About the blog and Danik

Hi there everyone, we are the Bates family from Stevenage, UK and we love traveling. Who doesn’t? Welcome to our travel blog. Now we want to tell the world about our travels as well as showing you our top tips, travel guides and information. The way we see it is, the blog is here to help you plan your future travels as well as entertaining you. 

So who are the Bates family? Well, Daniel (Danik) is the daddy of the family. A keen runner and beer drinker (a good combination there..eh?) Daniel has been traveling the world since 1998 (but not full time), but has also been a blogger in the past with ‘Danik the Explorer’, which started out in 2007 and ceased in early 2021. After a short break, it was time to bring out a new travel blog, a fresh start, especially after tough times going through the Coronavirus pandemic. Traveling to fifty-three countries so far and numerous adventures around Europe and North America mainly, there is sure to be plenty of blog posts to keep our readers interested. 

In tow there is Olga, the mother of the family and of course Daniel’s wife. They have been married since 2010 after meeting up in the Latvian capital of Riga way back in 2006. After buying a house in the commuter town of Stevenage in Hertfordshire (35 miles north of London) two bouncing babies came their way. Amelie was born in 2016 and Isabella came along very late in 2019.

Why ‘Voyager avec Danik?'

After thinking long and hard about a new blog name, a niche and to get away from the ‘Danik the Explorer’ identity, it was time to bring in a new identity. I kept the Danik name, but with our love of traveling and of course, France, we gave the travel blog a French feel. However, this blog is not just about travels in France, it will be all over the world, bringing you stories, advice, and hopefully, inspiration.