Traveling the World

I have never been to a non German speaking area while traveling with my parents.

This changed radically after I have been traveling on my own for a first visit to the UK in 1987. While short on budget in the first years,
I most often traveled through western Europe with my girl friend, my old VW Golf and a small tent.
Over time I traveled all along the north and west coast of Europe from Germany to the Spain.

From 1997 on, I started to travel the world. The first country outside of Europe has been Egypt, followed by many others places from Svalbard in the North to Patagonia in the South, from Fiji in the East to Cook Islands in the West. 

Over the years I have been to 124 countries and self governed territories*, have stayed in more than 300 different Hotels, have visited 200 Unesco World Heritage sites and so far 59 out of the Hillman Top 100 places.

*) Out of 251 listed in the ISO 3166-Alpha 3 spec. If you count only the todays 193 UN member states this are 99 out of them. If you count todays 195 recognized "countries" this are 101 out of them.