Nothing Declared

06/07/2024

Shanghai was surprisingly lush, rainy, and humid but also beautiful with a French quarter and sometimes reminded me in a weird way of... Atlanta 🍑

30/06/2024

The Bund, Shanghai

06/06/2024

Cakebread 2016 - 4.2 / 5 Aromas of cherry, dark fruit, blackberry balanced with the vanilla bordeaux smokey sweetness of oaky French oak aging. Beyond the Aromas, the taste is what separates this - incredible plum, to***co fruity finish which has a thick smooth texture.

20/05/2024

Afghanistan - Mazar i Sharif & Balkh
We arrived in Mazar i Sharif late in the night after a long drive from the Afghanistan – Tajikistan border. Our first stop was clothes shopping. Clothes shopping was the absolute first priority?...

Mazar – i – Sharif Mazar is an ancient city of over 500,000 inhabitants known for the magnificent and expansive blue mosque complex The cities name translates to “tomb of the saint” which is a reference to the tomb of Ali, the famed cousin, son-in-law and companion of the Islamic prophet Muh...

19/05/2024

Afghanistan - crossing the border report🇦🇫
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Crossing the border into Afghanistan from Tajikistan was a 4 hour ordeal full of unusual predicaments. Read this full report and how to guide

Afghanistan – Crossing the border from Tajikistan Traveling to Dushanbe, Tajikistan The morning of my travels to Afghanistan begin with a jarring message – my local contact who was supposed to meet me at the border was no longer available due to some sort of emergency. This was an interesting me...

17/05/2024

Trip Report - Afghanistan Independent travel 🇦🇫
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Always a mysterious, magical place to explore. I have tried to organize all the info I wish I had before visiting. We recently explored Afghanistan for 8 days, traveling independently, with the help of 3 different local guides, entering from Shir Khan border in the north with Tajikistan and exiting at Torkham in the south with Pakistan (one of the craziest borders I have ever experienced - hands down). In Afghanistan we explored Mazar i Sharif, Balkh, Kabul, Banyan, Band i Amir, Herat and briefly Jalalabad. Some of my best memories in Afghanistan were experiencing the amazing hospitality of friendly locals, learning more about daily life in a country that has seen so much dynamism and change, exploring the beautiful sights of Band i Amir, and exploring the ancient markets of Herat.

Here’s a detailed trip report from my visit, including…
📌 Visa, land border crossings with Tajikistan 🇹🇯 & Pakistan 🇵🇰
📌 Permits: how to, GPS locations, regional registration GPS pins on google maps
💰 Costs, guide contact info, recommendations
📌Itinerary, logistics, crossing from 🇹🇯 or 🇵🇰
📸 Sights, things to see and do, etc
💸 Money & getting around
⚠️Safety and other community resources

If you want to see my 🇦🇫 photography, or if you have any questions feel free to message me directly via IG @ nothing_declared

go deeper in Afghanistan? See below NothingDeclared individual city guides and specialty resources: Money ATMs will most likely not work with any foreign debit cards in Afghanistan. Therefore most travelers rely on the old fashioned method – money exchanges. AFN is the currency in Afghanistan and ...

21/04/2024

2001 Musar is a great way to start to an amazing week. A delicate blend of Cabernet Savignon, Cinsault and Carignan aged in oak for over a year. At its peak from my cellar - 23 years later it's showing notes of dried cherries, cassis, prunes, some leathery vanilla oakyness. The complexity is off the charts and I'm getting aromas of smokey Tennessee to***co barn and cherry bramble which is a combo I never imagined I would want so bad. The structure is light and balanced. Silky smooth acidity and fine tannins which is a hallmark of this exquisite wine.

27/12/2023

Foggy Indiana morning 🌳

11/09/2023

New Website Post!

Turkmenistan! Explore the infamous Gates of Hell, the gleaming white marble capital of Ashgabat, and centuries old Mary

Brando shares how he visited Turkmenistan on a semi independant itenerary, seeing the major sights, in one of the world's most mysterious countries.

11/07/2023

I'm here at the Balkh Green Mosque, in Afghanistan. Built in the 1400's at a key spot on the silk road. It's architecture influenced the Taj Mahal 🕌

04/07/2023

Happy 4th of July 🇺🇲
SO. Many. Checkpoints. Leaving Kunduz province the consulate officer asked me, “You are not a soldier, are you? Or you promise to not become a soldier once you are in Afghanistan.” Lol. I think he was joking, maybe. The American passport really throws them off. There are probably 50 checkpoints in the 6 hr drive to Mazir-i-Sharif. 80% of checkpoints seemed to end up in an argument or a long conversation where they could not understand why an American was a tourist in Afghanistan. Fair. Tip. Don't travel at night, and not in Western clothes. At one checkpoint a group of 4 TLB turned into a crowd of 15 TLB. Everyone with automatic weapons except me, in various states of confusion, happiness, or angst. I was certain I was going to TLB prison at this one. After around 30 minutes part of the crowd decided I probably wasn't a soldier or spy, and then began asking for selfies with me. Yes, let's do selfies…not jail. I embraced this choice and their superiors seemed to soften a bit. Thankfully we didn't get arrested. The checkpoints made the long journey very stressful. I learned that if we said I was living in the Netherlands, this helped. No one had ever heard of the Netherlands, though. Sometimes I would try to illustrate a map: Germany is here, Belgium is here, and the Netherlands here. Still nothing. But at least in that moment, I wasn't from the USA, yet, unless they opened my passport….

28/06/2023

Nothing declared is travelling to Afghanistan! 🇦🇫 The border guards say I’m the first American to enter Afghanistan at the land border with Tajikistan since the 2021 “Fall of Kabul." The subsequent creation of the TLB-controlled Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan meant huge changes felt throughout the country. I’ll be independently traveling through Afghanistan to witness the current state of affairs, learn more about Afghani daily life, and see some of the amazingly beautiful sights we hear far too little about.

03/06/2023

Wine review. Kagor 2002 -Turkmenistan.
1 out of 5 ⭐ This wine was horrible and afterwards I felt like my head was going to explode and my arms would fall off