Pixora: my personal travel blog, built with Astro

Pixora is my personal travel blog. A dedicated space for my adventures, photos, and tips for fellow travelers — separate from my developer portfolio. Fun fact: the name comes from Pixel + Aurora. I thought it captured the idea of photographing the world's beauty through a lens.

Why Pixora?

Three main reasons pushed me to build a separate site.

Separating work from personal life

My portfolio is a professional space. It showcases my projects, skills, and career. But travel is personal. It's my weekends, vacations, and spontaneous adventures. Mixing the two didn't make sense. Pixora gives me a space where I can be myself, without worrying about my "developer" image.

Showcasing travel photography

Travel photography is a real passion of mine. Social media compresses everything, limits formats, and drowns images in an endless feed. With Pixora, I have full control over how my photos are presented — full resolution, themed galleries, visual storytelling.

Sharing practical tips

Every trip teaches me something. How to manage a tight budget, what camera gear to bring, how to pack a backpack for 3 weeks. Instead of keeping it all to myself, I'd rather share it in a structured way.

What you'll find on Pixora

The site is organized around three main sections.

Trips

Full travel stories by destination: Canada, Iceland, South Korea... Each article covers the itinerary, best spots, and the mishaps too. Because no trip is ever perfect — and that's what makes it interesting.

Photos

Galleries are organized by destination and theme. Landscapes, street photography, portraits, architecture — there's something for everyone.

Tips

Practical guides on travel budgeting, travel photography, and backpack preparation. No fluff, just field-tested advice.

Under the hood: the technical side

Pixora is an open source project built with a modern, performant stack.

Why Astro over Next.js?

My portfolio runs on Next.js — and it's great for interactive apps. But for a content-heavy travel blog focused on images, Astro is a more natural choice. Zero client-side JavaScript by default, blazing-fast static pages, and native Markdown/MDX support.

---
// Example: photo gallery component in Astro
// JS is only loaded when the component is visible
import { Image } from 'astro:assets';
 
const { photos, destination } = Astro.props;
---
 
<section class="gallery">
  {photos.map((photo) => (
    <Image
      src={photo.src}
      alt={photo.alt}
      widths={[400, 800, 1200]}
      loading="lazy"
    />
  ))}
</section>

Tailwind CSS for design

Tailwind lets me iterate quickly on design without leaving the HTML. Dark mode included, responsive by default, and easy visual consistency.

Service Workers for offline mode

Travelers don't always have network access. Thanks to Service Workers, previously viewed articles remain accessible even without a connection. Pretty handy when you're on a plane or in the middle of nowhere in Iceland.

Conclusion

Pixora is my personal corner of the web. A place where code meets travel, where every destination becomes an article, and where every photo tells a story.

If you're into travel or photography, check out pixora.raphaelraclot.dev — and feel free to let me know what you think.