After thousands of dives all across the globe – still, when I entered the Danube River Delta it was like a whole new world opened up for me. To be honest, it blew me away. The high variety of environments and habitats, all in various stages of the process of consolidation, an underwater flora creating dream-like landscapes I’d never seen before, abundance of fish life and some underwater creatures looking more like they came straight from a space cartoon for kids.

The lucky winners of the Christmas draw in our rapidly growing Travel Club were drawn on December 20, 2013 by Frans Schepers, Managing Director of Rewilding Europe, Ilko Bosman, Finance and Operations Director and Iva Tontcheva, Communications Manager.

Driving one’s own draft reindeer with a sled through the snow-covered landscape and across frozen lakes in Sweden! This is the fantastic Grand Prize (for two!) in the December draw of the Rewilding Europe Travel Club. What more can you wish for a Christmas present!

I look down and meet a pair of hard-boiled white eyes staring back at me from Virginia’s freshly cooked zander fish soup. It is lunchtime with Cristian and Florin under a pergola dressed in grapevines. Finally I am here, in the village Crisan after flights, road trips, hotel nights and an extensive riverboat journey.

Rewilding Europe Capital was recently launched at the WILD10 congress in Salamanca, Spain, and has completed its first two loans to financially support businesses in Velebit (Croatia) and Portugal.

Four Romanian NGO’s raised their voice for the sustainable development of the Danube Delta, one of our rewilding areas. The most important of demands of the four organisations are also included in the vision for the Danube Delta rewilding initiative.

Rewilding Europe efforts to bring back wildlife in the Romanian Danube Delta are featured in the article “Nature gets its players back” in the Dutch Trouw daily (June 18).

A contest for young professionals in The Netherlands on ideas to double nature in the country, has delivered two winners. An essay of Iris de Boer, together with a short film from Stefan Sand, Merijn Biemans and Christoph Janzing to “rewild” Dutch cities by adopting flagship species and support their comeback through an online platform, were the price-winners.

A new documentary about Danube Delta will launch tomorrow, 30 January.

The Scientific Council of the Danube Delta Biosphere Reserve Authority has confirmed the findings of a recent study that suggests potential resizing of the strictly protected areas in the Danube Delta. The study was commissioned by Danube Parks with the subsequent amendment of existing legislation to establish new borders of some protected areas expected in the short term.