Who wrote this

Standard Englishman who in the last 20 years:

• Lived in 7 countries
• Travelled to 100+ countries
• Picked up something like 1000+ travel experiences
• Dirt-poor backpacking to indulgent luxury
• Rushed weekend getaways to endless months on the road

Travel hasn’t been so much been a phase, it’s been a constant and somewhere along the way I started ranking everything in my head.

Why this site exists

Two reasons:

1. To organise and rank these experiences properly – from the utterly wow to the truly gash.

2. Share my honest pros and cons of the experience, and high-level, no-nonsense tips.

Travel marketing and guides often feel broken – everything is “unmissable . . . breathtaking . . bucket list.”  They aren’t.  Some places are good, some are overrated, some are extraordinary.  This site separates them.

All my personal opinion, no sponsored content, no AI-written fluff and not 3 hours taking an Instagram photoshopped fantasy.  Just one guy’s opinion after being to all these places and wants to share what they were really like.

Travel Philosophy

Everyone has their own travel style and favourites. I’ve changed my travel philosophy a little bit over the years – I’m less keen on 30 hour bus rides and dorm rooms – but the core beliefs still remain:

Travel Philosophy #1 Having fun on a travel experience amplifies it – anyone who’s done any travelling has been templed out within hours, but less so when there is a fun element to it.  If can, take the opportunity to cycle, segway, quad, zorb, bungee, sky dive, whatever.

Travel Philosophy #2 Over commercialised and busy ruins the place – the really big t icket items are for sure “wow”, but usually chock-a-block with fellow tourists and overly commercialised, which removes the magic of the place.  If there is a 10/10 location that is rammed and a 9/10 that is empty, I go with the 9/10 every time.

Travel Philosophy #3 Nature vs Culture – need one or the other, and Culture tends to be harder if you don’t have the context.  The best travel experiences all have either outstanding natural environment (vistas, animals etc) or outstanding culture (festivals, architecture etc).  Nature often easy to appreciate, but Culture needs context so try to take the time to get it.

Travel Philosophy #4 World Famous vs Unique – need one of the other.  No getting away from it, world famous spots illicit a “wow” reaction.  But without the fame, you’re now looking for unique.  Without either, it typically doesn’t justify a travelling trip.

The site’s scores

Travel Experience (TE) Score – the travel philosophy above feeds into the scores.  Every travel experience gets a score out of 10 for Fun, Avoid the Crowds, Nature, Culture, World Famous and Unique.  They then get added up as Fun + Avoid the Crowds + (best of either Nature or Culture) + (best of World Famous or Culture) and turned into a number out of 10.  Yes, very analytical.

The Wow Factor Score – less analytical.  This score factors in just how much you’re likely to say “wow”.  As there’s a lot of experiences in the world, and a lot of wows, I’m using a 5 star rating system.

Longer background

I’m originally from Newcastle in the north of England.  Went to university and then moved to London to seek my fortune.  It wasn’t for me – the combination of big city and not knowing too many people didn’t help, but if I’m being honest not being particularly good at my job didn’t help either!

I had a friend sleeping on my floor who had a plan to head off traveling – a vague gap year he’d probably call it that involved one of those round-the-world tickets.  One terrible week at work I came home, had a rant to a consoling ear and next thing I knew I’d made a decision that would change my life forever – resigned from the job, called notice on the lease and booked my flights the other side of the world, New Zealand.

I crash-bang-walloped my way through New Zealand, Australia, South East Asia and India over 18 months or so, working as I went to fund things and get closer to the real feel of the places. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing and the emotions I was having – the world was so big and yet so accessible.  In my mind, all I really needed was a backpack, some credit cards and a Lonely Planet – and I still do!

It was a formative experience for me and I got back to England exhausted after the buzz of leaving a semi-rioting Delhi . . . but within days was looking at the map of the world trying to figure out which piece to explore next.  As it turned out, it would be China for 2 years or so – working, studying, partying and trying to understand such a giant country that is really more like a continent on its own.

The next stage was more dull – I joined a large corporate headquartered in the UK . . . and, even duller, a bank!  I needed money and figured endlessly travelling may not be a great idea.  But I quickly found that the travelling didn’t stop there.  Maxed out on holidays and taking every international assignment I could allowed months in Africa, one giant visit to all sites for the company across 6 of the 7 continents (how dare they not have offices in Antarctica), 6 months in Vancouver and ultimately a move to Hong Kong, which has been my home for 10+ years.

After returning from a six month sabbatical that I used to travel Latin America, and ultimately a giant break for 18months to live in Italy, I had a profound feeling of being just so incredibly lucky to have the fortune to experience the places I’d been to. At the same time I felt frustrated at the travel information that was out there – dull n’th degree travel blogs of Jane’s Gap Year around Australia; Instagram influencers where you just knew they’d spent three hours getting the perfect photo with pure fluff recommendations; and travel guides all-too-often praising just about everything in the country they are covering, without calling out the BS.  There was nothing out there that gave an overall comparison of all the experiences around the world.  So I decided to build it.