Extraordinary Travel Festival: The Art of Going Further
As Bangkok prepares to welcome a gathering of global explorers, founder Ric Gazarian considers the irresistible pull of the places we have yet to see.
There is something deliciously unfashionable about saving the best until last. In an age of instant gratification, Ric Gazarian has kept Ireland waiting for a decade. When he finally arrives, there will be a Guinness, a celebration and the quiet satisfaction of completing an extraordinary ambition: visiting every United Nations member state.
For now, the traveller and podcaster known as GlobalGaz stands at 190 countries. Three remain. But listening to him, you suspect the finish line is merely another departure gate.
Appearing on Trends, in conversation with TravelDailyNews founding publisher Theodore Koumelis, Gazarian brings that restless energy to the Trends pop-up studio on the trade show floor of IT&CMA and CTW 2026.
His subject is extreme travel. His real preoccupation is connection.
A Different Kind of Travel Club
From 22 to 25 October, Extraordinary Travel Festival III will bring his far-flung community to Bangkok’s Ambassador Hotel. Across four days, talks, films, workshops and evening gatherings will celebrate lives shaped by an unusually expansive sense of possibility.
Forget any single picture of who belongs here.
“The extreme travel community is not a monolith,” Gazarian explains.
Some arrive with private-jet budgets; others travel by local bus, sleep on borrowed sofas and stretch modest funds across remarkable distances. Gazarian places himself somewhere between those extremes.
What unites them is curiosity: the persistent feeling that somewhere, beyond the familiar, a conversation, landscape or encounter awaits.
Friendship Without Borders
The festival began with a recognisably modern predicament. Gazarian had friends around the world whom he had never met.
After setting himself the goal of visiting every country in 2009, he gradually found fellow travellers online. They exchanged advice, compared experiences and helped one another navigate journeys that could feel bewildering alone.
Years passed. The friendships deepened. Still, many existed entirely through screens.
“So, then I started thinking, let’s create an in real life alternative to this online version of my life.”
Extraordinary Travel Festival became that alternative: a place where familiar voices acquire faces, and shared ambitions find a table around which to gather.
Bangkok After the Applause
Gazarian promises close to 40 speakers, with stories stretching from remote corners of the planet to journeys beyond it. The programme combines inspiration with practical insight, while dinners, parties and the NomadMania Awards give the gathering its celebratory rhythm.
Bangkok supplies the invitation to linger. A restaurant becomes an evening’s discovery; a conversation suggests a journey through Thailand or a flight further afield.
For the host destination, Gazarian sees value in welcoming travellers who also tell stories, carrying their impressions to audiences across the world.
For guests, the appeal is wonderfully uncomplicated: finding people who understand why the next journey matters.
“I’ve been saving Ireland for 10 years to be my last country,” he says.
Perhaps Ireland will mark the end of the list. But over that long-awaited Guinness, another journey will surely begin to take shape.
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