After a 17-month trip through Africa and the Middle East reporting in conflict zones, Javier Martinez de la Varga , 'Bicicleting', he felt exhausted mentally, so he decided to go with his bicycle to the farthest place from which he could return without taking planes. So in 2010 he flew to Jakarta ; three years and 38,000 km later, he arrived in Madrid pedaling. Eager for more, he continued the journey through Africa. It took him two and a half years to reach Cape Town (South Africa), from where he embarked on a sailboat bound for Brazil. And so it was 9 years on a bike...
Blanca Fernández, 57, also she left everything for the bike . He brought forward his retirement to take a big trip: he wanted to get from his house in London to Indonesia, ferry to Australia and then cross to Africa to cycle home. He traversed Europe, stopping at Greece to spend some time as a volunteer in a refugee camp , and continued to Turkey. Cambodia, Thailand, Egypt… He had been traveling for 19 months!
The story of Jan Janowski , a Catalan geologist who left everything to travel, is also fascinating. He traveled on foot for three years: he left Barcelona with the intention of arriving in Australia in two years. Jan walked about 30 km on average each day . He traveled with a car in which he carried between 40 and 50 kg, which allowed him to be self-sufficient in terms of accommodation and food. One of his premises was to generate the least possible impact on the planet.
For his part, Roberto Sastre was already trained in long trips and hitchhiking, he had always traveled alone but this time he would return home accompanied... On the first of his trips through South America he came across Cocaí, a sick dog that he adopted. In March 2019, Roberto and Cocaí left Madrid with a backpack, a tent and a mission between eyebrows and eyebrows: to hitchhike to China.
A trip that he baptized as the “Peking Express Canine” . They would not reach Beijing –the pandemic caught them when they were in India– nor would it be express, but it was a dog for a while: in addition to traveling with a dog through Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, Iran, Pakistan and India and immersing themselves in their exciting cultures, they added a new furry to the team in the desert of Rajasthan: Chai . "Three years later they have returned home with an Indian dog and a path full of learning, exciting adventures and wonderful beings", they underline from the IATI Conference on great trips.
A great event that this year celebrates its 9th edition, which will be from March 22 to 26 in Madrid , and which brings together 10 travelers like Blanca or Roberto who will explain their great trips and journeys around the world.
See pictures: Movies that encourage you to “drop everything and...”
The new edition will be a hybrid event: face-to-face and broadcast via streaming from the Madrid Flea Market and the Clock House Cultural Center . The IATI Days of the Great Journeys will feature globetrotters such as Diana Tallo and Miguel Angel Sapag, who spent 22 months backpacking through Latin America, or Manuel Carpintero, who will recount his experience as a disseminator in the KLM Norway Expedition 2019 , an exciting exploration that combines adventure and science for 15 young people between the ages of 16 and 20 accompanied by the Norwegian historian Torgeir Higraff.
Organized since 2013 by Itziar Marcotegui and Pablo Strubell (responsible for 'A great trip', the reference book, podcast and website for long-term travel), the #iatiJGV brings together hundreds of globetrotters , in order to demonstrate that great trips are not the exclusive domain of anyone. Going around the world or traveling around the planet for several months or years are dream trips within the reach of those who propose it. If you want to drop everything and travel, this is the time!