Who is pickingpins?
Nice to meet you! We are Chrissi & Flo, a couple from Austria and we are currently traveling around the world since December 2022. If you want to find out more about our picking pins map click here.
What countries did we already visit together?
We started our world travel in December 2022 and are still enjoying the backpacking life. So far this was our travel route (we started in New Zealand):
- New Zealand – North and South island by campervan
- Duration: 5 Weeks
- Australia – South-West Australia, Tasmania, Adelaide-Melbourne, Sydney, East Coast by campervan and rental cars
- Duration: 3 1/2 Months
- Fiji – Renewing our Australian visa for another 3 months since we traveled from/to Australia
- Duration: 2 Weeks
- Indonesia – Bali, Lombok, Flores
- Duration: 4 Months
- Malaysia – Kuala Lumpur
- Duration: 4 Days (Visa extension for Indonesia)
- Japan – Tokyo, Japanese Alps, Hiroshima, Kyushu, Osaka/Kyoto
- Duration: 2 Months
- China – Shanghai
- Duration: 3 Days
- Thailand – Currently exploring Chiang Mai
Before December 2022 we also explored Peru, Vietnam, Taiwan, Singapore, Maldives & many other places within Europe. Separately we also visited the USA, Bahrain, UAE, Oman, Namibia and China.
How do we travel?
We aim for visiting the most beautiful & exciting places. We try to avoid the large tourist crowds (the big buses) and try to get the most local experience possible.
We would consider ourselves as budget to mid-budget travellers. We definitely aim for the least expensive option when it comes to accommodation and restaurants. However, we are mostly staying in private rooms or AirBnB apartments.
Chrissi is a registered coffee addict. Besides that, we also enjoy wine & beer. But usually we drink anything.
We love food! If we need to label ourselves, we would consider us as “flexi-vegans”. If restaurant options and budget allows, we are aiming for plant-based food at first. But we are also trying local specialities even if they contain meat.
This depends a lot on the country. We love hiking (e.g. in Austria, New Zealand and Indonesia), diving & snorkelling (e.g. in Australia & Indonesia), practicing yoga (we did a 100 hours yoga teacher training in Bali), surfing (e.g. in Australia), going to museums and trying out new things (e.g. we did a sky-dive and bungy jump in New Zealand).
Why did we start another travel blog among the existing millions of blogs?
Good question 🙂 Short answer: We love what we do & we think that our pins map is one of its kind.
Longer answer: When visiting new countries or regions you need to plan your travel itinerary according to your time, budget and interests. The most difficult part is the first stage of planning: You are overwhelmed with new names, places you don’t know where exactly they are and that they even exist. Add the transportation- and budget-constraints and many other things you need to find out.
When going to new places we are in the same situation. So we thought wouldn’t it be cool to have a map where you have all popular and secret travel destinations on it, including all important information? YES! And this is how we started picking pins.
We want to make it easier for you to choose your favorite places you want to visit in the world. Filter the best restaurants, beaches or accommodations and check out what places we awarded the golden pin, our crème de la crème, on our pins map.
What’s next?
Since we just started creating picking pins expect more pins to be added regularly. Don’t forget to follow us on Instagram.
Get in touch with us! Seriously, if you have any questions or suggestions just send us a message via Instagram.
Chrissi & Flo