TrodPod

Laos is Southeast Asia’s quietest secret: a landlocked, mountainous country of saffron-robed monks, mist-wreathed karst peaks and a pace of life so languid it makes its neighbours look frantic. Once the Kingdom of Lan Xang — the Land of a Million Elephants — it was later the most heavily bombed country per capita in history, a fact that still shapes its landscape and its people. Today, it blends Buddhist tradition, socialist politics and Beer Lao into something utterly beguiling.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Laos for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell

Peru is South America’s superstar, and it knows it. From the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu to the culinary fireworks of Lima, from the enigmatic Nazca Lines to the vast green sprawl of the Amazon, this is a country of almost absurd variety. It has been reinventing itself for decades and keeps getting better. The food alone would justify the airfare. The rest is a bonus of civilization-spanning proportions.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Peru for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell

Benin is a small, narrow strip of a country on the West African coast with a history vastly disproportionate to its size. This was the seat of the Kingdom of Dahomey, one of Africa’s most powerful and militarized states, and a pivotal node in the Atlantic slave trade. It is also the birthplace of Vodun - the spiritual tradition that traveled across the ocean and became Haitian Vodou, Brazilian Candomblé, and Cuban Santería. Benin is raw, fascinating, and profoundly important.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Benin for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

Turkey is one of those rare countries that genuinely straddles civilizations. Straddling Europe and Asia, it has absorbed the legacies of Hittites, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines and Ottomans and turned them into something entirely its own. Istanbul alone could occupy a lifetime. Add Cappadocia’s surreal landscapes, the Roman grandeur of Ephesus, the thermal terraces of Pamukkale, and a cuisine that ranks among the world’s finest, and you have a country of almost unreasonable richness. The tea is strong. The welcome is stronger.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Turkey for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

Belarus is Europe’s great enigma: a landlocked country of vast forests, Soviet-scale boulevards and a political reality that makes it one of the continent’s most unusual destinations. Under the long rule of Alexander Lukashenko, it has earned the nickname ‘Europe’s last dictatorship’ - yet visitors often find a country of quiet charm, genuine warmth and a cultural resilience that defies the headlines. It is not an easy place to visit, but it is a fascinating one.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Belarus for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

One hundred episodes. Twenty years on the road. Six continents and counting. To mark our centenary, we're doing something different: no single country this week, but a victory lap through the very best of the world's first half. Join us as we hand out wildly subjective, fiercely defended awards for the most sacred site, the most beautiful city, the greatest road trip, the finest cuisine... the wheat, the chaff, and everything in between! Here's to the next hundred.Love the pod? Get the guides! We've now published a TrodPod guide to all 100 countries we've covered, released weekly with each new episode: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

Bulgaria is the Balkans’ best-kept secret, which is both its charm and its tragedy. Sandwiched between Romania, Serbia, North Macedonia, Greece and Turkey, it offers Black Sea beaches, dramatic mountain ranges, ancient Thracian tombs, crumbling Ottoman mosques and an Orthodox monastic tradition of extraordinary beauty – all at prices that make Western Europe weep. The yogurt is excellent, the wine is underrated, and the rose oil is world-famous. Come before everyone else does.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Bulgaria for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

Zambia is where the walking safari was born, and the country remains one of Africa’s finest wildlife destinations – raw, uncrowded and thrillingly authentic. From the thundering curtain of Victoria Falls to the intimate game viewing of South Luangwa, this is a country that rewards those willing to venture off the beaten path. It is also one of the continent’s most peaceful and politically stable nations, which helps when you’re trying to relax with a leopard fifteen meters away.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Zambia for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.

Pakistan routinely astonishes visitors with the gap between reputation and reality. The north alone – a staggering wall of peaks including five of the world’s fourteen eight-thousanders – would justify the trip. But there is so much more: the ancient ruins of Mohenjo-daro, the Mughal splendour of Lahore, the frontier energy of Peshawar, and hospitality so generous it will bloe you away. This is South Asia at its most seductive and surprising.Love the pod? Get the guide! Out with each new podcast, we publish a guide to the country. Buy the TrodPod guide to Pakistan for just $3: https://www.patreon.com/c/trodpod/shop. Better yet, become a TrodPod member for just $5 a month and access TrodPod guides to every country in the world, released weekly with each new podcast episode! Sign up now: https://www.patreon.com/trodpod/membershipThanks for all your support!TrodPod is Murray Garrard and Elle Keymer. Sound editing by Leo Audio Productions. Design and marketing by GPS: Garrard Powell Solutions.