Hi Everyone , first of all thanks to all of you for visiting my blog.
I am Raman Kumar (RK) a passionate traveler who has only one dream to explore the whole world & I am on it. Till October 2023 I already explored 34 countries. By profession earlier I used to work as an IT officer in a public limited company in Delhi but I quit my that job after 4 years in Oct 2016 & started full time traveling. Later on I joined a backpacker hostel as a front desk manager in Varkala, Kerala in Jan 2018 & now I own my own backpacker hostel at a beautiful location in mountains known as Bir Billing.
My travelling is all started when I joined the “Indian Scout & Guide” community during the school time & I felt so amazing when I attended the camps in jungle or a village far away from my home. After that time passed slowly & I moved to Jaipur for my graduation (B.Tech IT) in 2006. I have done some more trips (Amarnath, Srinagar, Mussorie, Haridwar, Amritsar, Mcleodganj etc) & enjoyed a lot during the college days. But the actual journey started when I moved to Bangalore (2011) during the days of my struggling & the target was to get a good job in IT industry which was recently affected by Recession in 2009 & most of the IT graduates had empty hands after graduation.
First time in my life I was staying far away from my home & family that also for a long period of time. I focused on to set my career & started to attend Off campus interviews which were organized at Cochin (Kerela), Tirchy (Tamilnadu), Chennai (Tamilnadu), Mangalore (Karnataka) & so on. I didn’t knew at all that what life actually secure for me. I enjoyed my struggling life for which I have traveled through all the South India.
After mid of 2011 I decided to shape my knowledge of Web Development with one of my friend & started a venture. Side by side I started preparation for Govt. exams. During my this phase of life I visited whole Rajasthan. I also enjoyed my this phase with the end of own venture due to lake of customers & non regular income.
In March 2013, I joined a public limited company as an IT Officer. Now i had started to earn & its time to shape my passion. I have started regular journeys once in a month in the different different parts of India. I went to my dream destination ie: Goa in Oct,2014. I have not wasted even a single penny & was doing trips in budget. At that time two of my friends also joined me for trips. We have done a trip of North East India (Meghalaya & Sikkim) with a budget of 8000/- including one side flight in 2014. It was actually challenging to do this trip in such a small budget but we have done it successfully.
In March 2015 , I came in touch with a Himalayan community “DoW” & I noticed that there are many beautiful places which are hidden in the lap of Himalayas & can be explored after trek. So I decided to start the trekking from now. I have done my first trek in April,2015 for Tungnath Mahadev, Uttrakhand. This was the unexpected snow trek & it was really adventures & we enjoyed it well. After this i have done many treks till now ie. Triund Trek(HP), Kheerganga Trek (HP), Parashar Lake(HP), Beas Kund (HP). In Sep,2015 i have done my another dream destination trip of INDIA ie Leh Ladakh with my two travel partners. We have also done it in a budget 12000/- which include both side flights from delhi. Side by Side i kept visiting another parts of INDIA like Khajuraho, Nainital, Jim Corbett, Banaras, Allahabad, Tihri Dam & so on.
During the end of the year 2015 I thought for my first abroad tour to Europe which was my first dream destination of world . I have started to search about Europe & found a beautiful country called “ICELAND” & prepared a total 15 day itinerary to visit total 5 European countries. I have decided to do all the necessary activity myself without any agent. After a month of hard work , i have collected all the necessary information which would required for Visa Process & trip. I have booked my flight tickets on a special day of Diwali,2015 for March 2016. I applied successfully for Schengen visa at Denmark Embassy but it was the worst day of my life when 16 Dec, 2015 when I received my passport with a rejection stamp on it by Denmark Embassy. After the inquiry I got to know that European countries hardly gives visa to a Solo Traveler due to security reasons & if you really want to explore Europe solo then its must to show them 4-5 countries visa stamp on your passport so that you could proof to them that you are really a traveler.
So after that i looked for South East Asian & gulf countries to explore so that I could get visa stamps on my Passport. In April 2016, I went to Malaysia & it was my first abroad trip 🙂 🙂
For my annual trip of 2016 I went to Bhutan in August 2016 & explore the most eastern part of Himalayas.
In Nov. 2016 i left my job as an IT Office in Delhi & started to plan a long trip across India. As i have already traveled through 23 states of India by Train ,Buses & flight so this time i decided to move with Bike Riding. This would have be my first bike travel experience as i didn’t had a bike till that time. So I purchased a bike & went for a PAN India trip with a cause started from 13 Dec 2016 from chandigarh & successfully covered 13 states 3 UT’s , 8350 Kms in 29 days.
After came from Riding Trip , i visited J&K & then Himachal Pradesh under Snow Storm conditions in Jan 2017.Then i went to Kasol to celebrate Holi on moter bike. Then i explored Thailand as a 3rd Asian country & visit Bangkok,Pattaya & Koh Phangan island & enjoyed Full Moon Party there in May 2017.
Meanwhile I got planned a Solo Backpacking trip to all 29 states of INDIA to set a World Record with the title of ‘ The Longest Journey By Scheduled Public Transport In A Single Country’. I Started this journey on 21st July 2017 from Chandigarh & follow the route Chandigarh – Kaza – Leh Laddakh – Srinagar – Amritsar – Dehradun – Lucknow – Varanasi – Patna – Siliguri – Guwahati – Shillong -Silchar – Agartala – Aizawl – Kohima – Imphal – Majuli – Tezpur – Tawang – Guwahati – Ranchi – Kolkata – Bhubneswar – Raipur – Hyderabad – Chennai – Rameswaram – Kanyakumari – Varkala – Bangalore – Goa – Pune – Mumbai – Ahmedabad – Ujjain – Jaipur – Hanumangarh – Delhi – Chandigarh. I finished my 74 Days long & 17500 Kms journey on 2nd Oct 2017 successfully. I Submitted my all evidences to Guinness World Records.
But it was not the end , i went to Gangotri Dham in Dec 2017 to celebrate my birthday in situation when road was declared closed by the BRO & i did hitchhiking & became the guest of BRO for night stay at their base camp. Celebrated new year in Delhi.
So finally i spent my all savings on my travelling so i was again looking for a job but not in IT again. My family advised me to start a business in Chandigarh but i was not interested to open any business. So finally i saw a post on facebook travelling group by the founder of hostel in Kerala as he was looking for a hostel manager for his property in Kerala & without any delay i sent my CV. Next day i received the call & it took 3 days to me to convince my family that i want to go to Kerala for a job which was not related to IT & even not well paid. But finally my family got convinced & right now i am here in Varkala, Kerala & working as a Hostel Manager. Beach is only 2 minute walking distance & i am enjoying my life here. I joined here in January 2018 & work for almost 4 months, saved money & traveled to Vietnam. It was an awesome journey 🙂
I joined back to the hostel after Vietnam trip & started to save money for my next international trip. I was still thinking to visit some more countries to get my passport more stamped before going to apply for Europe visa. I didn’t want one more refusal stamp on my passport. But then Universe send someone with his Message. It was August 2018 off season for kerala due to rainy season & recently there was a big flood in kerala so nobody was traveling in Kerala. Only 5-7 people in all hostel max. I met with some beautiful souls & wonderful people at that time 🙂 When there are less no. of guests its always seems like family. We are cooking , talking & hanging out together like a small family. I met with Aida from Spain. We were in a mid of conversation about how’s my life is turning year by year. When i told her i may visit Spain in 2020 as i am still looking to visit some more asian or middle east countries just to stamp my passport for a good travel history. She was so sad when i share How my Visa got rejected by Denmark Embassy. She said No Raman, You no need to wait for 2020, you can go anytime, may be at the end of this year or next year. If you want any help from my end from barcelona any recommendation letter anything just let me know. So she influenced me for my Europe trip. After 4 days i booked my flight ticket to Paris 🙂 and started to plan my journey. It took me 3-4 months to prepare a good itinerary & finally i applied on 7th January 2019 in French Embassy to visit Europe in April 2019. It was so surprising when i received my passport back with Schengen Visa. French embassy approved my visa in a day.
6th April 2019 was the milestone day for my traveling when i landed in Paris, France. I traveled for 64 days in Europe & visit some beautiful places met with wonderful people. I always staying with my friends and with the local people through Couchsurfing. It was a lifetime experience. After coming back from Europe i visit Malaysia and thailand with my sister. And i also met with Aida the universe girl to say thanks to influence me 🙂
After getting back from thailand in July 2019 i joined hostel back with one more year of commitment. So i joined the same hostel at Palolem Beach,Goa. Move around in all other hostel after spending more than 2 months in goa, 1 month in fort kochi, 2 month in Munnar & finally came back to Varkala just before Christmas for rest of my commitment days.
For 2020 my plan was to travel all South America for 6 months. I also got a Schengen visa because my flight to Paris was scheduled from Portugal as I was getting a good deal from there but due to covid I could not visit South America & got stuck at home in Chandigarh for 6 months. In mid of August I did one month long motorbike trip to Uttrakhand & covered Rishikesh, Kedarnath, Badrinath, Urgam Valley. When things started to open I joined back hostel job as operations manager. Now I was responsible for the operations of all 3 hostels but due to some issues I quit that job & joined another hostel in North India for 2 months until 2nd wave of covid arrive. I got covid & again got stuck at home for 2 months in April 2021. In June 2021 again I did motorbike trip to Leh Ladakh. I did complete circuit in 24 days Chandigarh – Srinagar – Leh – Nubra – Turtuk – Nyoma – Tso Moriri – Tso Kar – Manali – Chandigarh. I also made videos for my Youtube channel & my YT channel also picked up.
So the day came, i got my Guinness World Record certificate on 22nd Jan 2020 after 2 years 🙂 I felt very happy and got alot of calls from family and friends who wants to congratulate me. This news also got published in many news paper and AAJ TAK website.
In fabruary i got my Europe Schengen Visa for one year in a day after applying for my upcoming Europe trip. Meanwhile Corona virus knock the door of INDIA and i got back to home. My Europe Trip got postponed and i locked down at my home with All INDIA.
In july 2021 again I joined old hostel as Ops Manager for Varkala & Goa location and started to save money for my next trip to Europe planned in April 2022.
In April 2022 I went to Europe for 3 & a half month including Turkey. Just after coming back from Europe in mid of July I started to look for a place to open my own hostel & finally i found one in Bir Billing, Himachal Pradesh.
Now I have my own home which is open for all travelers, backpackers, bike riders & artists. Its known as The Lost Hostels Bir – Landing Site.
In July 2023 i visited Japan, Taiwan, Vietnam & Thailand for total 45 days. I completed my Japan trip (to/from) in just 80000/- inclusive everything. I choose to travel Vietnam 2nd time in my life just because of i really likes Vietnam & culture. I also visited Thailand 4th time but just North of Thailand as in last 3 visits i never been north of Thailand.
RK Discovering india 