BLACK TRAVELLERS

Travel Spotlight: Rethabile Ramaphakela

Since COVID19 has put a halt on my travel plans for a bit I thought I should put a spotlight on some of my favourite travel content creators, starting with Rethabile Ramaphakela.

Tell us who you are and what you do?

I’m Rethabile Ramaphakela. Best known as @Retini on the social medias. I’m a producer, writer and director who was a former kids presenter and one of the Ventertainment voice artists

We love your travel content, tell us the places you’ve been around the world

Travelling is like my side hustle. I try to do at least two trips a year with the major trip being in April – my birthday month. I also have started visiting places that are a bit ‘off the traveling grid’. I tend to hate doing first world countries because they seem to lack something when it comes to interacting with locals, for me, travelling is also about the locals. I’m interested in how other people live so meeting people plays a huge role in making a place memorable. I have been to the “usual” places like France, USA (New York, Miami and LA), UK, Hungary (not so usual), Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany.

But I have absolutely loved being in Tanzania, Mauritius, Jamaica, Cuba, Mexico, Maldives, Indonesia, Iceland, Morocco, Namibia, Croatia and Sri Lanka

What was your favourite destination?

This is so hard to answer, because every place holds a very special place in my heart but if I absolutely had to choose, I would say Bali. I have been there twice. Once in a big group and then on my own and even after these travels, I would still go there again. There is still so much I haven’t seen. It has a bit of everything and is really the epitome of holiday destination. (I know everyone goes there now but it’s really that good.

Do you use travel agents or are you a DIY traveller using apps?

I love putting an itinerary together, it’s literally one of my absolute favourite things to do.

What are your go-to travel apps?

Mostly Skyscanner (for flights) and Airbnb and Booking.com. I don’t like to stay in hotels when traveling. I like the idea of coming back to your own home where you can cook and drink.

When did the travel bug bite?

The first time I went overseas was in 2007 and it was for work. The producer on the trip actually said, “after this, all you will want to do was travel.” During that trip I went to New York City and I absolutely fell in love. The bug got me so bad, I went to live in New York for about 3 months in 2010.

Do you have any hints and tips for solo travellers or first time travellers?

Solo travelling can seem daunting but you just have to do it. I did my first solo travel because a lot of my friends couldn’t make the trip for various reasons. I had two options, either wait or go anyway. I decided to go because ultimately you can’t wait for people when you want to do what you want.

But obviously make sure you make sure you have things planned that force you to interact with people. So when solo travelling I always book a hotel instead of an Airbnb, because the hotel staff became your allies and are very helpful (and they are great for taking pictures). The best is that Airbnb now has experiences that you can do, this is a great way to interact with people whilst experiencing the new place. I highly recommend Airbnb Experiences.

Trust yourself. The world is not as scary as we think it is. I had many preconceived ideas about Morocco before I went and my solo trip there is probably one of my most memorable trips.

What do you never travel without?

I’m not precious about anything but one thing I always ask myself is, “do I have my wallet and do I have my passport?” The rest will sort itself out.

Money is no object, where in the world would you go?

Bora Bora. I love me a good ol’ island destination. I want to visit all of the beaches

To see more of Rethabile’s travel follow her on all her social media as @Retini and her hashtag #RetiniTravels

Recap of this past decade

As we approach a new decade I felt I should do a bit of a recap of my past 10years. So much growth happened and I also got bit by the travel bug. I started this decade as an agency producer then became an animation producer and I’m ending it as an artist manager and founder of Ofentse Management (shameless plug) but yes I have grown in leaps and bounds. I did a bit of self-searching (not sure if that’s a real phrase) over the years and I have to say travel was actually a huge part of me finding myself. I’m happiest traveling to be honest and I hope the next decade is filled with even more travel (preferably in business class universe *nudge, nudge , wink ,wink).

Ladies and gentlemen I present to you my travels through the years:

2010 London- UK

2011 New York – USA

2012: Dubai- Dubai

2013 New York, Miami, LA- USA

2014- 2015 Were clearly a dark time in my life as there was no travel during those two years LOL. Seriously though those were my transition years when I left the 9to5 grind and that’s when the soul searching began. These proved to be very crucial years for me and I’m grateful for the experience and I haven’t looked back since.

2016: Vienna, Graz- Austria

2017 Inhambane- Mozambique :

2017 Paris – France

2018 Mombasa – Kenya

And this year I returned to my favourite place in the world to celebrate my sister’s 40th birthday: 2019 PARIS once again

French 40 : What we got up to in Paris

I’m posting twice in one week because well I haven’t posted anything in a while, my bad. Anyway as the title says my sister turned 40 and here’s what we got up to in Paris, you know touristy things for me and shopping for everyone else. Amongst the touristy antics we got up to; we trekked up and down all 284 stairs of the Arc de Triomphe so I could get my perfect shot of Paris.

Trust I took a break walking up these stairs

My perfect shot of Paris from the Arc de Triomphe(I finally got it. YAY!!!)

I didn’t take many pictures of the crew shopping so instead I will gladly share more happy-clappy- touristy shots.

Eiffel Tour

Louvre

Crepe break

Arc de Triomphe

Jardins du Château de Versailles AKA Garden of Versailles

Mombasa the Rundown

Since posting about my Mombasa trip I’ve been getting a bunch of questions from people so I figure I should use this post to address their queries.

Can you fly directly to Mombasa from SA? At the moment no airlines fly directly to Mombasa, I had to connect from Nairobi.

Where did you stay? We stayed at the Behari beach hotel which was quite pleasant and had friendly staff.

What can we do there? Ours was a short trip but here are some of the things you can do while you are there.

1. Also my favourite lay in the sun

2.Go on boat rides and swim in the ocean

3. Go shopping at the markets

4. For the adventurous types windsurfing and kite surfing

5. Go site seeing

6. Or enjoying some cocktails by the water

Would I recommend this trip to other people? YES over and over and over again, Mombasa is beautiful and the people are friendly.

5 Days Of Summer: Part 3

Lets take it back to the beach

What is a holiday at the coast without spending time at the beach. Let me just say Bahari beach is a beautiful and eventful beach. You have everything from vendors selling fabric, paintings and wood carvings, then you have people offering camel rides. Everyone is trying to make a buck I was offered a massage and one dude tried to charge us for a tour of the beach he was like ” There are people selling paintings there, the water is over there…” people are such chancers.

The tide is high in the morning so you see no sand for while so the morning started up here and we worked our way down the stairs to explore some more.

Checking on the tide

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Chillin’ like a villian

Tide’s low lets go

Camel rides at the beach

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Local bar

It started to rain on our walk back to the hotel

It started to rain as we walked back to our hotel, and it stopped when we reached the pool so we chilled some more. SAM_1977

I honestly could get used to life at the beach.

5 Days of Summer: Mombasa Part 2

Day 2 was a more traditional tourist day and we checked out Fort Jesus, walked through Old Town and saw the Mombasa Tusks.

Fort Jesus is one of Mombasa’s tourist attractions. It was built by the Portuguese in 1593 to protect their sailing route back to Portugal. The Portuguese regarded themselves as representatives of christianity hence the name Fort Jesus. There is a constant stream of people coming in to see Fort Jesus both international tourists and locals (the cover charge is cheaper for Kenyans).

Walking through Old Town the buildings are beautiful but hella neglected, the different textures make for great backdrops though for our selfies and cheesy tourist shots, so we obliged.

Because it was a Sunday the street was not busy I managed to get the shot of the Mombasa Tusks uninterrupted.

5 Days of Summer: Mombasa Part 1

Travelling drama aside I had finally made it to Mombasa and I was ready to soak up the sun. The rain and the sunshine kept alternating throughout the course of the days but the warmth stayed constant so no jackets and no long sleeves. Just what the doctor ordered.

Poolside

SAM_1747 The view from our room ❤

Our day started with us exploring our surroundings which on day 1 was the beach where we booked our ride on a glass boat and the shopping centre to get money to pay for boat ride and the likes (I didn’t exchange currency beforehand. You know me “rebel”).

And then the touristy fun began, be warned I get trigger happy with a camera so a photo overload is upon you.

Tuk-Tuk rides

Glass boat

Fish swimming beneath the boat

They are called glass boats because they have glass bottoms so you can see the fish once you sail deep enough (If you saw my insta-stories you heard how excited I was to see these buggers)

In the spirit of trying new things I got in the water with the fish swimming around my legs.

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Solo Travel: My Experience

I’ll be the first to say I never understood traveling alone, I don’t even like the idea of going to the movies by myself. So to say I found the thought of going to another country all by my lonesome daunting would be the understatement of the year. When I was toying with the idea of going to Paris I tried to recruit everyone I knew. It soon became evident that the universe had other plans for me.

I said in the beginning of the year that I wanted to get out of my comfort zone, and what better way for an introvert such as myself to be thrust out than traveling alone. In all of the excitement that I would be going to my dream destination I kinda forgot how scary this actually was. Landing in Paris on a cloudy and chilly morning was however a quick reminder. As I waited outside the airport for my late shuttle surrounded by chain smokers the voice inside my head was like “WTF Ofentse? What did you do? What were you thinking?” yo I was ready to get back on the plane and go home.

When my shuttle finally arrived I told that voice to shut up and suck it up because we’re here now. I tapped into my inner Shonda Rhimes on some “I can do this I’m badass“. Luckily I had a jolly and rather chatty shuttle driver and then we were joined by some nice and equally chatty old ladies suddenly things didn’t seem so bad. I was like “hey this isn’t so bad I can do this” the next part could’ve been my imagination but I swear the sky cleared and the sun came out and Paris was magic again.

I went exploring, chatting to strangers, asking people for directions and asking them to take my picture. It was quite liberating to do things without overthinking everything. I also realize that I sound like a cliche but it was liberating and a growing experience. I only realized it when I came home and started telling people stories about my trip. I never thought I would ever take a solo trip let alone enjoy one, but I did and I highly recommend it.

Afterwards I had N*E*R*D’s ” She’s badass” playing in my head as a soundtrack because I felt like I could do anything if I managed to navigate my way in a country where I only knew a handful of phrases in their language and still managed to have a good time. Also traveling alone means not having to compromise on anything really; you do what you feel like, when you feel like it. Selfish as that may sound it felt nice not to have to negotiate on what activities to do and when to do them. That alone should be reason enough to want to try it out, that and meeting new people and honing your selfie taking skills.

Through my lens

When I was in varsity this one dude asked me “how are you going to enjoy seeing the world with a camera stuck to your face?” that question always confused me. I love taking pictures everywhere I go, its like freezing a single moment and when you look back at that picture you have that same feeling over again. I’m happiest when I’m traveling and the pictures remind me of those happy moments and I honestly cannot wait to capture more happy moments. So I hope this answers old boy’s question.

Here are a few of my immortalized memories:

DUBAI