Gemma and Campell from Highlands2Hammcocks are the ultimate travel couple, their photos together are #goals. I can imagine when they are old and grey sitting together looking at their incredible, romantic and beautiful travel pictures they will reminisce about a life well lived. They share great budget travel advice.
As always I start with the question no traveller wants to answer (because it’s so hard to choose)… Please share with us your favourite/ best/scariest or funniest travel story…
During our European adventure last summer, we spontaneously decided to purchase bicycles.
These bikes (and our poor legs!) then took us 800km down Italy’s eastern coastline, through countless cute villages and tough trials. There were many moments during this experience that are the best/scariest and funniest stories from our trip. Some days, we thought we would never see the end of the road; cycling through 100km of vineyards in the middle of nowhere, no sign of life for miles around. That is of course except for one massive dog, who decided to chase us for about a kilometre. Now, we love dogs but this one looked hungry and potentially wanted to eat us! There were also moments of hilarity throughout this trip, as we looked back on days like this and laughed at how we made it through them. Our spontaneous cycling adventure turned out to be the most challenging yet life-changing experiences we have ever experienced!
What is the best piece of advice you’ve ever had (travel related or otherwise)?
Don’t plan too far ahead and go with the flow. This was another lesson learned
during our European trip. We purchased 2 months of Interail passes which allowed us 10 travel days within 30 days. All well and good for getting an exact itinerary sorted.However, this didn’t work out as expected, as when we arrived in Europe we chucked our plans in the air and decided to change the lot! Being able to book our journey as we went allowed us to go with the flow, stay open to recommendations and even save money by going cheaper and local!
If you could only go back to one place in the world, where would you go and why?
This is a tough one, as we have been to so many wonderful places…Thinking it through, we are going to go with Malta! Three years ago, whilst enduring a long distance relationship, we met in Malta for three whole weeks. So many people had said that we would get bored spending three weeks there and that it wasn’t really a place for young people. Well, as it turned out they couldn’t have been more wrong! We fell absolutely in love with this beautiful island. We would love to go back and stay even longer. Malta is also the place where highlands2hammocks was born!
What has travel taught you?
Travel has taught us the importance of leaving your comfort zone. We have always been pretty good at taking risks and jumping on every new experience we have been offered. However, it is because of this, we have learnt to adapt to every situation we have been faced with whilst travelling. We have learned
so much about ourselves, each other and the world around us through travel.
What is that one moment from a trip you will never ever forget?
The sunrise over Lake Bled. This experience absolutely took our breath away and is a moment that we will never forget. We would love to return to Lake Bled one day and see experience it all again.
And finally… What’s your favourite line from the Stories from a Backpack manifesto and why?
We have lost count of the number of times we’ve been told that we’re lucky to travel or that they think our life looks like the dream life. Through highlands2hammocks, we try to show that by breaking that routine, you can do just that! After finishing university we worked for a few years to save up as much money as we could and then embarked on our adventure. With some good budgeting and being willing to
take a risk, anyone can take on the adventure of a lifetime.
Thank you so much guys! Laura xx