Forget Lonely Planet or The Guardian Travel, celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain’s travel site Explore Parts Unknown is the one to read.
The site is inspired by CNN travel show Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown where it explores Bourdain’s journey and people he encountered.
It gives in-depth stories of places he visited, food he tasted and people he talked to.
As for us at KajoMag, here are our reasons why we love Explore Parts Unknown:
1. First of all, it has recipes!
What is travelling without enjoying the local food? One of the saddest parts for some of us coming home is that we start craving the food we relished while we were travelling.
The website offers not only the local recipes from these exotic countries but adds some background story too.
For example, did you know that green seasoning – a mixture of fresh herbs – is unique to the Caribbean and it tastes slightly different from island to island?
Or how about trying your hand at making a Zanzibari dish called Wali Na Mchuzi Wa Mbogamboga? With Explore Parts Unknown, you can travel to another country for one evening without leaving the house.
2. It tells you what you can do in one day in a foreign town!
If you are too lazy to plan out your travel itinerary, Explore Parts Unknown has you covered for a day.
So far, it has the perfect itinerary for a day in Mexico City, Budapest, Stone Town, Tbilisi, San Francisco, Puglia, Seattle, Colombo, Pittsburgh, Lagos, Chamonix, Singapore, Tehran, Okinawa, Marseille, Nashville, Beirut, Port Antonio, Oxford, The Bronx, Kuching, Honolulu, Chiang Mai, Cologne, Porto, Port of Spain, Muscat, Lemaire Channel, Queens, Bilbao and many more.
From your typical tourist destinations to unconventional cities to visit, the website covers almost everything.
3. And more food guides and travel tips
Food guides are essential for foodies during travelling and this website has tonnes of it.
They tell you what to eat in every state in Mexico. (Just in case you didn’t know, there are 31 states in that country. Imagine the variety!)
No idea what to eat in Tanzania or Hungary? No worries! They have you covered.
For music lovers out there, they’ll guide you on where to find Seattle’s best music.
4. There are some history lessons too!
History is edible when dishes can tell more stories about the past.
Learn more about Sri Lankan history through lamprais, a dish of savoury rice and mixed meat baked in a banana leaf, or how Taco Rice became a signature dish of Okinawa.
For those of us who like reading about home in international circles, you can also read how midin, paku, dabai and engkala make up the riches of the jungle in Borneo.
Much like Bourdain himself, the website gives a fresh angle to stories that you wish you had learnt in school about countries like Puerto Rico, South Africa, and Nigeria.
5. Enlightening and intriguing stories of places and people from parts unknown
Who -or what – are the spiderwomen of Puglia? What would you need to know before you go to Tbilisi? How did Morrisania, a part of the Bronx become the birthplace of hip hop?
Every destination has its own story to tell, it is only up to us to look for it. Often, visiting new places always turn us into storytellers when we return home.
And here at this website, we find stories that we never had the chance to hear.
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