Country specialist : Steve Corriveau

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CONSEILLER-SPÉCIALISTE : Steve Corriveau

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What’s your best travel memory ?

Reaching the rooftop of Africa in Tanzania on August 20th 2009 : Kilimanjaro ! When you’re there, up above at 5895 meters, after so much effort, you feel like everything is possible.

Which place would you highly recommend ?

Sofitel Private Island and its overwater bungalows in Bora Bora, French Polynesia.

Where would you settle down ?

Northwestern fjords in Iceland. I spent 4 days there in 2010 and I would go back anytime. It’s simply magical !

What’s your dream trip ?

Reaching the Everest Base Camp for my 50th birthday in 2017.

Are you rather into highly organized travel or improvisation ?

Both. Therefore a self-drive tour in Iceland or Hawaii would be the perfect match.

Your all-time top three destinations ?

Thailand, Uganda and Iceland.

Where to go, when and why ?

You should go to Tanzania in September, the best time to view the great Serengeti migration.

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Customer feedback

Iceland - 2011-07-18

Trip of Guy et Paule

Hi everyone!

We are officially back from Iceland. It takes at least a week to get over being back!

Marvelous trip. Very intense. In fourteen days, we drove 2525 kilometers, and that doesn’t include the distances covered by bus, 4X4, boat, and plane. We come back with two hours of videos, 1651 pictures, seven stones, six samples of sand and volcanic ash (there, hash is spelled ash when it drops from the skies: it’s already been smoked!)…It looks like what the astronauts brought back from the moon after their first trip. Postproduction will probably take a lot of time! NASA worked on it for years…

We saw dozens of torrential downpours, bubbling and whistling pools, colorful mountains, lava fields, remote farms (that manage to stay connected!), birds, cliffs, asphalt and dirt roads. No volcanic eruption. No earthquake. We filled our lungs with fresh air every day. We lived outside. Our bodies expanded, often in relation to the long distances that separated tourist stops. We saw only one star: the sun, day and night, often hidden behind a blanket of clouds! The rain in Iceland looks pretty much like it does here…A harsh, demanding country for the less adventurous souls, and exhilarating for adventure lovers. Immense, often deserted landscapes. We were never too warm. In general, temperatures stayed between 5 and 12 ºC (see attached picture).

One could think that the foggy, desolate landscape would create a depressed nation. Not at all. On the remote roads where we rolled at high speeds on our 4X4s, our guide played the last Gusgus album (electro-dance music)! Surprising contrast that gives a resolutely urban character to the harsh and often hostile nature. The result is an atmosphere of modern daydreaming with a background of passing landscapes. Daydreaming for oneself that we only experienced in Iceland.

Icelanders are blond, tall, and strong, with pinkish skin. The Vikings really are their ancestors. They speak Icelandic among themselves and English with foreigners. They all have mobile phones and Internet. Their cities are modern, their homes comfortable (that is, for those who weren’t crushed by the recession – many farms looked abandoned). They jealously guard their solitude and take great care in keeping their land wild and untamed: guides systematically pick up abandoned tissues and plastic bags and had no qualms at showing their annoyance at this disturbance to their homeland’s natural beauty. Trails are maintained at a very ‘basic’ level (careful with loose rocks when walking down towards a waterfall: ramps are few and far between); there isn’t a single billboard in all of Iceland, even in the cities. In other words, they want their nature to stay natural.

We do too.

Over there they wonder how over here, we manage to stay in an office all year long.

Bless! (goodbye)

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