Speaking this month we have:

1. AGM : The clubs AGM starts at 1:15pm (card carrying members only), then at 2.30 the meeting begins

2. Hilary Clark —  Dancing backwards in high heels

   Hilary Clark has been passionate about dance since childhood. She took classes in ballet and various contemporary styles until her mid-thirties when a course of lessons in the Alexander technique started her on an inner journey of discovery and development. She trained and worked as a complementary therapist, as a psychosynthesis counsellor, and as Head of Education and Training for the Faculty of Homeopathy where she was asked to organise a milonga to follow the gala dinner at the Faculty’s bi-annual congress. Knowing little about Argentine tango yet determined to dance at the milonga, she enrolled on a beginners’ course in Bedford and was soon captivated by the dance.

   Her trip to Argentina earlier this year, funded in part by the William Wood Legacy Award, combined her love of dance, enthusiasm for travel and interest in the beliefs, rituals and customs of other cultures. From Buenos Aires, where she took one-to-one lessons with a local teacher, danced at several milongas and learned something about the “codigos” of the tango, Hilary travelled by bus to north-west Argentina to discover the history, culture and folk dances of the Andes.

3. Derek Brown — Travels around Europe by Boat.

   After Derek  retired he got the sailing bug and after buying a boat in Holland motored it down the Rhine and on the Danube all the way to Istanbul, traveling 3,750 kilometres, during which time they passed through ninety-four locks. The journey crossed Holland, Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Romania before eventually ending up at their final destination, Istanbul, in Turkey.

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. Admission costs, £3 for Members and £6.00 Non-members. You do not need to be a member to attend, and we do not sell advanced tickets, please just come on the day, the doors open at 2:15pm and the program starts around 2:30pm with each talk lasting approximately 40 minutes. There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

1. Paul Archer – How to drive a black cab up Everest… and other useful tips

   Paul has arranged various expeditions since he was 17.  Most recently, his ‘It’s on the Meter‘ expedition was a full circumnavigation of the world in a black cab, taking in 50 countries, over 43,000 miles and gaining two Guinness World records.

2. Eric Hayman – Up Africa ’74.

   Eric Hayman has always been a traveller. From half a dozen schools and homes he joined the army. Postings took him to Germany and the Middle East. After demob in 1964, he helped his parents at their Eastbourne hotel before working with horses around the UK. Then his itchy feet took him to the southern African kingdom of Lesotho.

   By early 1974, Eric had spent five years there. From running a country hotel, he worked on the Lesotho Highlands Water Project, before being a UNDP field geologist. The end of this contract coincided with that of a teacher/volunteer who, like Eric, wanted to travel back to the UK overland.

   They left Lesotho in April 1974 with, as far as Botswana, an ex-pat doctor working in Maseru’s hospital and an ex-pat employed by the Lesotho government. The journey would take them both up through Africa; they went their separate ways after Cameroon, but met up again in London in 1975 – and again in 2007.

   By road, rail and river, both pushed northward, Eric working as cook’s “boy” on a cargo ship from Dakar to Grimsby. His yet-to-be-published book-length illustrated account of the six-month journey – “Up Africa ’74″ – is available on DVD.

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. 

Admission costs, £3 for Members and £6.00 Non-members. You do not need to be a member to attend, and we do not sell advanced tickets, please just come on the day, the doors open at 2:15pm and the program starts around 2:30pm with each talk lasting approximately 40 minutes.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

• Darren Winwood — St Helena – South Atlantic Ocean

  Discover the most extraordinary place on earth! Well that's what their tourism page says.

  Darren Winwood talks about his life long dream to visit the island and to discover the hidden charms of an island lost in time. Darren is currently studying an MBA at the university of Liverpool and his dissertation topic is to examine what activities attract the tourist to remote Islands with a view to assist the locals (Saints) in their preparation for the opening of the islands first airport. He will be spending two weeks on the Island this August.

  Darren is well traveled and has worked overseas for over six years, the majority of that time in the Far East.

• Nick Hunt — Across Europe on foot: Walking from the Hook of Holland to Istanbul

  October 2011 travel award winner Nick Hunt is a journalist and writer, who has written on subjects including melting glaciers in the Himalayas, the loss of indigenous languages in Finland, and the plight of migrant workers in Dubai.

  He is currently writing a book based on walking across Europe in the footsteps of Patrick Leigh Fermor, which will be published next year.Read more about this project at: afterthewoodsandthewater.wordpress.com .

Admission costs, £3 for Members and £6.00 Non-members. You do not need to be a member to attend, and we do not sell advanced tickets, please just come on the day, the doors open at 2:15pm and the program starts around 2:30pm with each talk lasting approximately 40 minutes.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Members Slides : Around the world in eighty minutes.

8 presentations of 12 slides

This month we have a fast paced journey around the Globe..

Probably the best meeting of the year and your last chance to meet up before the summer.

Speakers are:

1. Kevin Brackley – Signs in India
2. Sue Learoyd- In Memory of Jean Clough
3. Tony Annis – Tony’s Tasty Travelling Times
4. Janie Butler – Tabaski-In the desert with theTuaregs
5. Dick Curtis – Nepal – less the trekking !
6. Jacqui Trotter – Venice & Verona via Paris
7. Phil Fergusson – Bolivia
8. Sylvia Pullen – Around Rwanda by Bus
9. John Pannell – Trans Siberian journey
10. Neil Harris – Harbin Ice Festival

Hope all of you remember we are organising picnic in Regent’s Park this Sunday 8th of July 12:00 – ‘Globies in the Park’!

Bring your own food and drink to enjoy the sunshine, hopefully!

If it is raining or too wet we plan to go to the Wetherspoons pub by Baker Street Station.. the Metropolitan Bar around 12.30

Map attached below

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

• Peter Cloudsley – The Magical World of Pablo Amaringo
  Pablo Amaringo (1938-2009) was an Amazonian shaman who became increasingly concerned by the disappearance of Amazonian ancestral knowledge and the destruction of the rain forest. He taught himself to paint and used this as vehicle to teach a new generation the value of indigenous ways and a new kind of spirituality free from dogma. This afternoon’s talk will be illustrated by Peter’s slides and recordings, and we will explore the stories behind Pablo’s pictures and what they aim to to transmit. We will delve into the world of Amazonian spirits and beings and see what they say about restoring balance to the world.
  Peter Cloudsley is a musicologist, researcher and writer who has lived in Peru since 1980. He founded the Amazon Retreat Centre in 2003 and coauthored ‘The Ayahuasca Visions of Pablo Amaringo‘ published last year.
• Doreen Tayler – George Orwell’s Police Postings in Burma, & Doreen Tayler’s Burmese Days.

This meeting is taking place at 2.30 at the Dragon Hall, 17 Stukeley Street, London, WC2B 5LT as there is another booking at the Church of Scotland.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

• Delia Cardnell – Madagascar, Along the Route du Sud and road to Morondava (RN34)

  Delia Cardnell takes us on a journey along the Route du Sud travelling straight through Central Madagascar, where the scenery is as stimulating and surreal as the culture.

• John Pilkington – Georgia to AfghanistanAfter his last talk for us, ‘A Stroll through the Axis of Evil‘, John promised a sequel and here it is. From the Caucasus he followed a spectacular branch of the Silk Road across the Caspian Sea to Samarkand, then turned south-east to the High Pamirs of Tajikistan and Afghanistan (a region well-known to Marco Polo and possibly one or two Globies), before finishing at the source of the Oxus where Afghanistan, Pakistan and China meet.

  See http://www.pilk.net/update1.centralasia.html more information about John and his adventures.

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

• Marion Bull – Upper Mesopotamia and Kurdistan

Marion is a London-based travel writer and photographer, published in the Sunday Times, Guardian, Independent, Mail on Sunday, Observer, magazines and books.

She has a special interest in early civilisation, Neolithic art and artefacts, and is known for solo expeditions to deserts, especially in Africa and the Middle East.

She has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Excess Baggage and in a TV documentary. Highlights of her career so far include meeting Nelson Mandela, being the first UK journalist to record and exhibit rock painting images from the Tassili N’Ajjer, Algeria, and the first to photograph the remote off-limits Northern Skeleton Coast of Namibia, which became a touring exhibition.

She is currently writing a book about her journeys.

• John Kenny – Sub Saharan Journeys: 6 years of visiting Africa’s remotest communities

John Kenny is a fine art photographer living in London.

Since 2006 his focus has been on Sub-Saharan Africa, highlighting the pivotal role that traditional communities play in humanity’s survival in places where the earth’s resources are minimal. His work emphasizes the positive role that Africa and Africans play in the 21st Century and also highlights the threats to traditional ways of life today.

John’s work has been exhibited worldwide through international art shows and has been featured in The Times of London, The Telegraph, and the international art and photography press. John actively supports organisations that work within traditional African communities and has been a guest on BBC Radio and at the London International Documentary Festival. Last year John donated works in support of Survival international, Concern Worldwide, and his work was auctioned at Sotheby’s New York in aid of ‘Art for Africa’.

John has been visiting tribes across the African continent for six years as part of an ongoing photography project and will be talking through his will be accompanied by a slideshow featuring some of the remarkable people that he has met on this journey, and why these people and their communities matter to him in the 21st Century.

To get an idea of John’s work you can see his Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/johnkennyphoto

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.

Speaking this month we have:

• Neil Rees – In the Footsteps of King Zog of Albania Neil Rees researched King Zog of Albania and his exile in Buckinghamshire, England during the war. He has retraced his footsteps from his birth in rural Albania in 1895 to his death in Paris in 1961. He wrote a local history book called “A Royal Exile” about the story which has been translated into Albanian, and he is reliably informed that it is probably the first Buckinghamshire local history book ever to be translated into Albanian. It was launched at the national museum in Tirana in November 2011.
• Nadine Horn – Grateful for a spoon and getting trousers sewed by an Icelandic – Mission Spain What if you know that you like to travel, but simply don’t know where to start? Every day is the same and you feel that time is simply passing by? The talk is about the journey of creating unplanned adventures around you such as walking the Grand Union Canal from Birmingham to Northampton, walking from the heart of Edinburgh until encountering hills – discovering the motivation for the travel bug and ending up organising the first expedition in 30 days: Cycling around Spain solo – exploring a country you think you know but as a famous saying points out – it’s the journey that makes the difference. And then the stories follow…from being grateful for a spoon and getting your trousers sewed by an Icelandic.

  Find out more at www.nadinehorn.com / http://missionspain.wordpress.com/

London branch meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden the first Saturday of each month, unless there is a UK public holiday that weekend. 

Admission costs, £3 for Members and £6.00 Non-members. You do not need to be a member to attend, and we do not sell advanced tickets, please just come on the day, the doors open at 2:15pm and the program starts around 2:30pm with each talk lasting approximately 40 minutes.

There is no London meeting in August, but we start afresh each September.