Fraser Island has ranked high on Amar’s (our STA Explorer known as Gap Year Go Getter) list of favourite destinations since he’s been travelling. And this is despite the negatives of sand getting everywhere and the loss of his flip-flops.
He’s in love with the emerald water of Lake Wabby, the beaches of Lake Mackenzie that rival those of Whitehaven and the ‘stunning’ views from Indian Head. The romantic mood continues,
“You’ll also never have a better chance to watch the stars. It’s as quiet as you want it to be and you can see every star in the sky. I spent hours one night watching shooting stars. I made a lot of wishes that night, let’s hope they come true.”
Lindsay is currently spending time in Fiji and is in the process of setting up a voluntary work based project helping the Nakavika community. She’s been working on it for a few months and things are currently in the balance but, as she says, the whole endeavour has been an amazing experience.
When talking about her time as STA Travel USA’s intern she talks on how the highlight of the whole adventure was the job itself, but does suggest that sky-diving in South Africa and lion sightings in East Africa are just two of the collection of experiences she’ll never forget. And then she passes advice to those applying to the UK 2010 internship,
“Remember that the position is about being an inspiration. Don’t calm the viewer down…pump them up. And by applying for the WTI, it’s implied that you love travelling. Saying it even once is redundant, and what time you have to impress the judges is vital. Don’t waste it saying things they can already guess about you.”
If you’d like to read more of the interview go to Amar’s site Gap Year Escape, and for more on Lindsay visit NoMadderWhere.com. Of course after reading this you might also feel tempted to get involved trying to bag one of the UK World Traveller Intern positions – if so, it’s all happening here.
Gap Year Go Getter Amar has been taking surfing lessons in Australia. Specifically he’s been to Spot X to get to grips with the board riding, a place that is great for honing the art and mastering the wave.
Well, that’s the idea anyway; sadly Amar didn’t quite find things as easy as he hoped despite having done it before,
“Three hour surf lesson and I couldn’t get on the board. On reflection I can attribute this to two reasons. The first being that my knee was playing up and putting weight on caused a sharp pain, the second reason being that beautiful women in wet suits are a little distracting.”
What can I say, two perfectly valid reasons for having trouble in the surf. Regardless of the difficulties, Amar had cool time just ‘lolling around in the waves’ and suggests giving surfing lessons a go if you haven’t already. Especially in Byron Bay if you’re in the area, but make sure to shop around as there are a heap of schools offering all sorts of packages.
Got something to add on surfing? Cool, do so below…
We’re back, and normal service is about to resume, but before it does a run through our friendfeed - the place to keep up with us and our tribe of STA Explorers and their travelling experiences - has spilled the details on all that they’ve been up to over the festive break.
Alex welcomed in the New Year with 12 grapes, taking part in a Spanish tradition of eating one on each stroke of midnight to bring you good fortune for the coming year.
“The atmosphere, the 20,000 people at your side, everything. Makes me grin like an idiot just thinking about it again. Yesterday will be with me for the rest of my life. When that bridge lights up it truly is a magical moment. I hope one day that you’ll get to see it for yourself.”
I think we’re just about up to date. It’s 2010 and we’re looking to expand our community as always, so if you had a superb Christmas break while travelling, or are about to head off to far flung lands let us known via email or Twitter.
‘Reasons to travel’ is the latest post from Amar, our Gap Year Go Getter. In it he considers the reasons people go travelling and what they look to get out of their time away.
The thoughts were kicked off by his own moment of realisation, as he describes,
“I guess I had a little epiphany or moment of enlightenment. Call it what you will, something happened. I don’t think the circumstances matter as long as you learn from it. I couldn’t even begin to explain what ‘clicked’. Unless you were me, you wouldn’t understand.”
Like all good scholars, Amar doesn’t rely on his own words to get the message across. Instead he turns to spiritual activist Marianne Williamson for further clarity, providing a quote that is certainly designed to get you thinking about yourself and your place in the world. If you’re the philosophical sort then click through and share your thoughts with Amar…
Due to some tricky stuff going on in the dark and technological corners of STA travelbuzz’s hidden inner workings our addition of new STA Explorers is running a little less smoothly than usually. However, such things don’t faze us, so I give to you Amar and Samantha, each embarking on a voyage of discovery!
Amar, who’ll be known as the Gap Year Go Getter, has already spent part of his gap year in Asia and is now heading for Australia. His latest posts have been splendid catalogue type affairs, one focusing on the Top 50 Travel Blogs and the other on his Top 50 Inspirational Travel Quotes. I’m a fan of quotes and couldn’t resist including this one from Marcel Proust (which also gave me the title of this post),
“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.”
Samantha is a £10 Pom 2009 who is currently doing her thing in Melbourne,
“As a recent graduate in fashion photography I’ve decided to dedicate this time in Melbourne to working my way into the creative photographic industry. This will be the first time I have given all my time to my favoured subject and am ready to see how much I can work and learn in this fresh, vibrant & artsy city.”
Because of this Samantha is going by the STA Explorer moniker of Fashionably Melbourne. She’s living up to the name having already had success helping out as an assistant on a photo shoot – though if you’d rather see her work have a look at the snaps she’s taken around Melbourne, including the one below.
If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to travel around India during Diwali, then the video below, India 2009, from Delhi to Kochin, may give you an idea.
It is snippets of YouTube user CEstima’s back-packing adventure during the festival of light and gives a flavour of all she got up to, including dancing, ceremonial fighting and riding on the roof of a bus…
