdown of goals, yes, but more importantly, it’s main support and foundation is a belief system, a strong faith about something. It could be Jesus Christ for devote Christians, it could The Force for Star Wars Fanatic, it could be the unicorn for people who believe in the unknown, the extraordinary, the unseen. We believe in fate, God’s blessings and positivity. Those are the foundation of our Vision, family values, you may say. The thing is, Vision is something we strive for long term, hence, our faith, values and passion should support our own desire for the future.

2. Visualize. Visualize. Visualize. And Visualize Some More. Have you seen the movie Jumper? If yes, you know that it’s about a young man with a teleportation abilities, his travel adventures mixed with family drama and young love action. Making our travel dreams come true is similar to how he used his teleportation abilities. Focus on that one.. Did you notice that he can only go to a place if he can imagine it? Pictures of different places all around his room. If he doesn’t know what Rome looks like, he can never teleport there. It’s simple and actually neuro-science worthy!

3. Don’t be just SMART. Be SMART-ER. Our family is more of an advocate of setting vision and goals than travel addicts. Well, we are travel addicts, but all of our travels are part of our bigger plan… to travel more! Seriously now, we believe that setting goals is necessary for everybody!

Everybody has this “SOMEDAY!” Here’s the big open secret to getting to our “someday.” Not only we need to be SMART, but what really works is if we are SMARTER! This good, (very) old acronym works!

Specific

Measurable (no-brainier KPI)

Attainable (in life, all goals are!)

Realistic (make sense to YOU!)

Time bound (w/ deadline set)

Evaluated (periodically!)

Reviewed (evolving YOU!) .

Write down goals, most preferably, uninfluenced, own personal goals which echoes your deep inner desires and passions, and evaluate it periodically, make necessary adjustments (to yourself, to the lifestyle or to the goals!) Of course, you can change goals in life. Life is….life. Sometimes, there are changes in life which we can’t control. When we say, our family aim to travel to 100 countries together, we are declaring and sending our thoughts on how we want to live our lives. If, for whatever circumstances, the Universe, God or Energy have other megaplans for us and the world, then we will adjust our goals. Revision of goals is not non-achievement of living life. It’s driving the car and changing routes when a particular road is blocked.

We can see this in every work employee. They are almost always afraid to set high goals at work because they may not achieve it, get punished for non-achievement and be embarrassed about it. But such is not the case about life – setting goals and being open about these goal, means the intent to maximize one’s life potential and God given resources.

When you set goals, you set the tone of your day-to-day lifestyle, like ours – Turknoy Travels 100 is A Lifestyle and it’s pretty amazing, so far!

4. Positive Can-Do Attitude. The glass is not half full nor half empty. Oh the places we travel with that glass!

The reality in life – positive attracts positive. Positive multiplies positive is enormous positive potential. We are the sum or total of the positive influence we surround ourselves it. That may be the universal requirement for goal achievement.

5. Be Spontaneous and Just Leave. Action cures fear! The beginning of a thousand miles is a single step! Take the first bite is how you eat the entire cow.

A little trivia about our family? We started traveling right after our Traveling Dad lost his day job. That’s when we know for sure that life is off to good start the moment we say…”What the heck!! Let’s just go.”

So, do you have goals in life?

Why Pinoy Family Should Travel The World

September 15, 2017September 15, 2017 by turknoys, posted in Philippines, Travel Goals, Why Travel With Kids?

“Ang kabataan ang pag-asa ng ating bayan.” – Dr.Jose P. Rizal, Pambansang Bayani ng Pilipinas

Translation: The youth is the hope of our nation, – Dr. Jose P.Rizal, Philippine National Hero

Why Pinoy Family Should Travel The World — Ang kabayan ang Pag Asa Ng Bayan – how do you want them to lead the future of our Country?!

Well, the world changed a lot since that Dr. Jose P. Rizal made that quote infamous. There is still a ring of truth into that quote at this day and age, that we believe. Despite the fact that how many generations of youth have let down Dr. Jose P. Rizal? Well, we are not an authority on Philippine History, much more an expert on interpreting Philippine current events based on history. Although, proudly we say, our family is raising three global citizens exploring the world (Turknoy Travels 100 , now 30/100) using their Philippine passports.

So, from one Pinoy family to another, we encourage you to travel with kids and we have three persuading reasons:

Pinoys are World Class, Traveling Magnifies Opportunities For Pinoy Kids to be World Class. Bragging aside, we know how Filipinos contribute to international workforce, arts, science and new discoveries. Monkey see, monkey do. When kids see Filipinos all over the world, doing what they like best and being admired for it by almost all nationalities, that fire of passion will burn until they accomplish something similar.

A lame comparison, albeit common, would be to be so excited about having a Filipino Restaurant in a certain city in any country! We will definitely be tempted to visit and chat with the owner about how that success came to be.

Don’t even get us started about Filipinos winning in international competition, mainly in singing or in fashion. Don’t we all feel that same old “Proud to be Pinoy” sentiments? Speaking of which… “Uyy, there’s a Pinoy winner in Project Runway.” or that Isn’t Bruno Mars Filipino by blood line?!

There’s fire burning in every adult Filipino to succeed in international scene. When that fire started kindling at an early age, there’s no amount of life’s fire extinguisher can void that.

The World is Beautiful. There’s More to Life Than SM.

Disclaimer alert, these statements are written from a village Filipino perspective, as our family came from a far away village with happily-ever-after endings. Yes, a remote, small village where everybody knows everybody’s names and sadly and happily, depends on how you look at it, everybody’s business.

Way way back, do you know where our family go to entertain guests? Where we think, we would go for an adventure? SM! Yes, those big, gigantic, enormous buildings, apparently the biggest malls in Asia or in the world. molding the minds of millions of Filipinos to buy their hard earned dollars, euros, pesos or any denomination because they are SM! Imagine how small scale entrepreneurs and small scale real estate agents would prosper without these gigantic commercial monopoly.

Okay, got a little carried away there. The point is, the Philippines has lots of magnificent islands, mountains, seas, waterfalls to explore. Thanks to a gazillion of tourists who got viral attention in the internet because they showcase the beauty of our motherland, The Philippines.And yes, we know that Pinoy millennial have been traveling the world and the country quite extensively, like no other generation has ever done. Why not Pinoy kids, follow millennial lead?

Going farther, when we travel with kids, we get to see that other countries have a lifestyle, not necessary like our country that works. In Europe, there are no big malls, yet the tourists and locals visit Old Towns patronising small shops earning their living for centuries! Okay, maybe for decades. But that’s the point. Business can run for decades because they have the sense of heritage.

It’s a beautiful world, not in a supermall, megamall kind of way! The earlier the kids learn this, the better for the country!

That Colonial Mentality (Hey Joe!)

Most – Hey Joe! You American?

Some: Not all white people are Americans! Some of them are Brits!

Obviously pun intended. But hey, not Filipinos fault! Our gorgeous archipelago has been colonized for centuries and the school textbooks are yet to be revised to include stories about other countries (you know, like what are Bohemians?! – seriously, hope we are wrong for thinking this, do educate us!)

Every country is different. Each one has different history and culture. White, black, brown, yellow, pink. If we are not open to this understanding and keen on generalizing skin colors, we might as well be uneducated. Europe has 50 countries, each one of the countries have diverse backgrounds and most of them, black, white, yellow, pink and every color in between. Africa is not country, the continent has 54 countries and no, not all of their inhabitants are black! Add in the other 4 continents, and we have almost 200 nationalities. We know how it feels to be stereotype as ” You Asian looks the same with your small eyes and like rice so much!” Ggrr

I guess, our point is, travel with kids for them to introduce diversity!

These are our three personal reasons why we travel with our Pinoy kids. There are more, like appreciation of world religion, which we elaborated on our Singapore blog post and our worldschooling ideas. We intend to share more as we go on more adventure with our family goals.

Do you have a burning reason why Pinoy kids should travel the world?

Qatar 1: Singing Sand Dunes of Qatar

August 21, 2016 by turknoys, posted in Family Satisfaction, Qatar, Travel Adventures

“What makes the desert so beautiful,” said the Little Prince, “is that it hides a well.”

Turknoys Exploring Qatar — “They’re sleeping in there or else they are yawning. Only the children are pressing their noses against the windowpanes.” “Only the children know what they are looking for.” “All grown-ups were once children… but only few of them remember it.” “What makes the desert beautiful,’ said the little prince, ‘is that somewhere it hides a well…” (Quotes from The Little Prince)

Our family didn’t love traveling instantly. It was a slow courting process for the parents and kids to love exploring. We used to be conformist to any society’s standards. Got married, checked! Got kids, checked! Put the kids in the best school we could possible afford, checked! Went to church and mosque religiously, checked!

Life became routine and predictable. We are very grateful. That is one value our family will always have – being grateful to whatever circumstances and predictability life hands to us. Yet, we can’t help but hear the silent questions of our hearts and minds.

“AND THEN WHAT?!”

What happens when a family wants something more? What happens when every family member questions all society’s standards? We are in our journey and we don’t have the answers just yet but this we are very sure of: When you start questioning the validity and existence of one norm, such as education and traditional family lifestyle, there is no turning back. We just had to question all norms and the “why” we do the things we do day in and day out, like robots, like zombies, like programmed applications in a matrix.

That is why we like hanging out in the desert. The Singing Sand Dunes of Qatar close to Al Kharara is our favorite place in Qatar, whatever the weather! Yes, even in the middle of summer when the temperature is scorching 55++ degree- Celsius!

There is something about the beauty of the sand dunes, dependent to the blowing of the wind, yet standing firm and proud to its desert background while humming its sand dune songs!

We may be an ordinary expat family in Qatar, yet we have our ambitions and goals as family. We go where the wind blows, especially with the unpredictable world economy nowadays, yet to stand firm and proud to our family’s quests and questioning while we hum our family quests song unique from all the songs of other family!

The Singing Sand Dunes of Qatar is a must-see for all Qatar residents, visitors and tourists! During winter, this is the perfect place of hanging out with friends for a BBQ and bon fire, sand duning, sand tobogganing, climbing cardio exercises and a lot more activities! It’s a great hang out for kids.

Great playground for kids with free play-all-you can sand dunes! Our family has seen the sunrise and sunset from the Singing Sand Dunes of Qatar, both spectacular nature wonder at work.

Most of the time, what we actually question in life has no right and wrong answers. Those who claim, they have it all figured out and they know the right answers are all wrong. And we are mostly sure, they didn’t watch the sun rises or setting from the sand dunes or desert!

Maybe life should never have answers. Maybe deserts contain hidden wells, yet again maybe none.

Does it matter really? When we can survive life without water?

COUNTRY 14- Denmark: Where Life Seems To Be A Real Fairy Tale

August 17, 2016August 17, 2016 by turknoys, posted in Denmark, Travel Adventures, Why Travel With Kids?

“Every person’s life is a fairy tale written by God’s fingers. “– Hans Christian Andersen

Turknoys Exploring Denmark — One of our family bucketlist is to enjoy the Nyhavn in Copenhagen; there’s something about the multicoloured and posh houses close to the harbour that makes life look like a fairy tale

Is it a coincidence that our two favorite children’s authors, Hans Christian Andersen and Astrid Lindgren both stayed in Copenhagen, Denmark? Maybe or maybe not!

To be able to see where these authors worked during the prime of their lives before they have written their printed masterpieces, is like a dream come true. Kinda like seeing the Nyhavn street with is colored houses by the harbor in Copenhagen. A real fairy tale place.

Denmark will always be that fairy tale land for our family. We had enjoyed five wonderful days of exploring and enjoying castles, fairy tale rides at Tivoli Garden (what a great full day it was!) and scenic landscapes and statues like Little Mermaid and Carlsberg aka for our family, beer paradise.

We also enjoyed tremendously the walk in Denmark suburbans with all the elegant cabin houses. We always say to each other: “These people actually live in this place?! Seriously?!” The grass is always greener from the other side of the fence, yes. But Denmark houses are beyond green, it’s green, flower-filled, technology-savvy paradise!

We were also amazed with how the Tesla electric cars is already so normal. It is a different world where we are used to land cruisers powered by cheap fuel oil. Well, its kind of given in our family. Summer in Denmark and yet we were wearing our winter jackets, we desert-dweller, we!

While we were enjoying the Rosenborg Castle, our little boy gained a tourist friend when we were exploring the throne room of the castle. The kids our boy were playing with came from North America, USA , together with their grandparents.

The grandfather was so fascinated that our family came from Qatar, he ran to us and asked – Do you ride in camels in Qatar?! (True story!) Most of the tourists looked at us with different expressions on their faces. Mostly, fascinated faces.

The sarcastic version of ourselves wanted to blurt out, “Oh my God, aren’t you so uniformed citizen of an industrialized first world nation. You actually believe that only your country can be so civilized. Hoops, wait a minute, did we feed our camels before we head out here in Denmark, kids?!

Well, it’s a great story for our family’s fairy tale story. Once upon a time, there was a family who only know camels and decided to explore the world….. Turknoy Travels 100 happily ever after.

Of course, we were not sarcastic to our fellow tourists. We tried to be articulate about our life in Qatar. After all, we are ambassadors of three countries when we travel, Qatar, Philippines and Turkey. We wanted to look like “educated travelers.”

Oh well, side story in Denmark over. That’s not about the country, it’s about how people treat us when we travel. Nonetheless, a story linked to Denmark memory.

We moved on to exploring the place and was able to visit the ever famous Little Mermaid. It’s really not that impressive, a popular tourist trap. When we visited Carlsberg, there is another Little Mermaid almost similar to the original ones. Exploring Carlsberg gave us a lot of opportunities to talk about global entrepreneurship and philanthropy.

You see, Mr. Carlsberg is the one who donated the Little Mermaid statue for the love of art. The take away we got from all the discussions is, we can be passionate about something and yet earn a lot of money from businesses we are not really passionate about. Somehow, passions will link the two together.

It was a great experience, exploring Denmark with all the getting lost around the neighborhood, the people we met, the awesome views we’ve seen, lessons learned.

We read this quote about Copenhagen and we agree to this interpretation of the city and even the country. Country No. 15 and our conclusion that country affects the attitude and way of life of people, residents or citizens alike holds true. Swoon!

“If Copenhagen were a person, that person would be generous, beautiful, elderly, but with a flair. A human being that has certain propensities for quarrelling, filled with imagination and with appetite for the new and with respect for the old – somebody who takes good care of things and of people.” Connie Nielsen

Yes, being in the country for few days, we know why Danes are the happiest people in the world.

COUNTRY 13 – NORWAY: 2,407-KM-Away from the North Pole!

August 16, 2016 by turknoys, posted in Family Satisfaction, Norway, Travel Adventures, Why Travel With Kids?

It’s our 13th Country to explore as family and we are so amazed with Norway. We haven’t done much in Norway but one full day of winter at Narvik, enjoying the closest point our family was the closest (so far) from the North Pole with lots of snow. It seems that not having a complete family photo is a great reason to go back. And we really intend to go back. We have our hearts set on this quest!

Turknoys Exploring Norway — a taste of Narvik keeps us wanting more of Norway

The fun of exploring never ends. Once we step on new territory, there will always be some new feat to conquer, new bucketlist to tick off.

We intend to explore of Norway and now aim closer to North Pole! Oh my, let the dreaming continues! Dreaming knows no bounds, only the limits that we set for ourselves.

“A tied dog does not jump farther than his cord. ” – Norwegeian Proverb

“Bunden hund bykser ikkje lenger enn bandet rekk”