· David Stanley at Avalon Travel Publishing has just issued the latest edition of Moon Tahiti…a well received series of travel books. See more details athttp://www.southpacific.org/tahiti.html
·Greetings from Bike the Earth:-
Dear Globetrotters
Wonderful to get your news as we are in mid Australia on BIKE THE EARTH –http://www.biketheearth.net (Please check out at least the first page of our website).
We have done 3500 km, connecting communities, inspiring initiatives, on ABC Television, on the radio, and in the media, with some great testimonials for the work we are doing!
This time round Mac recalls time in Hong Kong & Macau…
“I made several trips by boat to Macau from Hong Kong and when I was there they had several casino boats for gambling but no elaborate casino or hotel…
There was a “noodle” priest in Hong Kong that from donations of flour from the US & Canada he had noodles made by I believe Canadian nuns in Hong Kong. It was better to give noodles to the poor in Hong Kong rather than sacks of flour as they could just dip the noodles in hot water.
On our trips to Hong Kong I volunteered to help pass out these five pounds of noodles. Someone would canvas the poor and give them a ticket & told to appear at such a place – then I or some volunteer would give them a five pound sack in exchange. It got to be quite the social in thing for Ambassadors wives etc to be a volunteer for this duty.
One time it was the Ambassador from New Zealand who had a small girl and the three of us did the duty. The girl had taken a Chinese name like Ming Ling which means beautiful and she would answer her Mother only if the Mother called her Ming Ling. I was doing the lifting in the hot sun and I fainted which was embarrassing as here is was this well fed Caucasian handing out these sack of noodles to these thin people !
I did this several trips until the priest (I think maybe he was Italian) invited me to go to Macau where they made the noodles. He had a motor scooter and took me all around Macau on his motorbike and to the border of China where Chinese soldiers were looking over at us. He said they sometimes fired their arms in the air to let us know they knew we were watching them through binoculars.”
The night in Macau made it look more like Las Vegas than I experienced it but maybe it has been built up since. One time getting on boat to go Macau the Chinese lady next to me got sea sick and was ill on me..we hadn’t left the harbour yet.
Macau must have changed since I was there but then the whole world has. Hope you get a chance to enjoy the wonderful Chinese…
If like me, your idea of a long distance cycle trip is a mountain bike ride around Richmond Park, then you might wonder whether Stephen Lord’s “Adventure Cycle-Touring Handbook” is for you. My review copy sat with me for six months, waiting for me to find a way in and to answer that question…
Adventure Cycle-Touring Handbook, Picture courtesy of TrailBlazer Guides
See TrailBlazer’s web site for more details of this updated edition including ordering information, reviews & excerpts to browse –
And for more of an insight into Stephen Lord, trying reading this interview with him by the Travelling Two web site http://travellingtwo.com/5032.
I should have had no fears about tackling “Adventures Cycle-Touring”…its narrative is ‘full of get out there and do’. Consequently I felt myself drawn into this particular long distance world. Through both the Globetrotters club & the Royal Geographical Society I have met & talked to a number of long distance cyclists but I was never sure I understood their drive & reasoning. Now by sifting through this hardcore almanac of matters cycling I can shine some light on what motivates these ultra travellers…
On a general level “Adventure Cycle-Touring” had me reminiscing about my early days of planning my round the world trip – full of possibilities & differing uncertainties. It is absolutely crammed with help, facts & anecdotes…at times its detail could overwhelm nervous travel planners J There is an absolute bank of information within…what to look for in a bike, what you need to know about maintaining the bike & your fitness and what you should pack for your very own epic !
New travel names also help to widen the possible enjoyment & reach. Bill Wier writes engagingly on India & China…how can a reader not got charmed by his opening paragraph on the sub continent as it reads – “Exotic, enticing, though sometimes exasperating, India will entertain you like no other country – and cycling provides the best way to experience it!”. Or Tom Kevill-Davies as he adds a culinary taste to adventure cycling via his alter ego ” The Hungry Cyclist” from page 233 onwards. These guys show us the diversity of adventures to be had…
As with any review it is not easy to succinctly critique what you read and still convey the subject matter in such a tightly packed review. So as pointers for potential readers I thought on some of the following:-
What I Liked ?
· I enjoyed reading about cyclists such Peter Gostelow or Alastair Humphreys…people who have a wider, more well known public appeal and yet are keeping true to enjoying what set them off in the first place. These hardy souls get back into their saddles almost immediately their current trip has finishes, searching for new challenges that they can take on & then recount to attentive audiences.
· Inserts throughout each of the chapters – giving a people perspective across a whole range of experiences, whether about routes travelled or the mechanics of a trip. I particularly liked “Planning Schedule” on page 12, the “Trailer Alternative” on Page 54 and “You cannot be said in Sumatra” on Page 172 – they are neat encapsulations that give the reader the sense that they can also dip into this text, as well as work their way through it.
What needs a touch more polish ?
· Whilst there are continental route maps, there is a lack of useful, detailed maps to illustrate journeys described within each unfortunately. Admittedly readers might buy their own or use internet based sources, but having all this information in one space builds up the reading enjoyment and usefulness of the guidebook.
· The final chapters of the guidebook seem to suffer from ‘packing too much in syndrome’. For example the glossary of terms is just a single page and the Appendices are neither overview or detailed help.
· A couple of final nitpicks that if resolved could help deliver an even more authoritative handbook. One being…do females not travel as long distance cyclists and/or they less publicised ? And the best is not made of all of the colour photographs, as some are not placed in context of the chapters they refer to – it would make for a stronger use of the images if they all illustrated their relevant stories.
Martin Wright, a Globetrotter who unfortunately died whilst in the saddle, covered much of the globe in a style that this handbook reminds me of – lightly impacting his surroundings, not rushing and engaging all experiences with an open mind. Overall Trailblazers Guides are up there with the best of the guidebooks on the travel guides market – they are for independent travellers by independently travelling authors. They are not glossy or hotspot orientated…they get you travelling. Long may they be on the road…
Competition time – the first person who can tell me who first cycled round the world & when, then they can have my review copy of this handbook for free ? Send your answers to theant@globetrotters.co.uk and announce the winner in a following edition.
For information on Ontario meetings, please contact Svatka Hermanek: shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.
John Pilkington – A stroll through the axis of evil – Lebanon, Syria, Iraq & Iran
Photographer, documentary maker, traveller but above all brilliant lecturer on his travels around this wonderful world of ours and in doing so gave an excellent, entertaining slide show on his latest trip. “A Stroll Through The Axis Of Evil” A play on George Bush senior’s words of a few years ago…John’s route took us through the Euphrates, the Caucasus and the Valley of the Assassins to finish on the Persian Gulf.
To read more about John & his travels visit his web site at http://www.pilk.net/
Dick Curtis – It all started in Kashmir ….
Former London meetings organiser, Wasps rugby union number one fan & all round personable chap Dick took us back to an earlier point in his life and explained what first set him on his travels and his subsequent adventures in Kashmir. Many of the audience appreciated Dick’s standpoint and in listening to him, remembered their own experiences of independent travel…an excellent compliment to John’s engaging first half.
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.
A new year edges out of the wintery days and we have a raft of articles, news & anecdotes to recount for you…
Hot off the press – introducing the Globetrotters Club new President John Pilkington 🙂
John Pilkington, Picture courtesy of Tony Annis
John arrived at the London branch December meeting, expecting to renew a number of friendships & acquaintances and deliver his booked talk on travelling through the ‘Axis of Evil’.
However John left London with more than he bargained for – club members Jeanie Copland & Jacqui Trotter also invited him to become our President…and according to Tony Annis who was in the audience he “was enthusiastically endorsed by the whole audience”.
John’s involvement in the club has now come full circle, as he once helped make tea [during a meeting] for the club many years ago.
You will get to hear more from John over the coming months but like me I’m sure you’ll welcome him aboard & wish him luck !
Congratulations John 🙂
What else is happening across the wider travel world ?
· the Adventure Travel Show returns to London in January 2011, http://www.adventuretravellive.com/, where the club’s very own Dick Curtis will be organising a travel advice stand once more. Hopefully the volunteers can continue to help would be travellers make sense of all the possibilities the exhibitors highlight 🙂
If you don’t fancy volunteering you can still benefit from the club’s friendship with the show’s organisers…members can get a discounted entry to the show itself…simply the club’s Members’ Area on the web site or contact me for details via email.
· Hot on the heels follows London & Birmingham’s Destinations Travel shows – http://www.destinationsshow.com/, where more mainstream travel options get their airing as well
· I’ve also got news of another discount for club members – this time it’s courtesy of www.travelwritingworkshop.co.uk. Organiser Peter Carty is offering “…[for] the workshop…in central London…there is a discount of £10 for your members…the next workshops are January 29th and February 26th 2011″.
November’s edition see’s us gathering some global miles/kilometres as we catch up on our world of travel.
As you can see we have the return of Mac to enjoy, feedback on Doreen Tayler…the club’s travel award winning BBC guest speaker and highlight’s from London’s latest branch meeting. A good solid travelling starting to these darker, wetter months for us in the northern hemisphere J
South Africa & the USA are covered in no less detail both from quite an adventurous perspective…perhaps inspiring future trips for any of us? And all rounded off with a dash of travel news & web sites to give some breadth.
What else is happening across the wider travel world ?
The Adventure Travel Show returns to London in January 2011, http://www.adventuretravellive.com/, where the club’s very own Dick Curtis will be organising a travel advice stand once more. Hopefully the volunteers can continue to help would be travellers make sense of all the possibilities the exhibitors highlight J
Hot on the heels follows London & Birmingham’s Destinations Travel shows – http://www.destinationsshow.com/, where more mainstream travel options get their airing as well
That’s all for now, enjoy the read and keep sending me more of your stories, adventures and articles J
Denise returned to the London branch and focused on one of her many Cambodian passions the role of dance & its cultural impact on the country’s history. Starting at Angkor Wat intricate temples and moving up through the ages to Pol Pot’s regime, Denise led us knowledgeably & enthusiastically through why she is so fascinated by her subject matter ! Now I’m not a dance person but I found myself listening intently to all that she had to present to us.
Paul Archer – The It’s on the Meter Expedition: Hard Hearted Hannah – the Meanest Gal in Town!
The second talk was such a contrast on a number of levels three university friends Paul, Johno & Leigh are driving their black cab Hannah from London to Sydney, in aid of raising much needed funds for the British Red Cross charity and having as many adventures as possible. At the moment the guys are learning to repair their cab, be safe in challenging locations and ensuring that Hannah can look after them for eight months ! As Paul says “The planned route travels through some of the most inhospitable and beautiful regions in the World covering four continents, thirty-nine countries, ten time zones and over 35,000 miles”.
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 in September.
Saturday 27th of November is our next meeting and again and we have two fabulous talks lined up for that day, the first one is by Don and Eve, who have spent time travelling through the outback in Australia. They will have lots of information on the “must see” list and what to avoid, places to stay and help for travel overland.
We will have our usual break where everyone can swap stories and relax over a nice cup of tea or coffee and biscuits.
Then after the break Madeleine is going to introduce us to the Great Wall of China and in addition going off the beaten track into Inner Mongolia.
We started a year ago with our Chester Branch of Globetrotters and we really have appreciated your support over the last 12 months, but it is essential to maintain attendance at the bi-monthly meetings to make Chester Globetrotters a viable society and therefore hope you will support us again in the coming year so that we can continue with our success and enjoy the benefits of a travel club locally.
For information on Ontario meetings, please contact Svatka Hermanek: shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.
The Ontario branch meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.
Not only did Doreen enjoy her Globetrotters’ travel award part funded trip earlier this year, she also gained herself an interview on national UK radio J As part of BBC Radio 4’s Excess Baggage show, http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/excessbag, Doreen was interviewed by John McCarthy & for 15 minutes, where she recalled her adventures around India as she travelled a route much trodden by Rudyard Kipling’s iconic character Kim. If you listen to the Podcast you might even hear Doreen mention Globetrotters J
Other listeners & readers also enjoyed Doreen’s adventure and here are some of the most positive comments:-
Barbara at barbara.arndt@btinternet.com commented that After listening to Radio 4 this morning I checked out Globetrotter’s web site. Doreen Tayler’s story is really great. I can totally sympathise as I travelled on my own in India and her article brought back many memories. Well done, Doreen and many more happy travels
Read your article with great interest as we to discovered India in our prime and pleased to say we had a great experience despite all the misgivings of others who went before us.
I help run the Chester club and on 17th July we are privileged to hear about the travels of another couple who did very much the same as we did. Found a taxi driver we felt we could trust and paid him by the day to show us his home land. We got far more than we bargained for as he had a relative in almost every place we visited including one who owned one of the many reed boats in Kerala so yes we spent a night on one. What it cost us to hire him we certainly got back in cheap deals and wonderful experiences including meeting his family and being treated to a welcome and a banquet fit for a visiting king.
Perhaps we saw India as everyone should see it through the eyes of someone who is passionate about his homeland and not through a package deal which protects you so say from harm and influence..
“Wanted: The World’s Greatest Travelers To Compete in Around-the-World Travel Adventure Competition” SANTA MONICA, CA 2 November 2010
Looking for all would-be Magellan’s, promising Indiana Jones-types, adventurous Nellie Bly hopefuls, and Phileas Fogg contenders!
The annual around the world travel adventure competition known as The Global Scavenger Hunt, that will begin April 15th taking participating teams to at least ten countries over 23-days before crowning The World’s Greatest Travelers on May 7th, wants real travelers to compete in a real travel adventure event.
Novice wayfarers and jaded travel veterans always ask who the greatest travelers are Are they independent globetrotters, backpacking travel junkies, business travelers (aka road warriors), do travel writers make for great travelers, what about tour guides or travel agents, maybe travel bloggers have an inside edge these days, or even former reality TV contestants?
It just makes such great on-the-road travel conversation: Who are the best travelers? asks Event Director and author William D. Chalmers, But our event adds a new wrinkle to that simmering debate, because for the first time all those Amazing Race wannabes who claim that I could do that!’ finally have the opportunity to prove it in a real life travel adventure competition. The rubber meets the highway–literally in our event.
The Global Scavenger Hunt travel adventure is designed to test not only participants travel IQ, those well-honed travel skills that serious international competitors bring to the event; like overcoming language barriers, intercultural competence, logistic challenges, team dynamics, the heat of competition, and three week’s worth of real-world creative problem solving, while traveling to at least 10 countries performing cultural scavenges; but this real-life event is also about getting travelers to trust strangers in strange lands and about personally and actively participating in sight-doing scavenges, not just passive sight-seeing while traveling the globe.
The travel competition is now accepting applications at the GlobalScavengerHunt.com website for a limited number of 25-two person team slots available for the 2011 event that will at the end, crown The World’s Greatest Travelers. The reigning 2010 champions are excited about defending their title and crown in this life-changing event against other international travelers.
Life-changing because not only are there bragging rights and The World’s Greatest Travelers trophy at stake, but because Teams will be collectively traveling more than one million kilometers in travel-a-thon fashion to help raise funds towards a $1 million goal for ongoing global charitable efforts including micro-loans supporting entrepreneurial women, and the continued building of co-ed elementary schools in developing nations such as: Kenya, Niger, Sri Lanka, Sierra Leone, and Ecuador, among others.
The event is limited to 25-two person teams, and the $9,900 per person entry fee (about $400 a day) includes: all international airfare, first class hotels, 40% of meals, along with special event gear. All travelers will be interviewed for suitability! Single travelers are welcome to apply.
Via an email from R. Dale Anderberg, Mac came up with these answers to some interesting questions about the life he’s enjoyed so far. Just a bit of harmless fun but it does help to explain our American friend The Ant
A. Three names I go by:
Billy (when young)
Macsan (Japan)
Your Excellency
B. Three places I’ve lived:
Japan (five and one half years (military)
McCool Junction, Nebraska
Have been in over 150 countries both in]
and out of service.
C. Three places I’ve worked
In Nebraska and California Railway mail service
New York City (mafia)
Everywhere taking travel notes.
D. Three things I love to watch:
Not answered what happened Mac ?
E. Three places I have been:
Not answered what happened Mac ?
F. Three people that email me regularly:
Toogood
Janis, Marilyn, Carol, Betty, Ann, Linda, Kay, and all the other nieces.
World War 11 llths Armd Div buddys
G. WHAT I LIKE TO eat
Dunkin Doughnuts and their coffee (prefer it to Starbrucks)
Italian Wedding Soup
Peach pie with icecream
H. Three things I am looking forward to:
Richard Haddocks new book
Any new travel thing Pico Iyler writes.
To be able to travel again.
I. Three people I think will respond:
None
Maybe all of the above.
The Beetle, The Ant, and Padmassana (Globetrotter people)
If you enjoy writing & travelling, why not write for the free Globetrotters eNewsletter ! The Ant would love to hear from you: your travel stories, anecdotes, jokes, questions, hints and tips, or your hometown or somewhere of special interest to you. Over 14,000 people currently subscribe to the Globetrotter eNewsletter.
Email The Ant at theant@globetrotters.co.uk with your travel experiences / hints & tips / questions. Your article should be approximately 1000 words, feature up to 3 or 4 jpeg photos and introduce yourself with a couple of sentences and a contact e-mail address.
We hope that you might find information about our Epic Enabled holidays and Accessible Epic Guest House in Cape Town useful for your members, if ever they want to travel further afield to Africa.
South Africa, the most cosmopolitan of the African nations, has long been renowned for its bio-diversity, wildlife and the breathtakingly beautiful landscape.
However, these amazing gifts of nature have always been little more than a dream for people stricken by disability. Until now! Epic Enabled offers accessible African Safari’s in South Africa’s famous Kruger National Park , and private game reserve close by, as well as day tours in Johannesburg , Cape Town the
Or do you know someone who could benefit from a helping hand into the wider world ?
What is the award ?
Each year the club offers up to two £1,000 awards to give out for the best independent travel plan, as judged by the club’s Committee.
The deadline to receive applications for the next award is 31 May 2011.
See the legacy page on the club’s web site for more details, where you can review previous winners’ trips and/or apply with your plans for a totally independent, travel trip.
If your idea catches our eye we’ll take a closer look at what you’re proposing and give you feedback & maybe a helping hand on your journey of a lifetime !!
This time round Mac recalls time in Hong Kong & Macau…
Denise Heywood – A Cambodian Odyssey Part 2
Paul Archer – The It’s on the Meter Expedition: Hard Hearted Hannah – the Meanest Gal in Town!