Category Archives: travel

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“Thanks largely to the ‘sixth-most famous man in Kazakhstan’, Central Asia is attracting unprecedented attention from travellers. Films come and films go, but after the Borat hype has simmered down, the region’s oomph will keep adventurers coming back for more. So which ‘Stan has it? Lonely Planet’s Central Asian specialists argue the case for their favourite.” at the Lonely Planet.

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Depressing reading:
‘Tourism is already out of control, and unless the Cambodian government takes some pretty radical action to rein it in now much of Angkor’s magic and heritage could be lost forever.’ Guardian

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Yes, blah blah blah, I’m even getting sick of hearing myself crap on about it. But how do I reconcile my travel bug with my hippydom? Is going by rail or road where possible, and flying less and staying longer really enough?
“Travel educates and broadens the mind, and connects us to the rest of the world – which is especially important for Australians.
But how can we do it without being environmental vandals, especially as poor nations are expected to suffer the most from climate change?” Age

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I went on a tree planting holiday with Treesponsibility on the weekend. It was too snowy to do any planting on the Saturday so we went for walks instead, but on Sunday most of the snow had melted, and the sun even came out. It was lovely to get out of London, and even nicer to do something proactive for the environment. Treesponsibility are based in the Upper Calder Valley but it would be ace if similar projects were available all over the UK.

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“The UK government is to set standards for carbon offsetting schemes to bring “greater clarity” to the industry.
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The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has named just four offset providers that meet its new guidelines -Pure, Global Cool, Equiclimate and Carbon Offsets.”
BBC

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I keep forgetting to blog this… the first thing we saw when we emerged from the U Bahn in Berlin was… an Australian shop.
Of course I bought some VB, so my first beer in Berlin was actually a Victoria Bitter from a stubbie, not a stein of something frothy.
It turns out the Australian Embassy is on the same street so it’s not as random as it sounds. I still think it was a pretty good coincidence.

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Oh, and Berlin was great. Will post in more detail later. Had colds so spent a lot of time napping but it was lovely to see Dreeny. Watched the fireworks at the Brandenberg Gate from Unter der Linden, where lots of people were setting off their own fireworks. It reminded me of the the Nieuwe Markt in Amsterdam.

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Working, working, working… but in a brief moment of procrastination (double checking spelling to send a greeting in Dutch to a colleague) I managed to discover this handy Welsh phrase for the English at the moment: G