...and it was Christmas Eve

Bi Ali, Yemen

In this week's Camino a Ítaca a Christmas adventure on the southern edge of the Arabian Peninsula from several years back. Click over to read the original published in Spanish in el HOY or read the English translation below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

Behind us, a blanket of blinding white sand drifted two thirds the way up black volcanic mountains. The finger-like peaks rose up like a photographic negative taken of the Alps, that is until you looked closer and saw that palm trees rather than pines fringed the bottom of the scene. In the opposite direction the turquoise waters of a halfmoon bay ran out into the calm, deeper blue of the Arabian Sea. A calmness that was only disturbed by pods of dolphins that swam in and out of the natural harbor in search of tuna.

I unzipped my tent, shook out the sand and looked up at the craggy mound of black rock bordering the bay. Nestled up in the jagged rock was where, according to local lore, fed by a scarcity of pre-Islamic inscriptions, the ruins of the mythical frankincense and myrrh market of Cana were supposed to lie. Legend has it that one of the Three Wise Men set off towards Bethlehem, laden with local produce from these southern Yemeni mountains. It was already stifling hot and it was Christmas Eve.  

Further up the beach our mandatory security detail was also up. The young soldiers with feathery moustaches and patched up AK-47s squatted around a portable camp stove and were making qishr, a hot drink made from coffee bean husks, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom and generous amounts of sugar. Breakfast on the sand was fresh guava and flatbreads served with the thick black honey that local bees extract from the areas frankincense trees.

In between sips of the tea-like drink our driver Abdulilah advised, “It’s a six-hour drive to Aden from here, and that is if there aren’t too many sand dunes crossing the highway. If you want to get a last snorkel in, now’s the time to do it. We don’t want to be on that stretch of road after dark.”

As we sped down the mirage laden highway, adobe villages with whitewashed windows and tired looking date palms emerged from the sands. Live nativity scenes rolled past my window. Singing boys riding haggard donkeys up parched riverbeds happily waved as we passed. Less congenial women covered entirely in black were working the fields. They wore enormous conical straw hats perched atop their hijabs to beat back the unforgiving sun. When I asked Abdulilah to stop to take a picture I was met with a hail of stones that clearly demonstrated I should have asked first.

We pulled into Aden, a city some equate with the biblical Eden, just as the evening call to prayer echoed around the volcano crater that makes up the old city.

It was my task to find us something for dinner through the crowded streets completely devoid of any hint of flashing lights, Santa Clauses or snowmen. For our yuletide meal back in our hotel room I scrounged up a gaunt roast chicken, some flatbread and honey covered pastries to go along with the six beat up cans of Heineken we had found in one of the shadier markets.

Under the whirling blades of a rickety ceiling fan we looked back on the day’s events and enjoyed our meal. No lights, no carols and no sales, just the company of close loved ones was all that was needed for this festive evening.

Remember Yellow Fever?

This week's Camino a Ítaca looks back to when I first started traveling. Remember those Yellow Fever passorts they used to give out? I imagine they still do? Looking back and looking forward. You can click over and read the original article in Spanish en el Hoy, or read the English version below. (PDF en castellano abajo)

If memory serves me correct, it was a little yellow booklet. Similar in size to those that banks used to give out when you opened an account with them. I used to carry it in the same ‘secret’ place with my passport when I travelled, which now that I think about it really wasn’t so secret at all. The first time I got one, I was so excited. Each little stamp that I got meant that I was one step closer to experiencing places I had only dreamt about. Each needle I had to endure meant that I was about to get on a plane to somewhere seriously ‘exotic’.

I think the first one that I got was for Yellow Fever. Then I remember there was one for Hepatitis A and another for Hepatitis B, but there was also talk about one that was going to be released that combined them both and maybe even added Hepatitis C. I think there was one for typhoid and I may have even got one for Japanese encephalitis. For me, I couldn’t have cared less. I’d go to the infectious disease specialist, we would look at a wonderful world map and I would tell her where I was going. She would then tell me what I needed and if there was a chance of malaria, dengue and diseases like this that weren’t covered by vaccines. That was it, end of story.

I think that the only time that I had a healthcare professional tell me that it was up to me to decide was when there was an experimental cholera pill that had come out, but as I wasn’t planning on visiting an area that had experienced a recent outbreak, it wasn’t necessary and she said it was up to me if I wanted to spend the money on it. It would have never occurred to me to ask which pharmaceutical company produced the vaccine. I simply knew that I was used to the sunburnt red color that I always turn in tropical countries and that I wasn’t particularly anxious to turn yellow with some terrible fever and got the needle, case closed.

This was long before the advent of Facebook and the millions of homegrown specialists that now spread their idiocy across the world at the click of a button. Illuminati that have emerged from their parents’ basements, convinced that Bill Gates was somehow going to implant them with a tracking device that was more powerful than the one they text on and carry in their pockets everywhere they go.

Of course people who are vaccinated are going to catch the virus, some may even get sick and a few may even die. This is what statistically happens when you are talking about vaccinating an entire planet. These aren’t the numbers that your cousin found on a blog and insists are true, these are empirical facts. Vaccinated people suffer a lot less from the illness, period.

I’m desperate to get on a plane again, to feel that sensation and excitement I have always felt when traveling to somewhere new. If it means one, two or even three shots, bring it on.

Christmas Tales

Bir Ali, Yemen

Different places, different times, different Christmases. This week's Camino a Ítaca goes back to the beaches along the coast of Yemen in search of the Three Wisest of Men. Click over to the original piece in Spanish or read the English version below. Tambien se puede ver el original en castellano abajo en PDF.

Fingers of white sand scratched up the black, volcanic mountains flanking the half-moon bay. The sharp contrast gave the impression of an inverted black and white photograph of snow-capped mountains. Dun desert scrub extended beyond the lifeless bastions of rock and framed the image, making it seem even more like an old print from time gone by. Down below on the beach, a pair of unaccompanied camels plodded along the shore as the turquoise waters of the Gulf of Aden rolled out towards Somalia and the horn of Africa 300kms away across the strait.  

It was Christmas Eve and we were camping outside the tiny fishing village of Bir Ali on the near virgin coast of Yemen in hopes that the wild dolphins that frequent the bay would make an appearance while we were snorkeling.  

It was a reverse pilgrimage of sorts, the inverse of the scene that you see in so many homes at this time of year. This is because, according to local lore, one of history’s great enigmas began here. Those one-hit-wonder pop stars of classical antiquity that get only a brief, obscure mention in one of the gospels, yet whose image can be seen trotting towards miniature mangers all over the world. It was from this corner of Arabia Felix, that one of the Three Wise Men began his journey.  

It’s a claim that becomes all the more plausible if you consider the fact that this is one of the few places in the world that produces two of their three gifts, frankincense and myrrh. Rather than coming to us though, we had come to them. With what, I wasn’t so sure. 

In between swims I decided to climb up the craggy stones and see for myself just what was left of this biblical port that used to serve three different continents. Just a few years before, amphorae dating back to the first century that had sunk with one of the trade ships that ran from here to Africa, India and beyond had been found out on the reef. The draw of the story kept me going. 

Archaeology though, even on such an amateur level, is never easy and even more difficult in a country so beset with inner conflict, war and strife. Unless we found some more amphorae, goods like wine were impossible to find and the few cans of warm Heineken that we had managed to find on the black market looked like they had fallen off of the back of a truck, both literally and metaphorically. Bir Ali’s days as a major centre of trade between continents were long behind it. 

I finally reached the top and found nothing. Unless it was buried away under the sand, any real trace of what once was had disappeared. Their trail, and story, ended here. 

Years later I would find myself once again face to face with the kings, or at least their remains, this time in Cologne, Germany. Though their tale began in Yemen, it wasn’t until much later that they were ‘rediscovered’ in Europe in the fourteenth century and then go on to become central to so many Christmas carols, mantels and children’s wish lists. 

It was then, amidst the heaving Christmas crowds jostling to get a glimpse of the ornate golden coffer of bones, that the epiphany came to me. It’s not the facts that necessarily matter. It’s not necessarily even what actually happened. It’s the story and the power they have to keep us dreaming and rolling on. 

Fear and Loathing in Siberia

Platskart...open wagon travel.

COVID has created our own Siberias. My next installement on the Camino de Ítaca travels from Vladivostok all the way to Extremadura. Click over to the original Spanish version or the English one below.

We were somewhere around Chita on the blurry edges of Mongolia and China when the vodka really started flowing. I remember, in a vain attempt to make communication, passing around our well-thumbed pocket atlas to the people who continued to fill my glass because at that point the only Russian I knew was how to form a negative, and these people weren’t taking no for an answer. These were professionals.

We had left Vladivostok several days before and had only just crept around the outstretched elbow of China and dropped into the vastness of central Siberia when our fellow cellmates in our dormitory platskart train car decided that even if we couldn’t speak any Russian, we could propose elaborate toasts. Bundles were unwrapped and bread, pickles, herring and russian meat patties were set out to accompany the bottomless bottles of vodka that fuelled our conversations that went nowhere.

With the summer sun skirting the horizon in front of us, the train rolled into one of the endless Cyrillic names that marked the stations along our route in my atlas and I remember saying something like ‘maybe I should sit this round out.’ Suddenly there was a terrible roar all around us and the air became choked with a deafening buzzing sound. A black mass poured into the open windows and breathing became difficult.

By this point, I had been on the move for more than fifteen years, constantly traveling for my entire adult life, either because of music, teaching or writing. Now, I was faced with two less than desirable possibilities. Either I was about to die of blood loss from ravenous Artic mosquitos that seemed to coat every surface or blood poisoning from the next bottle of dodgy looking vodka with a matador on the label that had aluminium foil for a lid.

The epiphany came as vendors competed with the mosquitos for space through the windows. It was time to set up a base, a home and stop moving for awhile. It was time to come ‘home’. It was time to, if not stop, slow down.

After crossing the entire landmass of Asia and Europe, I found my Almohad refuge behind the millenarian walls of Caceres. Travel, however continued to beckon. A tour in the southern United States, a teaching position in Libya, a chance to write about Damascus or a family get together on the prairies of Canada, there always seemed to be a reason. I now had a base, but then something would call me away. 

That is until the coronavirus.

After months of being closed in behind my arabic wall, travel is once again possible. Borders are cautiously opening and airlines are desperate for our business. Look up and you can see the supposed chemtrails have returned to the sky. My doubt is whether to listen to the sirens’ call or let them sing.

A future without travel is inconceivable to me. After all, it’s precisely travel that has made me what I am. What can change though is the distance we move, the focus can shift closer to home. Now is time to travel deeper, now is the time travel on foot. Now is the time to discover those Siberias closer to home.   

Road Tripping in La Raya (Blurry Boundaries)

"Heading west again as you pass through Valencia de Alcántara, leaving the last remaining Spanish villages behind, a jagged dorsal fin rises out of the surrounding green patches that cluster around courses of water that feed into the river. Like some sort of prehistoric Border Wall, this granite fence signals that the border is near..."

10 Reasons to Get Up before Dawn

Through the jungle before sunrise with hopes of catching the falls in all their glory. Stories behind the Images. Click on the link in the description for the tale. #nonotfar . . . . . . . . #saltoangel #canaima #angelfall #angelfalls #worldstallest #worldshighest #unesco #worldheritagesite #canaimanationalpark #visitvenezuela #mistandclouds #clouds #analogphotography #gransabana #travelwriting #onceinalifetime

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Abr 2, 2018 at 12:19 PDT

Water poured out of the clouds down into a limpid pool surrounded by the nearly impenetrable jungle.

It wasn't raining.

Maybe it was somewhere up on the tepui but the clouds that clung to face of the table-top mountain were cottony white, yet still the water tumbled down.

"When can you see the top of the waterfall?" I asked as we swam under the curtain of water falling from nearly a kilometre above.

"It's normally clear just as the sun rises over the range in front but that doesn't last very long." And our guide was right, we had first caught sight of the waterfall as we traced the river along the rough path through the jungle but really had only seen glimpses of it all day between breaks in the clouds as they floated by.

Later that evening as we swung in our hammocks to the earthy sounds beyond the fire, I asked him if he could take me to the see the falls at dawn and he laughed, "Tomorrow's my day off and there's no way I'm getting up that early. If you want to go, just walk that way through the jungle until you get to the river. You'll see them from there."

"Is there a path?"

"Not really from here, but if you just keep going that way, you should get there in about 1/2 an hour."

"What time does the sun rise around here?"

"At about 6:00 I think." Early, even for the jungle.

I continued to swing in my hammock. If I really wanted to see the falls in all their glory, it meant that I would have to trudge for 30 minutes through dense Amazon rainforest with only a small Maglight to guide the way. On the trek leading up to the falls earlier that day we had seen that this was indeed the jungle, complete with snakes, monkeys and ants the size of small mice not to mention the rest of the insects that we keeping up the jungle soundtrack around us.

I turned to my brother who was in the next hammock and asked, "Are you up for it?"

"Well if you insist," he said, draining another of the tepid 20ml Polar beers, "why not?"

Setting my old-style battery powered alarm clock for 05.20, I tried to roll over to get some sleep only to be reminded that I was in a hammock. Catching naps while swinging between two trees can be lovely but if you're not used to sleeping on your back...well, suspended nights can be long.

I must have fallen asleep though because when the alarm went off I was shaken out of a beery sleep. The fire had long ago burnt itself out and darkness enveloped the corrugated tin shelter like a blanket, making it impossible to see where the open shelter ended and the jungle began. I awkwardly tumbled out of my cocoon and shook my brother only to be greeted by a slightly different pitch in his snoring. He was either deeply asleep or had reconsidered.

I was awake and alone but getting into that hammock was little more appealing than what lie beyond the shelter. So I grabbed a bottle of water and a leftover sandwich and started out in the direction the guide had indicated. My tiny Maglight pierced the black just far enough to see a thick curtain of vegetation in front of me and might just give me enough time to make out the colour of the anaconda as I bumped into it. While I don't think it had rained overnight, everywhere I touched was damp and the exposed roots that made for somewhat better footing were slippery footholds above the muddy jungle floor. I listened hard, trying to make out the sound of the river but the night jungle sounds were all that came back to me. With no light above, it was impossible to know if I was moving in a straight line or in circles. Every so often I would slip or have to make my way around the thickest bunches of trees or undergrowth and with no watch, it was impossible to know how long I had been walking.

Then I heard it, the reassuring rush of the river greeted me just before coming to a clearing on a bend the river carved out of the green. On my left a thin line of light broke above the forest's canopy and then a blueish blush started to silhouette the tall trees. To my right, there it was, a thin line of cloud lying across it halfway up, like a revealing bikini that only served to frame its undress.

I must have sat there for a few hours before I heard the rest of the group emerge from the jungle and come up behind me. As they approached I realized that it had clouded over and what had once been a bikini had now turned into a housecoat. "Sorry that you got up for nothing," they jeered but I just smiled.

"I guess the falls are just a little immodest and the show was just for me."

The Smoke that Thunders

Tokaleya Tonga: Mosi-oa-Tunya The Smoke that Thunders Watching the Zambezi fall Stories behind the images #nonotfar Link in description . . . . . . . . . #worldslargest #worldsbiggest #waterfall #waterfalls #smokethatthunders #thegroundshakes #zambezi #visitzimbabwe #zimtravel #zimbabwe #travelzimbabwe #africa #rainbow #mistrainbow #igerszimbabwe #igers_waterfalls #igers_rainbows #cataratas

Una publicación compartida por Troy Nahumko (@troynahumko) el Mar 30, 2018 at 3:02 PDT

It was a hangover of African proportions, the size and depth of the continent itself. Vague images of the night before included: urban elephants attacking faulty taxis, a woman who loved WWF wrestling, baboons, townships, dance-offs, Afrikaans and Africa itself.

Chibuku was a new word I'd rather forget.

The sun shone brightly as I awoke, mangled in a hammock.

The night before...

No coffee in the hostel...the instant had run out.

Man, is that sky bright...the deep blue above reaching out to the endless horizon, trudging into town. I couldn't remember the last time or even the last thing that I had eaten.

Out of sight but the Smoke that Thunders lets you know it's not far off.

Call centres and moped scooters making more noise than normal.

Zim style meat pies and nuclear orange soda pop.

Forget the coffee.

There's only one way out of this.

Kashan Bazaar, Iran

The only thing bizarre about Kashan's bazaar is that it isn't overflowing with tourists. The adobe beauty of this covered market screams out for travelers, but in reality ends up calling the locals to do their daily business. Cooling mudbrick domes filter in shaped beams of light, illuminating everything from carpet wool to dates. Laid-back Caravanserais lie hidden in the lanes and it's hard to pay for your own tea among the extremely friendly locals in the many teahouses that dot this relaxed place. After picking up your camel meat, ask one of the hospitable merchants if you can climb up to the roof and add another reason to your list of why strip malls should be banned.

#shopping #market #getaway #teahouse #local #wool #bazaar #offthebeatenpath #adobe #remote #silkroad #dates #tea #coveredmarket #localculture #carpets #carpet #caravanserai #coveredmarkets #camelmeat #generous

Originally Published on Trazzler

Hash Assassins in Alamut, Iran

The Crusaders might have had a more difficult time getting here and the bus is surely faster than Freya Starke's donkey, but the windy trip into the ancient realm of the mythical Hashshashin is still a modern day adventure. Deep in the Alborz mountains an 11th-century sect hounded the invading Crusaders with fierce warriors stoned out of their minds on hash who descended out of impregnable mountaintop fortresses. Their ferocity gave birth to the word ""assassin"and this valley was their home. Today's residents however are far more welcoming (and sober!) though the inaccessibility of the now ruined fortresses still holds true for all but the most intrepid hiker but the stunning views make the effort worthwhile.

#adventure #hiking #history #mountains #camping #views #getaway #castles #fortress #adventuretravel #remote #11thcentury #warriors #crusade #crusades #fortresses #freyastarke #assassin

Originally published in Trazzler

Imagined Distances

Writing in the local paper. Local issues with a global take. I never translate literally and the editor trims at will to make it fit. Here's my version, then theirs.

It happened while we were overlooking one of the world’s unofficial wonders, sitting under a desperately thirsty acacia tree, swatting away flies and scratching at fleas. A temple dedicated to one of the busiest men in the patronage business. Countries as disparate as the U.K and Georgia reclaim his favours while cities as far away as Rio and Moscow share the Cacereño hope that he will mediate with the powers that be on our behalf against plagues, dragons and the men in black. However this temple wasn’t the familiar one with whitish spires here in Caceres that lords above our squat 1960’s plaza named after this busy man, but one carved out of living rock in Lalibela, in the remote hinterlands of north western Ethiopia. A religious ceremony was going on 25 metres below in the cool of the hollowed out grotto when two people sat beside us under the extremely meagre shade and asked us in accented Spanish where we were from. I said Canada and my wife, Caceres. Our new neighbours told us that they were from Barcelona and had never been out to Caceres but had always heard that it was lovely but that it was so far away and difficult to get to that they had never been. The ceremony drew on as a satin robbed priest breezed along under colourful parasols totted by angel-like helpers dressed in billowy white while emaciated and envious cows began to nudge us out of their shade. I may not be a believer in saints but I am an admirer of tales and their power to persuade. I was once in Cyrene, Lybia, where some say ol’ George slayed a dragon, at a time before another tyrant was dragged out of a culvert and murdered and I have seen first hand legend’s power to convince. What we perhaps need here is to ask for a different kind of intercession, one that slays the black legend dragon regarding our remoteness and puts in a good word for us in yet another city that retains his favours. 

Treading Lightly in Laos

Travel, as far and wide as you can. But tread lightly.

Writing in Verge Travel.

Brave New Travel World

I usually get various reactions from editors when I send them submissions about traveling in Iran. They usually range from complete silence to cheeky replies regarding the sanity of those who travel in such places.

So it was with great surprise that I got an email the other day from Trazzler asking me to write about Iran, in an attempt to dispel some of the myths surrounding the place.

Click over here for the first installment about Persepolis.
Alexander the Great in Yadz
Sufi mysticism in Ardabil
Marivan's Kurdish Market
Hash Smoking assasins in Alamut
Silk Road Shopping in Kashan
Cool in Tehran?
Relaxing in Isfahan
The Birth of the Renaissance in Soltaniyeh
Rolling Green in Masouleh

You're Not Going There!?

Tell anyone that you're traveling to the Middle East, and in particular Yemen and you will invariably get a similar response to the title of this post. It's possible that you get a slight variant, like "You're nuts!" or the more tactful, "But, isn't it somewhat conflictive?" ranging to the brutal, "But they are terrorists!"

These accusations however couldn't be further from the truth and a little investigation into the matter shows things a lot differently from what they seem glancing at the 2 second sound bites fed to the internet world.

True, there have been kidnappings, the most recent ending in brutal and senseless murder, but let's remember that these things happen in many other places and things are not always as the headline seems. Reading past the byline reveals a new world.

Would you get a similar response if you were heading to Mexico? Just a few more kidnappings there wouldn't you say?

How about a trip to see the Pyramids? Surely the neighbours would be jealous? What about the atrocities in Luxor or the frequent bombs in Cairo?

A trip to Sunny Spain will have your office mates drooling, but what about ETA and then there were the train bombings?

Yet Yemen has an image problem...


One worsened by the customary Jambyia knife that juts from the belts of 97% of the men over 17...Worsened even further since the attacks of 9/11 and lazy journalism that never fails to mention that it is the 'ancestral home' of Osama Bin Laden, whatever that means?

The truth is that it is home to some of the kindest people in the world. People who cried with my Spanish wife when the news of the Madrid train bombings hit. People who will chase you down the street to return some money that you might have dropped as you walk along. People who will happily shout, "Welcome to my country!" as you walk along the streets. People who are as repulsed as you and I regarding acts of violence committed against civilians.

In fact, the only tourists that have been senselessly slaughtered in Yemen were a group of Spanish tourists who were deliberately targeted in a car bombing, carried out by foreign assailants.

But what about the kidnappings?

In the late 90's there was a rash of tourist kidnappings. Mainly in the desert areas where the central government's control is weakest. In order to bring the tribes under heel, the government has resorted to underhanded tactics, such as cutting off water supplies during drought periods. These tactics pushed the tribes to their last resort, the age old Bedouin tradition of kidnapping and negotiation. It is easy to reject such methods while the water flows freely from your tap, but a different matter when your children go thirsty.

A very small number of tourists have tragically been killed in these situations, but again they were not executed, but caught in the crossfire during botched rescue attempts by a government refusing to negotiate.

Once again, it's difficult, but nevertheless important to keep in perspective that these kidnappings were meant as a part of a negotiation process. The only way that powerless tribesmen thought they could influence the government.

The recent kidnappings that are front page news however are a different matter. These were not tourists, but people working at an Evangelical hospital located in an extremely conservative Muslim area.

Officials from the Foreign Ministry in Berlin believe that the Germans kidnapped in Yemen were abducted because of their missionary activities. Local Muslims had threatened one of the group and told him to stop proselytizing -- a warning the German ignored.

Whether or not the others were involved is still unclear, but the selfishness shown by those who belonged to a group whose mission statement is, "we see our mission mainly as the conversion of the peoples of the world who have not yet been reached," is unbelievable.

In their blind zealousness, these people put others at risk, that much is clear and excuses given for their charitable acts are immediately canceled out when it becomes clear that proselytizing rather than helping is their main goal.

It's easy to turn your back on a country and book your ticket elsewhere, but in doing so you play directly into the hands of the few extremists that are hoping for exactly that. By isolating a country, you only make their job of closing minds easier.

The 10 Best Places to Swim...?

I read a post the other day listing the 10 best places to swim around the world. Reading through them I realized that I hadn't been to even one of them!

Poor me, but then I thought, wait...I've swum in some lovely places.

Let's narrow them down to 3 in no particular order.

Ginnie Springs, High Springs, Northern Florida


If northern Florida wasn't interesting enough in its own time travel way, these springs are perfect. It's a surreal place to swim among the Spanish moss while the alligators patrol out in the warmer river that the springs flow into (the big toothy grins don't like the cooler water).

Bir Ali, Yemen


Yemen never makes it onto the glossy Caribbean style travel brochures, but the emerald green of the Arabian Sea is a mighty match for hurricane alley. Just outside the town of Bir Ali you can camp on a deserted white sandy beach that seems to extend all the way down to Aden. Behind you the sands of the beach meet and mingle with those of the desert on the volcanic mountains beyond, looking like snow in Arabia. In front of you dolphins come by in the mornings to chase the big schools of fish. Not enough? Rumour has it one of the 3 wise men called from these parts.

Salto Angel, Canaima National Park, Venezuala


Fancy a swim under the world's tallest waterfall. It's possible at certain times of year, or at least it was when I was there. Before making its way to the Rio Gauya, the water forms in pools in the middle of the jungle and if the volume of water isn't strong enough to flatten you, the swimming is divine.

Where's your favourite place to swim?