This month we had the annual member's slides show. We were treated to eight mini talks from club members, covering three continents. I have described them below in a geographical order and not the actual sequence in which they were presented.
We will start with the Americas. The Seattle suburb of Freemont took us on a tour of the strange public art on display there. This ranged from a wall decorated with gunshot to a gigantic troll who “lives” underneath a bridge. We then moved down into Mexico for a look at the less touristy areas west and north of Mexico City, taking in Guadalajara and Oaxaca. Cuzco in Peru was our last port of call in the Americas, we saw weavers in traditional garb and a saline river that helps the local people to a living.
Across the Atlantic Ocean to the Cape Verde islands off the coast of Senegal. We saw some excellent slides of this remote set of islands and its stark landscapes. Into southern Europe we stopped off at the Spanish City of Barcelona, to see some exciting pictures of a festival that included devils and fire breathing dragons as well as giants and human pyramids. Across the channel via Paris we saw some of Britain and France's architecture. We saw London's Millennium wobbly bridge, the glass pyramid of Paris' Louvre and the pyramid in Bedford!
In Asia we called in at Rajastan in India, from the Far West City of Jaisalmeer, with its spectacular hill top fortress and it's camels, then across to Udaipur on Lake Pichola, where we saw the washing ghats and the Lake Palace Hotel. Our final stop is in Cambodia at Siem Reap. We saw some of the spectacular temples at Angkor Wat, before seeing some of the local villages, which are accessible only by boat.
Thank you to all the members who spoke to us.
There is no London meeting in August, but we will be back on Saturday 7th September when Marion Bull will be talking about her recent travels, “Travelling with the Tuareg” in the Southern Algerian Sahara and rock paintings of the Tassili N'Ajjer. Julian Webster will be sharing his thoughts and slides: “India – a Kaleidoscope of Memories, Moments and Surprises.
London 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.
For more information, you can contact the Globetrotter Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk