the bucket list! back attribution
it's always been a dream of mine to travel and see the world. it's something i think about a lot... i've been really restricted with where i can go growing up and my family hasn't really had the money to go to many places out of town, so i've mostly just been stuck at home. even here, where i live in the suburbs of a really cool city, i haven't really had the chance to explore the downtown area since we've always just gone to one place and then immediately went back to my house that's half an hour away from the city :< as you can imagine, this has left me with sooo many fantasies that have come and gone that i wanna try fulfilling someday, soo i wanted to make a page about them to write about and remember them!
this page will have a ton of entries in the bucket list, majorly cities, but i also added stuff i wanted to do because i didn't just want it to be exclusively about travelling :P i fear that the way i write here may sound really touristy or tacky and i'm sorry for that... it's a bit of a pain to try to summarize why i wanna go to these places and i wanted it to be more personal than educational but it's my first time really writing about travel in general so it was hard to decide how i wanted to write. this is a page i plan on updating too, so check in every once in a while since i wanna add new entries as well as just add more resources and stuff here. with that tho i hope you enjoy my bucket list!! U^ ^U
and if u want to tell me what u think on my guestbook please pls do i would rly appreciate feedback!! :^)
cities... things ▼
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united states n.a. ▼
hartford 
new england is probably the region of the us i wanna travel to the most!! it feels like it’d be super cozy to explore, especially the remote parts of vermont, new hampshire, and maine and all of their large forests and rural towns. but i’d also really like to check out the cities as well obviouslyy!! what sorta convinced me to wanna go here was the dunkin’ park which looks like it has lovely views and it has a dunkin inside as well! during travel, i’d also really like to see places of worship, and i think the cathedral here would be great although i’d probably wanna put some thought into what i’m gonna do with that kind of stuff before i go on any trips by myself.
bismarck 
this city's one of those that i've always sort of admired ever since i found out about its existence. yeah, it's like cheyenne where nothing of note really happens and people make fun of it cause of how seemingly unimportant it is, but i really would like to look at some smaller countryside cities someday, and besides, there's really cool things here that i can't ignore, both cause of their historical importance and cause i'm fond of them!! alsoo a common travel theme for me especially in us cities is i wanna see a ton of college sports stuff... both ncaa schools are far away but bsc is moving to naia next season so i'd love to see them play!!
cheyenne 
i guess this isn’t the case for anyone, but every time i remember that this city is the least populated capital in the country, i wonder what it’d be like to visit even if it was for a little bit. apparently it was founded because of its prosperity along the union pacific railroad, and ever since it’s grown its own traditions too, as any city does :p there’s this huge western rodeo festival every year, the largest in the world filled with events such as bronc riding and barrel racing and stuff. there’s other spots too like the depot plaza that contains things like a museum, hotel, and restaurant, as well as other museums like the cowgirls of the west museum which i love the idea of!!
erie 
this is sort of an unusual pick since i’ve never been to philly or pittsburgh before… and i’ll go visit them someday too, but i really wanna go here to see lake erie. there’s a ton of ways to get a great view of it, from the bicentennial tower at a bird’s eye view to presque isle state park where you can do stuff like bike and see the lighthouse within as well. i forget about amusement parks a lot when it comes to traveling to cities, but there’s a huge one here and again some interesting museums like the maritime museum on e front st. if you’re thinking of the mistake i made, don’t make fun of me for it omg… however this city is a great destination especially if you love lakes!!
anchorage 
alaska is a super odd state. from the isolation and strange sun cycle and the way it can drive people crazy to the frigid climate and weird laws, there should be interesting places to visit here too, right? well, of course there are! what’s on my mind right now are the uaa’s athletics, especially the ice hockey and gymnastics teams which are their only d1 teams, and i wanna walk through their campus too if i can!! there’s also a ton of other things, like the santa claus and christmas themed attractions or the anchorage museum full of exhibits among other museums and other things!! i used to think i could handle the arctic cold when i was younger, so this will put that to the test :P
seattle 
this city’s on my mind at times since some of the people i see on my tl are from here. but there’s more to it than just that obviously! for one, sports are a huge reason why i wanna go here to watch mighty teams like the sounders as well the kraken and mariners whose stadiums are beautiful but aren’t as good… then there’s also a big transit system and seattle is pretty bike friendly so i wanna try those things out too!! and of course i wanna go to the mopop and to the huge arboretum in washington park and japanese garden right next to it as well as the space needle. i think it’d be cool to meet up with a couple of mutuals someday, so maybe i can do that by the time i travel here!
new york city 
an absolute no brainer… i’d love to just walk around all night and try to go to as many places as possible lol :P there’s an unimaginable amount of things to do here, and i think i’d wanna get a healthy selection of things like watching the knicks and both the mets and yankees, walking through central park, going to a bunch of museums like the met, and using the subway and grand central terminal. and of course i can’t forget the ny style pizza either!! there’s so much diversity here too that’s shown uniquely in each neighborhood, and i’d love to go to places like chinatown, little italy, and the bronx to see what they have in store.
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u.s. ▲ north america s.a. ▼
banff 
a friend told me about banff cause of a trip he went on and when i looked it up i just knew i have to go here. the town’s center is built in this “prairie and craftsman” style of architecture, which makes it look sorta like a wonderland to me… they celebrate festivals such as the snowdays festival with snow sculptures across the urban area and loads of tricks done for skijoring. outside of the main town, there are tons of natural things to do like get to the top of sulphur mountain via the gondola, hike through the jonhston canyon, and variety of other things which add to the city’s wonder. it all feels like a winter lover’s dream come true and then much more!!
winnipeg 
one of my internet friends is from manitoba and i guess that’s how i first learned about this city. i honestly wanna visit the less populated cities of canada first and this is one, although there are still lots of people here… watching a jets game is my top priority, but that’s not the only thing in winnipeg, silly!! for example, the forks historic site has been the home of everything from settlements to trading hubs for six millenia, and close to it is the forks market. adjacent to the forks and throughout the city, there are also tons of museums, ski and hiking trails, a spa village, and their very own botanical garden too; you name it, there’s a big chance winnipeg has it!
vancouver 
you can say this for a lot of places you never learned about until some point in your life, but i think i did underestimate vancouver and the cool places it has to offer… there’s a lot of sports stuff here, although it is mostly minor league other than the canucks. another cool part of the city is the extremely popular granville island, which is like its own world full of places including the public market with a diverse selection of stuff always on rotation. the multi-layered central library is also just a crazy work of art, designed in the 90s with a garden to top it off. even thinking about all of the things here has me kinda giddy… i had no idea vancouver was this cool!!
toronto 
here’s another really popular city to visit someday! i remember seeing the cn tower on that total drama spinoff and the whole skyline looked really pretty; i’d love to be there in person. the city’s vibrant and diverse culture is shown so much throughout, some of the most popular places that show this are graffiti alley and the kensington market that’s a neighborhood as well. obviously the sports here are important to me, especially the gigantic skydome that has some amazing high level seats as well as scotiabank centre for the raptors. and there’s so many amazing things like the various museums and ripley’s aquarium and the festivals and different stores… toronto is full of things to see and do which is awesome!! and i’ll say here that i do wanna go to a timmy’s too…
iqaluit 
i’m gonna be honest and say that i wanna go to cities for really simple reasons sometimes. iqaluit is the capital and only city of the largest canadian territory, and as you can probably tell i just wanna explore some of the north! a lot of the things i wanna do when it comes to the city have to do with just sights, like the hiking trails on the outskirts or the calm river in the sylvia grinnell territorial park. the unikkaarvik visitor centre is a place filled with iqaluit things and then i’d really wanna eat the signature arctic char pizza at a cafe or go to the legislative assembly of nunavut to see the warm lighting. i doubt there’s much tourism here at all… but that just means more room for me!!
pachuca 
i’ve always wanted to travel to mexico, but i never knew which city i’d travel to first since there’s so many different options… but now i absolutely know. it started cause of pachuca fc who attracted me cause of their crazy playing style. the city is at a really high elevation and is apparently overlooked by many tourists. along with the usual things, there are rly unique museums like the figurine museum that looks like a castle and a footy one shaped like a football as well as this amusement park with a rubber duck theme… and there’s a lot of art as well, like the huge mural “las palmitas de pachuca” which is stellar. it's a beautiful, humble city and i have to go someday!!
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n.a. ▲ south america e.u. ▼
são paulo 
brazil is one of my favorite countries to learn about. i made a fictional restaurant with a menu of brazilian food for an english final a few years ago, and i’ve been learning and talking to a few ppl from there ever since!! from that project, i learned that coffee is huge in the country, and apparently here is one of the most coffee-crazy places. along with that, there’s a lot of other things to see like the huge popularity of football thru the stadiums and the museum about it here or the cathedrals and theatres that south america has made me look forward to for their beauty, and the metro too!! if i had to choose just one brazilian city to visit, it’d be this one!!
montevideo 
uruguay is a small country compared to its neighbors, but it packs a huge punch!! i first considered this city when i learned that it was pretty walkable. uruguay is really good at international football, but montevideo's role is crazy to me since it has one of the largest amounts of football teams in the world... people say it’s like a smaller buenos aires, and you can see this by walking thru parts like ciudad vieja and the rambla. along the rambla, there’s the castillo pittamiglio which displays world cup host memorabilia among many other museums, a beautiful theater called the teatre solís, and the city hosts the longest festival globally with celebrations of all kinds: carnival.
santiago 
a friend of mine went here for a trip last summer… it was such an amazing experience while we talked about photography together and taking a ton of pictures and it made me really wanna come here too! there were a bunch of memorable things that i saw like the art museums and the people playing music in the streets and the breathtaking views from the sky costanera. santiago is an overachiever, with it having the highest building in the continent and it having one of the largest metros as well. there’s also some great parks and other natural views to see to within and outside the city like cajón del maipo and i’d wanna make the andes part of my trip too :>
la paz 
bolivia is such an overlooked country... the release of los thuthanaka has me a bit more interested in it despite me not listening to it yet, but i looked into it some more for a project in my spanish class a bit ago and i realized just how unique of a city it is!! all of its staggering terrain, the vibrant traditions and markets, the mountain backdrop, and the cute extensive cable car system that runs throughout the city are all part of what makes it so appealing to me! i’d also love to take a bike tour along the yungas road, which even though it’s outside of the city limits it’d be amazing to try out.
potosí 
while i was playing around on wonders of street view one day in school, it took me to the train graveyard in uyuni but it was labeled as being part of potosí. even though the two aren’t close, after looking into the city there were some cool things i found!! i fell in love with a photo of the national mint that’s shown on the collage which shows part of the architectural style here, but then there’s a few footy teams like nacional and real potosí and some historical importance as parts of the city like the cerro rico and urban center are unesco heritage sites for their settler history. i don’t really know many smaller cities but this is one that’d probably inspire me to find more!!
quito 
at the beginning of the year, my spanish teacher had a bunch of pictures hung up from her trips to latam countries, and i think quito was one of them. surrounded by andean volcanoes and mountains and founded in a valley of incan ruins, apparently the whole city is a unesco cultural heritage site, which is great since it has such rich, preserved history U^ ^U there are lots of magnificent places of religious worship like the basílica del voto nacional and la compañía and also a huge botanical garden which features plenty of national species; a cool fact is that ecuador has one of the richest biodiversity collections globally. it’s a beautiful city and i wanna learn more about it!
buenos aires 
there’s a lot of exciting things about buenos aires to me. the local music scene here, for example – invisible is one of my favorite bands ever, and i’d love to see what this city is up to currently!! of course, you then have the vibrant football part of their culture… it’d be awesome to watch the superclásico, but a match at both stadiums would do. learning about the grandeur teatro colón was what makes me wanna go to theatres all over the world, and there’s an assortment of other things scattered throughout the city like diverse architecture and art as well as popular public transit and one of the most salient cemeteries in latam. yeah it’s filled with tourists, but it makes sense why!
lloró 
i have a few guinness world record books that were donated to my family and i found out about this town through one of them where i’m pretty sure it held the record for most annual precipitation (wettest place) in the world. it sits on the atrato and andágueda rivers and focuses on commercial agriculture and mining. i think its record is disputed hence why i haven’t been able to find any more info online about it, but i think that it’d still make for a cool trip since i wanna look at some rural places outside of the us too. there’s not really much information on the internet about lloró, so it would be cool to compile information about it or talk more about it someday.
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s.a. ▲ europe a.s. ▼
ljubljana 
my favorite city that i wanna visit!! i read a whole travelling book about slovenia and i think it’d b cool to look at the whole country one day, but this would be the place to start for me. its various styles of architecture like pleznik’s modernist touch are really interest, and i really wanna ride a bike through it all but probably not in the same day when i drink a bunch of wine… xP there’s also just so much to explore here within the city and around it from caves to bridges and historical houses to markets, and all of slovenia is great with sustainability, apparently being the first country as a whole named a “green destination”. there’s nowhere else i’d rather go than here :D
reykjavík 
another really green country, iceland has always been a sort of enigma to me… it’s close enough to mainland europe but far enough to keep its own natural isolation, and that’s part of why it’s so special!! there’s a huge prevalence of volcanoes as well as mountains throughout the country and it would be cool to observe one erupting; since there’s so many i think i could catch one on a trip someday. there’s also things to do like watching vikingur play or witness a performance at the national theatre. however, nature would be the focus of a trip to reykjavík; another option for this would be the árbær open air museum that shows the life of those who lived in the city in history.
oslo 
for a long time, i’ve been wanting to visit the nordic countries for a bunch of reasons like how snowy they are and their strides in making their cities more green and sustainable! oslo does this in many ways, like encouraging biking, having elaborate systems of public transit fueled by renewable energy, and having lots of urban forests and parks. of course there’s also the viking history which includes the viking ship museum featuring burials ships… and there’s lots of skiing stuff like the holmenkollen ski jump tower and both indoor and outdoor resorts :p as part of their medieval history, there’s other cool stuff about the time period like the akershus fortress, the medieval festival and the ruins like st. mary’s church.
tromsø 
yeah, a bit of why i wanna go here is because of the northernmost mcdonald’s… but upon learning more about this city i’ve found that there’s so much to see!! like i’m not really into nordic footy much, but i think their stadiums are beautiful in terms of natural atmosphere, and tromsø idrettslag plays here too although they aren’t very good :p the city as a whole is stunning too, of course with the availability of northern lights but also because of the gigantic hill in the background and the colorful and captivating architecture both of the living places and the attractions that make it feel sorta futuristic yet very lively at the same time.
stockholm 
continuing with the theme of viking history in nordic cities, stockholm is around the same place of the birka settlement which was a huge trading hub not just for scandinavia but throughout europe and asia. there’s plenty of places having to do with such history like the viking museum and runriket as well as other places like millesgården and its beautiful river view from an open air museum and garden with tons of art and statues, ferries to view the large stockholm archipelago, and different markets such as the antique styled östermalms saluhall filled with food. a ton of european cities have great metros which is why i haven’t mentioned them a lot, but stockholm’s is unique since each station is decorated in a variety of different styles and structures which is so cute!! U^ ^U
london 
you can probably guess that footy is a major reason why i wanna go here. there’s so many clubs here that i’d love to watch a game at, including the lower division clubs since i don’t just wanna stop at the prem. yea wembley isn’t in london, but it’s close enough so i included it here too! but in addition to that, it’s just such a dreamy city in the sense that it’s somewhere that’s so popular and filled with opportunity and creations… i really wanna drive an ebike through it all. there’s also the british library which i’d love to take a day to peruse their catalogue and the huge national history museum of course along with other places i’ll decide down the road!!
moscow 
moscow is the most populous capital in europe and with this comes an overwhelming amount of history and sights and things to do that show it!! the city has an abundance of museums not just here but all over the country, a lot of which were built during the soviet union. meshchyorsky park is also great not only for its beautiful wetlands and woodlands, but also for its own hidden footy field :p football is big here too; there are multiple competitive teams in the premier liga from here. aviapark is one of the largest malls in europe, there’s tons of outdoor skate rinks like gorky park, and there’s lots of great art and architecture such as the kremlin itself which you can go inside!!
utrecht 
i don’t watch not just bikes a lot, but i remember watching his video about the bike garage that operates here. it astonishes me how good infrastructure for bike are throughout europe in cities like utrecht and it made me happy to learn about it coming from such a bike-hostile country. but of course there’s lots of things here beyond the bikes that i had no idea about until now… like did you know the de haar castle is the largest castle in holland?? and this is miffy’s hometown too; they have a museum and intersection for her here!! there’s so many wonders throughout the world you don’t even realize exist in places you know…
barcelona 
here’s a silly story… while i was on the bus and started to leave from a field trip, i was taking pictures out the window of some suburbs and one of my irl mutuals saw me and told me about how sad cities in the us look compared to when he went to spain… and it made me a bit sad too, but he was right :p barcelona really is just a top tier city though. there’s endless culture, marvellous architecture, great football, beaches, this is one of those cities that truly has it all… like did you know there’s a whole park designed by a modernista artist that looks straight out of hansel and gretel?? i didn’t but that might just be cause i’m dumb U>_<U
piraeus 
when you think about greece, the first city you probably think about is athens. however, there’s one city in greece i wanna go to more, and it’s piraeus. i’m not rly a fan of olympiacos, but i like them a lot cause the first football merch i ever bought was an olympiacos jacket back when i first got into the sport, and then later on i realized they're good at basketball as well :p piraeus has lots of other sights too, like its historical harbour which is one of the busiest and largest in europe, a bunch of museums including one about olympiacos themselves, and the top of the kastella hill!! this city doesn’t even have their own airport, so i’d likely see athens first, but this would be next for sure.
rome 
there’s a lot of reasons to wanna go to italy. i’m sure you’ve heard a ton of about the more known ones in rome, like the historic coliseum, the tiny vatican city, and the stadio olimpico inhabited by multiple teams. and of course there’s a ton of cool lesser known stuff like this museum / shop called the profondo rosso themed after the movie of the same name or the various restaurants with authentic cave interiors and the ruins converted into a cat shelter as the torre argentina cat sanctuary. sometimes i wonder whether new york, chicago, or italian pizza is better… i’m not usually interested in restaurants, but of course there’s only one way to find out!!
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e.u. ▲ asia a.f. ▼
ulaanbaatar 
mongolia is a huge country sandwiched between two larger ones, mostly covered in vacant grassland :p situated in the north, ulaanbaatar is cold both in climate and in feel at times because of its mainly brutalist style of architecture influenced by surrounding countries. there’s a huge air pollution problem here largely because of the coal plants within the city itself. even though it may seem kinda dreary though, ulaanbaatar has a collection of fascinating things to see, like the tumen ekh ensemble who portray many parts of mongolian culture such as song and dance or the bogd khaan palace museum all about the pioneer for buddhism in the country.
krasnodar 
you could consider the following two russian cities on here to be sort of odd picks, but i have my reasons for them. cause russia is such a huge country, i think that watching a few clubs outside of moscow would be fun!! krasnodar has also mostly been a really competitive team, and i wonder what it’s like to be at a game for a sorta isolated league. also i don’t know how i haven’t talked about them yet, but i absolutely love malls, and this gargantuan one really piqued my interest and i just wanna walk through it all for a whole day :p i think amusement parks might also be really popular in russia, and there’s one here called sunny island on the other side of town that looks nice.
norilsk 
norilsk is the only siberian city on here, although i wouldn’t count out looking into more someday. it has this unique style of architecture (probably brutalist) with bright colors yet it still looks so dull… this place has been in my head for years ever since i stumbled upon it. it’s been called the most depressing city on earth and in order to get in i think i’d have to reserve a guided tour since apparently the mining here is strategically important. here, there’s things like the norilsk polar drama theater, the nord kamal mosque, the wooden cottage, and lots of other things. however i’m not sure where i’d go on a guided tour, so i’ll find that out when the time comes for that :p
kathmandu 
kathmandu lies within a deep valley surrounded by four mountains. i think this city is cool since it’s like a taste of the himalayas along with other spots like temples using nepali, mughal, and other architecture and their own culture demonstrated through festivals like maha shivatri and and holi, both of which are best celebrated in this city. there’s also some great museums here like the national museum and the narayanhiti palace museum, the latter of which was rebuilt and opened recently in 2008 following the 2006 revolution. i’m fond of the architecture that you find walking around the city, especially the places with temples but still throughout the more traditional buildings of the city; it’s all really pretty and i’d love to just walk around all day and see it all U^ ^U
thimphu 
do y’all remember the photo of the guy nuking a baseball in front of the great buddha statue?? that’s just a sliver of the hidden beauty of thimphu, the capital of a country that’s kept as a secret from the world. you can get an amazing view of the city from the platform, and then from there you can see a lot of the things that the city has to offer like the various temples and palaces such as punakha dzong and paro taktsang (this one is sorta far from thimphu but i’d still wanna visit ofcc!!), the rich local markets scattered around and the opportunity to go rafting in the thimphu chhu. i also just learned about cafe hopping and it sounds awesome to do here :>
kuwait city 
when it comes to the middle east, i’m not really sure of where i'd wanna go… a lot of the reason why this caught my eye though is cause of the souk sharq shopping center and this photo of it at night!! the city’s design is a mix of various styles like international style to middle eastern influences seen in the usage of geometry and tilework, with it also having this beautiful look that takes advantage of the space along the coastline. among the usual attractions like museums and malls, there’s also various mosques around the city, promenades like the marina crescent, theater buildings like the kuwait opera, and the crowning kuwait towers looking everything over together.
tbilisi 
this city is more than a millennium and a half old, thriving because of the political and economic benefits from eurasian trade and the silk road. tbilisi has a lot of things unique to it, like khikhvi, a local wine that’s colored orange, or the thermal baths which persuaded the city’s founder, king vakhtang gorgasal, to build a city here according to myth :p the city includes many things like beautiful ancient churches and cathedrals, the bridge of peace, their own cable car system, and dinamo tbilisi, their football club with a huge stadium!! you can see a plethora of both the old and modern architecture of the city, both united by the beautiful peace bridge within.
astana 
i have a couple of dumb stories about kazakhstan but i’ll basically just say that their basketball league was what reminded me of their existence and since then it’s actually looked like one of the most promising cities on my bucket list!! a lot of the country is steppe, and the city sorta pops out from the ground as this futuristic city designed by a japanese architect with so many buildings that masterfully flesh this idea out like the nur alem museum which is the largest spherical structure in the world, the several magnificent mosques, their own botanical garden with intricate patterns and vegetation from around the world, and of course stadiums like the saryarka velodrome!
beijing 
this is another city where i really wanna just stay up all night exploring the urban center… as you could probably guess, this city has soo many things to see from the annual china open to their various train stations equipped with high speed rail routes or a lot of the more cultural and natural things like the colorful temples with some sitting next to lakes and farther out places such as the longqing gorge and the great wall. it feels sorta like i’m just brushing over these things, and it’s a shame since there’s so many different things to see and experience here that goes beyond words!! and i know it’ll be really touristy too but i’d imagine it’d definitely be worth the trouble U^ ^U
lhasa 
lhasa is a really beautiful city. the first thing that catches my eye is the red mountain leading up to the potala palace, a quintessential structure to tibetan buddhism that was the home of the dalai lama until the tibetan uprising. in tibet, there are three sacred lakes, and trips to them are regarded as spiritual pilgrimages by followers. although they are far from lhasa i’d still really wanna go to them!! my fav would probably be lake namtso, which is the largest of the lakes. there are lots of other beautiful monasteries and temples throughout the city like jokhang temple, opportunities for trekking, and even a cool cave complex used as a retreat site called samye chimpu.
bukhara 
most cities i wanna visit right now are capitals or highly populated since i still ashamedly know very little geographically and about travel… bukhara is different though; it’s a hidden gem in the south of uzbekistan, preserved for millennia as a marvellous islamic city situated on the zeravshan river. it’s another city that grew because of the silk road and is filled with architectural masterworks like the many places of religious worship, the ark of bukhara, a fortress that fell in the bukharan revolution, and the mir-i-arab madrasa which is part of the larger religious complex poi kalan. it’s a very alluring city that gives you so much breathing room while you’re exploring, it’s amazing!!
tokyo 
in tokyo, as you might expect, there are nearly an endless amount of things to do. i think i’d have to make sure to save a lot of money for this trip since i’d buy so many things like exclusive cds and cool gadgets and merch and stuff like that lol xP out of all the museums here, my fav would probably be the studio ghibli museum on the west side of tokyo metro, and then i’d love to go to the religious structures and other natural spots like the scarlet senso-ji temple or the various mountains around tokyo… i wanna see miku perform live really badly and there’s also lots of sports stuff including a horse racecourse. horse racing is in my blood so of course i wanna go there! i used to fantasize about living in japan and although i don’t wanna anymore it’d be a dream come true!!
pyongyang 
north korea has been on my mind a lot in life since it’s such a hot topic for people, whether they are talking about politics or other things. the way it’s so isolated from everyone else is so interesting to me, and the fact that you have to go on a guided tour for trips there at any time makes me wonder what i would see… plenty of my interest is just seeing how daily life is in the capital, and the grandeur attractions as well as the quirky, eye-catching designs of other buildings for national pride is something that i really wanna see since the scale of everything just looks so astonishing, even with the calmer attractions like the recently developed mirae scientist street!!
seoul 
the popularity of convenience stores in seoul is something i really like since they are really cute and the whole city feeling, being able to look outside and eat and drink a little meal or something at whatever time you want is something i dream of!! i’d probably wanna go here on the same trip i go to north korea… after convenience stores, i think i’d wanna go look at places like lotte world, this huge fairytale-like complex featuring both an indoor theme park and outdoor amusement park, and then the dongdaemun design plaza which has a stellar futuristic style full of crazy shapes and features. i’d probably wanna look at rly popular things since the city’s style encourages me to wanna do that most… something else that’d be really cool is to go to a concert too!!
ashgabat 
people call this place “the city of the dead”; honestly, it fits it well, but it compels me a lot to wanna see what it’s like too!! ashgabat has a plethora of giant, magnificent structures that fit an authoritarian country made of white marble which earn the city the name “white marble city”. there are lots of these, like the wedding palace which has this crazy cube-like structure on top symbolizing the earth. something very interesting that’s unique to here is the turkmen carpet museum full of not only carpets but chuvals, khurjuns, and more items with signature elaborate patterns. i think i’d really admire the loneliness here, so it would be great to see someday…
melbourne 
even though a lot of australia is really hot and i can’t stand the heat, i can’t miss out on going here!! when i watched the nrl last summer, the guy who streamed it on twitch was a storm fan. they’re really good and it’d be cool to watch them play at the aami park his honor :p melbourne also has australia’s largest collection of vegetation in its royal botanical garden, and this might be silly, but i’d also love to go around the city and visit every unimelb library since they all look really pretty!! i think the country as a whole would be a great place to travel to since it’s coldest in the summer and i’d hopefully have ample time to plan a trip to melbourne and other cities as well.
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a.s. ▲ africa games ▼
casablanca 
northern africa has some really cool cities that would be amazing trips someday!! founded and used as a port throughout history, apparently many skip casa because of its focus on being an economic hub unlike marrakesh or fez which are more beautiful… but as an article i read pointed out, that’s the appeal – to see normal life firsthand. i wanna go to places like the morocco mall, the largest mall in africa, or the medina within the city, which despite comparison is still very pretty with its assortment of shops, bakeries, and all other sorts of places to visit and enjoy. a museum i really like is the abderrahman slaoui museum, which shows the businessman’s entire art collection.
cairo 
the historic parts of cities usually are located deep within (like casa’s medina) and are small, but cairo’s is the opposite. it covers so many important places like the cairo citadel, the al-azhar mosque, madrasas, the ruins of al-fustat, and others, all stunning artifacts of the egyptian people and their history. the rest of cairo also has really beautiful stops like the breathtaking cave church, beautiful bazaars like khan-al khalili, and palaces and museums such as the prince muhammad ali palace. this would be something cool to do across all african countries but i’d really wanna watch football teams and the cairo rivalry if i can!! and i wanna see the pyramids and sphinx too in giza…
addis ababa 
addis ababa is a really important city for africa. it’s considered a major african capital because of its importance when it comes to diplomatic relations by being a spot with headquarters for many organizations like for the uneca and the african union. along with that, it has all kinds of really cool local culture scenes. i loved learning about fendika cultural center because it looks so welcoming and embracing of just enjoying the music in a small room filled with nice decorations!! from the top of mt. entoto, you can get an amazing sight of the whole city, and there’s plenty of other things to do like see churches like the massive holy trinity cathedral as well as the ethnographic museum.
kigali 
in rwanda, there’s the history of the rwandan genocide, which has seen the country and its people move forward as they find solidarity to bounce back from it. and from that growth, kigali has become one of the best cities in africa not just for biking or greenery but in general!! the city is surrounded by many mountains and hills like mt. kigali which gives lots of opportunity for hiking. throughout there are lots of markets, cafes, and art centers to highlight the city’s diversity all over africa. and most importantly, there are lots of memorials and museums around that show the history of the rwandan genocide. i was really excited when i found this city because it looks so beautiful, and it’s amazing that it developed against the odds of such a horrific time in history.
brazzaville 
i thought it was really cute that the capital of both congos were across the river from each other!! my favorite out of the two though probably would be brazzaville. music has been an integral part of culture for both drc and roc and brazzaville is a unesco city of music, with them also hosting the pan-american music festival every two years. some of my favorite places here include the busy poto-poto market, the several places of religious worship like basilique sainte anne du congo, and some cool architecture things like 15 august 1960 bridge. i couldn’t rly find as much online for some places like the musée galerie du bassin du congo, so it’d be really cool to go to them too.
antananarivo 
i love the madagascar movies but i don’t think they ever went here in them :p here you’re greeted by an endearing city built on a hilly landscape with various types of architecture like the historic kotona style or more european-influenced buildings due to colonialism. there’s so many great sights to see like the royal castle of ambohimanga, sat at the top of a beautiful hill where a fortified settlement of the merina kingdom used to be. i was really excited to see that there was a museum of photography here with a cute cafe beside it!! and ofc you can’t forget lemurs; there’s lots of parks with animals here including lemur park, which is not just a zoo but a whole botanical garden.
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cities ▲ things...
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a.f. ▲ sports games to watch trains ▼
derby of eternal enemies
if there was any rivalry in the world that i’d want to watch most, this would be it. with panathinaikos housed in athens and olympiacos in piraeus, originally they became rivals because of differences in social classes and intensified because the latter believed they were victims of political injustice. in football, olympiacos is the more accomplished of the two, while pao is more so in basketball. i really like their ultras since their colors contrast each other and when they do the colored flares especially, it makes for an insane atmosphere!! i’d probably wanna watch the football match in person the most; watching the basketball match would be great too but i’m not sure i could get it done in one trip… i’d sure try tho!!
intercontinental derby 
this derby has one of the coolest locations ever for both teams, since as the name implies… they are separated by continents in the same city!! this is another match that i’d wanna watch more of since really, i feel the outside atmosphere is better and the ultras get to put on a crazy show. both clubs were founded with different backgrounds as galatasaray represented the high class while fenerbahçe represented the working class and it intensified over time as football became more important in türkiye. of course they are both really accomplished nationally, with galatasaray leading in football and basketball. istanbul isn’t on the bucket list yet but it might someday…
serbia's eternal derby 
i’ve seen some ppl say that basketball is so much better in europe, and although i’m not sure if this is the example that pops into most minds, when i watched a replay of this match around christmas last year, it convinced me that i have to watch this irl. the matches are always so close and you can tell that both teams are ultra focused to make sure they come out on top, it’s insane!! they are always neck and neck with each other, with them having almost the same number of trophies each too. i had found interest in this rivalry cause of how good their logo and basketball jersey looked, and since then i looked into them and it’s become one of my favorite rivalries in sports U^ ^U
a world cup match 
back in 2022, this was the sole thing that got me into football, and i’ll forever be grateful for it!! although they are hosting the world cup here in the us next year, i’m not really sure if i’ll be able to watch it here; honestly though it’d make for a really cool piece for a trip anywhere. people from all over the world come to dee these games, which make for an amazing experience and the football is superb as well as a lot of international football is. there’s so many storylines to follow, lots of huge stadiums to choose from and watch, and the competition is the most prestigious in football and the world. i feel like wanting to watch this competition is just a given for any football fan rly! :p
governor's cup 
this one is super local to me and hence really important. this is also the entry i could probably check off the quickest on this list… i definitely haven’t been a sports fan my whole life, but over the past year and especially as i’ve been slowly getting more interested in college stuff, this matchup has been on my radar. i don’t even have to check to say that louisville is overall better at american football, but even then whoever’s gonna take home the cup each match is always up in the air. although the atmosphere is nowhere near that overseas, the game itself is amazing and depending on the game maybe it even compensates for it? i wouldn’t mind either way!!
the game
this is another college football entry and it’s one of the most intense rivalries in the country. apparently one reason the rivalry began was from the decades long tension after the toledo war, a land dispute between michigan and ohio that turned hostile and nearly turned into a full on armed conflict. they both are super competitive and powerful teams, with them being among the teams with most natties. both stadiums are also among the largest stadiums not just in football but in the world, both having more than 100k capacity each!! i feel like american football is soo much better when it’s in person than on tv, and i really wanna watch crazy games like this someday!
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games ▲ train stuff activities ▼
the chunnel 
there’s a lot of really great innovations having to do with trains in europe, but i think one of the best engineering feats is the channel tunnel. apparently, along with passenger trains, you can travel through the tunnel in a train that transport cars called leshuttle as well, which is really cool! i saw some old pictures of construction and boring the tunnel while looking for pictures of train stations and i think it further puts into perspective just how monumental this was for travel in europe as a whole. crazy thing is that it only takes over half an hour… it’s probably the shortest train route that i really wanna go on but its importance is its best part for me!
acela express 
a few years ago, i started to gradually get into urbanism and trains; i chose the topic of hsr in the us for a research essay, and while i was researching i learned about the acela express which has almost all of the hsr in the us. obviously i’d love to use this in between trips to cities in the region but i wouldn't rule out taking the whole journey from dc to boston someday :p later this year, the acela trainset will be replaced by the avelia liberty, which optimizes speed on curved rail and fits more ppl inside… both of them are pretty cute! i’m happy it exists and even though not all of the route is high speed, it’s a good step towards making travel in the northeast better for everyone.
churchill to winnipeg
i learned about this route from randomly stumbling across an ap article about it. it talked about how the train route was the only way those who lived in churchill were able to get out of the city, and how it shows both scenery of the pristine forests and lakes of countryside manitoba while also serving that necessity. i really like the prospect of going on multi-day train rides cause even though you’re in a little room of sorts, you get to see so much of nature personally that you don’t see, especially when it comes to rural land. and the train’s unique shape encourages that too, with it having windows in this sort of semicircle shape, allowing you to see all of what’s around you!!
coast starlight 
amtrak has a ton of these vacation things that include itineraries and routes to specific destinations and stuff. i like a lot of them like the tons of getaways they have and they offer so many different routes but i think my favorite would have to be the coast starlight. the vacation itself isn’t just the train route from seattle to la since it also has its own itinerary for both cities and accommodations and stuff, but it stands out to me a lot since it’s an overnight thing and travelling on the coast in a train with a great view at night just feels so dreamy… i’d have to stay up but i wouldn’t mind it at all!!
trans-siberian railway
this is super extreme and something that i probably won’t do for a while... it reminds me of those other crazy records like driving on really long car highways and stuff. it’s the longest railway line in the world, with it taking eight days and over nine thousand kilometers to get from moscow to vladivostok. apparently there’s construction going on to extend the railway into bordering countries and talks that propose construction all the way to tokyo too. thankfully this is a pretty accessible train route and you have the choice to pause at each of the stops along the way or just go non-stop; i’m not sure which one i’d do yet but either way it’ll be an amazing experience for sure!!
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trains ▲ accomplishments and activities
fully bike through a country
being able to get a firsthand view of the beauties of everything a country offers feels like such an amazing experience to me!! originally this goal was just for europe cause i thought it had the best infrastructure, but i realized you could probably do this in any country as long as you wanna take on the challenge. i was inspired by the netherlands cause of their long distance bicycle paths and roads on highways, however i’d probably have to start smaller since every attempt would be a crazy journey… i’m super enthusiastic about it though since it’d be like driving on the highway where you move from rural to urban settings but you can truly admire what’s around you at your own pace!!
a marathon!
even if i don’t do it a lot, i like running as a casual activity :> it’s just natural for me to wanna go fast, and i think marathons are the peak of this activity or sport. i think i do have the potential and really i’d love to just practice especially by jogging through parks and trails while listening to lots of music; anyone can, rly, it’s just a matter of determination!! and then the whole experience of the marathon itself is the culmination of your efforts in one of the most intense ways possible… they are held all around the world so you get so many different settings from more usual ones like new york city to crazier ones like the great wall of china which i didn’t even know existed.
new york to la, somehow
there was this video i watched a while ago about this guy who went on a journey from new york to la just on greyhound busses… it was an amazing video and it connected with me in a lot of ways. i still think about it sometimes as a sort of challenge that i have to go on someday. people use this route when it comes to comparison of speed of transportation or casual travel, but not a lot of people try or even want to make it a challenge of resilience. what i’m talking is just ways to experience the width of the us at length through ways like the aforementioned greyhound buses, cars, or even hitch-hiking across it :p since the us is so diverse and has so many different places, i think this would be an awesome trip however it’s planned U^ ^U
skiing
i’ve been wanting to do this way more after learning about slovenia earlier this year, but really this has been in my mind forever now. even though i honestly just want the experience of a ski resort more than doing more intense things like sports, i remember watching the 2018 winter olympics and i loved the events like bobsledding and ski jumping and i think it’d be really fun to do tricks like the latter since the snow cushions the landing but i’d still have to be careful :p the routes of ski trails just look really fun to go down at every difficulty and learning the maneuvering seems like fun too!! it’s been sort of a silly fantasy but someday doing this would be awesome.
visit every county in the us
i think i was first exposed to this idea by a person on twitter who some of my old mutuals know about. it seemed like a ludicrous idea at first, since the us has so many counties – kentucky has 120 counties alone!! – but as it stuck in my head it became clearer the appeal of making it a long term goal in my life. this is another quest in exploring the country’s diversity in places, but this time it’s turned to the max!! there’s so much available that so many probably miss in their lives cause it’s deemed insignificant or whatever, but the bottom line is every place has its own story to tell and it would be cool to try to find all of their stories someday.
go to every milb stadium
out of all of the major league sports that i’ve gotten into, i think baseball has to be my favorite hands down. the experience is so simple yet really enchanting and fun, and there's so many games and so much action every day… and of course, it’s even better in person. i learned that my city had a minor league team and realized how amazing the hometown feeling was while watching the game, which made me think about going to every stadium for a bunch of reasons like the really good ticket prices and how they are spread out throughout the country. i’m even keeping a spreadsheet for it and it’d be a great piece to add for any road trips and county hunting i wanna do someday!!
climb a mountain
when i was younger, i wanted to climb mt. everest… even though that wouldn’t be on top of the order on my mountain climbing list, the activity in general seems like an amazing way to go on a unique kind of adventure. a lot of the states or countries that i wanna go to have tons of mountains to climb, like the julian alps in slovenia or somewhere in appalachia or the himalayas in nepal and bhutan, although i’d probably wanna stick to beginner stuff since i don’t wanna put myself in too much danger starting out :p this is another one that would be an awesome part of a trip too, and i’d definitely have to get some training for it but the journey would be amazing!!
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i'm not really sure what to put down here right now... but i think in the future once i do get to go to some of these places i'd be cool to put little progress update things or link to another page on my website where i write about the places i go or something. one thing i know that i really wanna do is replace the pictures in each collage with my own photos that i take and probably rewrite stuff too. some of them might be similar but i'd make sure they're like my absolute fav parts of my trips!! thank u for stopping by U^ ^U
work in progress, last updated ⁂ 12 jun @ 02h ⁂ for picture inquiries/removal email mimibucket23@gmail.com ⁂ back to top
