Category: archive

If you already live in the UK, or know that you will be in the UK
in April, why not zip over to France? The low cost airline, Buzz is
offering discounts on 15 routes from the UK to France.

You have to book by March 5th and the journey must be taken
between 3 and 30 April 2002. Below are the (one way) prices they
quote – the cost of the return is about the same!

From just £19 one way you can buzz off to Brest – Brittany,
Caen – Normandy, Rouen – Normandy or Paris (CDG).

From just £24 one way you can discover the delights of Dijon
– Burgundy, La Rochelle, Tours – Loire Valley, Limoges, Poitiers or
Grenoble – Lyon.

From just £29 one way you can explore Bergerac – Dordogne,
Bordeaux, Marseilles Provence, Toulon – St Tropez or Toulouse.

For full terms and conditions, or to book, visit www.buzzaway.com

The first two months of each year are a busy time for anyone
interested in travel shows in London. In early January, we had the
Daily Telegraph Travel Show that was held at Olympia. It was huge and
included attractions such as a revolving climbing wall and a large
inflatable pool for would-be scuba divers to try out their under
water skills. The Globetrotters Club was well represented, as always
– thanks to Dick for organizing the stand. A large number of
Globetrotter members turned out on Saturday and Sunday to offer free
travel advice to members of the public who were thinking of
travelling; Central and South America seemed to be extremely popular
planned travel destinations. All the usual adventure and overland
companies were represented.

A couple of weeks after the Daily Telegraph Show, there was the
Destinations travel show, also held at Olympia. This is more an
opportunity for tourist offices to offer brochures and advice to help
people plan their trips to specific countries rather than longer term
round the world trips.

The final show, the Independent Travellers World show is usually
in late February. It was again held at the much smaller venue, the
Business Design Centre in Islington. Compared to last year's
effort, (and previous years, which, quite frankly were awful!) this
show was far, far better. The emphasis was mostly on independent and
backpacker travel with fewer tourist offices being represented – more
overland truck companies, gap year organizations etc. There were
loads of freebies – these included baseball hats, key rings, free
T-shirts, lots of sweeties (candies) and mugs from shipping insurance
companies!

Meeting news from our branches around the world.

Thanks go to Frank in the US for the following:

At a Budapest zoo: PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS. IF YOU HAVE
ANY SUITABLE FOOD, GIVE IT TO THE GUARD ON DUTY.

Doctor's office, Rome: SPECIALIST IN WOMEN AND OTHER
DISEASES. Hotel, Acapulco: THE MANAGER HAS PERSONALLY PASSED ALL THE
WATER SERVED HERE.

Car rental brochure, Tokyo: WHEN PASSENGER OF FOOT HEAVE IN
SIGHT, TOOTLE THE HORN. TRUMPET HIM MELODIOUSLY AT FIRST, BUT IF HE
STILL OBSTACLES YOUR PASSAGE THEN TOOTLE HIM WITH VIGOUR.

Write in and tell us your funny sign! Drop a line to the Beetle!

We had two excellent speakers in February! First was Alastair
Lee who gave us a multi-dimensional view of his travels in China
and his very close up views of climbing various horrifically vertical
mountains in Northern Yunnan. He spoke of the friendships he and his
girlfriend struck up with people who lived close by who were
fascinated by some of his climbing equipment, the weather which
looked like it was going to defeat them and entertained us with some
great poses and a dancing finale! Alastair has published a fabulous
climbing guide on New Zealand. Take a look at his web site: posingproductions.com

After the tea and coffee break, Ben Nimmo spoke of his
cathartic pilgrimage complete with trombone from Canterbury to
Santiago de Compostela, in Spain. He regaled us with hilarious
tales of some of the larger than life characters he met en route, the
amount of beer and wine he sampled, all out of a sense of duty and
through a spirit of comradeship, of course, and in particular the
story of how he became a god father to a little girl in France. Funny
stories, great pictures, wonderful trip, Ben! Ben has written a
highly moving and entertaining book called Pilgrim Snail documenting
his pilgrimage. Pilgrim Snail is available now in bookshops and
the following website fireandwater.co.uk and Ben's
next book 'In Forkbeard's Wake' is out in January
2003.

Coming next, on Saturday 2nd March, we have Philip Koniotes
talking about “The Antarctic Peninsular.” Philip has
regularly travelled to the Arctic dog-sledding and has travelled
extensively, including diving around the world and making five polar
trips – the Antarctic has been his most recent journey. He loves the
space and trying to capture it on film. After the break, Mark
Elliott will be talking on “Saving Kilum Forest” set in
NW Cameroon – about curious kingdoms and unique mountain forests.
Mark is standing in for Juliet Coombe who is unable to attend the
Globetrotter meeting due to a car accident in Australia. She is okay
but not yet fit to fly

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.
There is no London meeting in August, but we will be back on Saturday
1^st September. For more information, you
can contact the Globetrotter Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, or
visit the website: www.globetrotters.co.uk

When he's not tying his body into knots, Padmassana is a bit
of a globetrotter on the quiet. Here are his nominations for best and
worst airports:

Best:

1 Dubai: great facilities, clean, everything is so cheap and it is
the only airport where you see Rolls Royce's and Ferraris
inside!

2 Hong Kong: well organised, lots to do if your plane is
delayed

3 Zurich: the escalators are constructed in such a way that you
can wheel your trolley onto them and the wheels lock into place!

4 Tokyo: clean, well organised, the conveyor belt has traffic
lights so not too much luggage is loaded on to it at any one time, so
that bags don't fall off!

5 Moscow: the best for entertainment value – you have to guess
which gate your plane leaves from and race there! (The Beetle would
like to add this also happened to her at San Jose in Costa Rica
airport too!)

Padmassana's worst airports included Luxor for bribery (the
Beetle also experienced this after a diving holiday in the Red Sea.
At Hurgahada the man who x-rayed luggage wanted a tip/bribe, as did
the man who checked you in, as did the man who lifted your bags on to
the conveyor belt to the storage place prior to the plane arriving),
Goa where the conveyor belt chews your luggage, Islamabad where the
customs official ate Padmassana's Milka bars, Guilin, in China,
where the runway lights were switched off on final approach.
Scary!!

Write in and tell us your best airport nominations! Contact the Beetle!

Hola from Laurie!

Our next meeting will be March 2, 2002. The usual: 4:00pm at the
Wings Theater, 154 Christopher Street.

The subject is MEXICO! I will be in Mexico myself at the end of
February but will be back in time for our March meeting… Matt
Link is back again! And along with Gretchen Kelly, they
will explain the interior of the Yucatan peninsula with an emphasis
of staying at small villages near archeological sites in lieu of
staying at the plastic, commercial areas like Cancun. They will delve
into the mysteries of the Maya, touching upon their spiritual
practices and history in the area, as well as present day problems
modern Maya face in Mexico. They will also be visiting the historic
town of Merida as well, one of the loveliest towns in the country. We
will have slides as well as some arts and crafts to pass around. Both
Matt and Gretchen have attended the Maya World Conference, a meeting
of all the countries that have Mayan populations. So this will
undoubtedly be a slide show and lecture not to miss!

Gretchen Kelly is the News Editor for Business Traveler
magazine and the travel editor for Design Times magazine. Recent
feature stories Gretchen has worked on include profiles of Buenos
Aires (where she interviewed Eva Peron's living relatives),
Aboriginal Australia and the story of porcelain from Dresden to
Chungking. She is currently at work on a feature article about
Jakarta, Indonesia. For those of you who did not meet Matt at
previous meetings, he has been traveling since the age of twelve,
when he boarded his family's boat for five years and sailed
around the Pacific including the Philippines, Papua New Guinea,
Micronesia, the Solomon Islands, and New Zealand, where he attended
high school. He hasn't stopped since, having visited dozens of
countries in Eurasia and living for a number of years in both Hong
Kong and Hawaii, where he ran kayak tours and published the guidebook
Rainbow Handbook Hawaii. He now lives in New York where he works with
Arthur Frommer as Associate Editor of the magazine Budget Travel. See
you all soon. Adios!

New York meetings
are held at The Wings Theater, 154 Christopher Street (btw Greenwich
Stand Washington St), to the right of Crunch Fitness, in the Archive
on the first Saturday of each month at 4 pm.