There’s always a talk about tourist traps and hidden gems among travel enthusiasts, but what no one really talks about is the middle of nowhere. Maybe your hometown that when trying to describe it to anyone, you can’t think of a single thing you can do there or perhaps a little village or an industrial town that you just pass through to your destination.
This leads to a conversation about what travelling means to you, because if it’s checking off all the monuments in Europe from your bucket list or finding the coolest place only a few chosen ones know about, then sure, by all means do your thing. I’m not here to judge, obviously I enjoy those as well (have you seen my blog?). But sometimes I feel this urge to go to the places people say that are not worth my time and see for myself. And chances are, I’ll love it there.
A short list of things I like in the middle of nowhere:
1/ A body of water
As long as there a little lake, pond, river, stream or sea, I don’t need anything else, I can just sit there and watch it for hours and hours. And, let’s be real, taking a ton of photos from every angle possible.
2/ Graveyards
Hear me out. As weird as it sounds, I do enjoy a little walk through the cemetery trying to see the beautiful old gravestones or some interesting names or recreating a possible life of those people in my head. A little creativity exercise if you will.
3/ Supermarkets
When abroad, there’s nothing more exciting than a trip to a supermarket! You can find new snacks (and who doesn’t love those?) and it gives you an idea about the country as a whole.
4/ Trees
I love me a nice tree, okay? This is very similar to the water point, but if I like the tree, I don’t mind not moving for hours (as long as there are no mosquitoes or other species of biting insects, in which case we run). So parks, singular lonely trees, gardens or forests are all welcome.
5/ Buildings
Okay, yeah, generic, isn’t it. But I’m not only talking about the astonishing traditional architecture or the breath-taking ultra-modern skyscrapers. It’s about the everyday blocks of flats (have you ever imagined them as robots though?).
And one unofficial point – people. People watching is fun (in a non-creepy way, please!).
Example places:
1/ Prievidza
Everybody in Slovakia knows that there’s nothing in Prievidza. They have the lovely neighbour of Bojnice after all. I worked there one summer and I walked everyday through Prievidza. I can’t tell you how many times I wanted to stop and see more of the town and had I had more time before my work started or my train left, I would’ve done so. There was this park I wished to take a stroll through, the river with ducks and a different water level, which was utterly fascinating, and so many undiscovered places still waiting for me.
2/ Žarnovica
Another quite random place that I only went to because I was nearby. What piqued my interest as I was driving through were the bridges crossing a stream in the town centre. I knew I had to see them up close. As it was the perfect spring weather with blooming trees, I could not resist and it was definitely the best decision that day. And, there were ducks! (I think we have a theme going on here.)
3/ Forna
A tiny village in the woods in Spain. You can walk around for maybe 20-30 minutes before you see it all. But the views won’t sink in in such a short time. Moreover, the cute little houses will make you wanna find out more about the people, the way they live so far off in the mountains and why they have so many cute cats. It was a paradise.
Maybe this is your sign to pay attention to your surroundings. It’s worth it. You may even find some ducks. Or cats.
