After checking all our guidebooks, we decided that Mutare, Zimbabwe’s vibrant “Gateway to the Sea,” would be our final destination in the country. Zimbabwe’s fourth-largest city lies just 290 kilometres west of the Mozambican port of Beira. Nicknamed Kumakomoyo...
The Bulawayo Railway Museum is one of Zimbabwe’s hidden gems, tucked away behind the main railway station in the Raylton suburb of the country’s second-largest city. Established in 1972, the museum charges a modest US$5 entrance fee and offers a fascinating, hands-on journey...
Rwanda’s ‘second city’, Huye, is a relaxed and sprawling town. It was the nation’s former capital. Butare, as it was known (and Astrida before that, in tribute to the 29-year-old Swedish wife of Belgium’s King Leopold III, who was killed in a car accident), was established under Belgian...
If you loved the Out of Africa movie, you’d love this museum as much as we did. It is located in the farmhouse where author Karen Blixen lived between 1914 and 1931. She left after a series of personal tragedies, but the lovely colonial house has been preserved as a museum. The...
Today, finally, we drove out of Amman, and we made a short stop at the museum (🎟️ 5 JOD), which displays more than 70 classic cars and motorbikes from the personal collection of King Hussein. It’s a gem and a great way to recount the story of modern Jordan. Vehicles range from pre...
We arrived at an imposing building that looked like a futuristic military base. Inside is Amman´s newest Royal Tank Museum (🎟️ 5 JOD), which opened in 2018. It was our honor and great pleasure to have a private visit guided by the general manager, Mr. Maher A. Tarawneh, through 20,000...
Our first stop on the busy sightseeing day was the Hejaz Railway, which once ferried pilgrims from Damascus in Syria to Amman and then to Medina in Saudi Arabia. Still, only the breeze rolls through this historic old station at present. There’s a small on-site museum (🎟️ free), and...
After nearly a week’s stay in Doha, we finally hit the road again toward Al Samriya. On the way, we stopped at our favorite hypermarket, LuLu, and bought a few goodies for our fridge. (we still feel it’s the most expensive country in the Gulf). After a 30-minute drive, we...
Our second museum today was opened in March 2019. French architect Jean Nouvel’s sprawling desert-rose-inspired structure is spectacular (🎟️ 50 QAR). It houses 1.5km of galleries organized into three ‘chapters’: Beginnings, Life in Qatar, and Building the Nation...
It took us a few hours to explore the world’s most extensive collection of Islamic art, drawn from three continents. This fabulous museum (🎟️ 50 QAR) is so rich in treasure that it rewards short, intense visits. Rising from its purpose-built island and set in an extensive landscape...