(Click on Link above for the story)
November 2008
MALI - Mysterious Timbuktu and Djenné with their Mud Mosques are synonymous with the ends of the earth. Mali is the largest country in West Africa and the Niger River is its most reliable traffic artery and life source. It is Africa’s second longest and is as important to the people of Mali as the Nile is for Egypt.
Also visiting ZAMBIA, SOUTH AFRICA, MADAGASCAR, ZANZIBAR, NGOROGORO CRATER, ETHIOPIA & LIBYA
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PERU
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April 2008
Visiting: LIMA, CUZCO, MACHU PICCHU
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(Click on link above)
May 2008
Visiting: HAVANA with Victor
May 2008
Visiting: HAVANA with Victor
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(Click on link above)
April 2008
2 Cities – 2 Cultures – a tale that encompasses cosmopolitan Mexico City – the old Tenochtitlán and the pre-Hispanic holy city of Teotihuacán with its Pyramids of the Sun and the Moon
2 Cities – 2 Cultures – a tale that encompasses cosmopolitan Mexico City – the old Tenochtitlán and the pre-Hispanic holy city of Teotihuacán with its Pyramids of the Sun and the Moon
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April 2008
My first three nights in the Guatemalan Highlands are spent at Casa Palopó, a pumpkin, blue and white coloured small villa on a hillside overlooking three magnificent volcanoes across misty waters of Lake Atitlán - alone. . . . I finally get to a Market Day in the little village of Chichicastenango – once purportedly the most colourful market in the world. . . . We leave the highlands and drive to the old colonial city of La Antigua Guatemala.
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INDIA
(Click on link above)
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(Click on link above)
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(Click on link above)
MARCH 1987
Michael visits with Mother Teresa in her convent in Calcutta before moving to live in London.
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BHUTAN
BHUTAN
(Click on Link above for the Short story)
March 1987
I am travelling with an Amex colleague Tony Singh to meet with relatives of the Bhutanese extended Royal Family whom Tony has met socially in Delhi. This is not a Royal Tour but a business trip to discuss their suitability to represent American Express and provide services for travelling cardmembers who may find themselves in trouble a long way from nowhere in the isolated Kingdom of Bhutan - lying in the heart of the Himalayas landlocked between Tibet in China, the state of West Bengal in India and the Indian annexed states of Sikkim and Assam.
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(Click on Link above for the story)
NOVEMBER 2004
Travelling with Alan Guignon and visiting: DELHI, AGRA, RANTHAMBORE NATIONAL PARK AND JAIPUR
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(Click on Link above for the story)
SEPTEMBER 2007
Visiting: DELHI, AGRA, JAIPUR AND UDAIPUR
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(Click on Link above for the story)
DECEMBER 2007
Travelling with Pam and Ken Turner and Visiting: AMMAN, PETRA, ALEPPO AND DAMASCUS
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(Click on Link above for the story)
JANUARY 2008
The Blue Nile, Ancient Kingdoms & Scenes from the Bible
- Travelling with the Turners
- Travelling with the Turners
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(Click on Link above for the story)
MAY 2007
Travelling with Pam and Ken Turner and visiting: TRIPOLI, SABRATHA, LEPTIS MAGNA AND GHADAMES
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APRIL 2001
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Our only port of call in Greece is Santorini, which rises out of the Aegean Sea and guards the mythical lost City of Atlantis.
January 2007
A year ago, my old travelling companion Alan Guignon emailed me an itinerary (as he is wont to do) for an escorted tour (yes, an escorted tour) that included a week floating down the Mekong River in the comfort of a newly built boat - it was leaving from an unknown port in China meandering through the jigsaw of countries around the Golden Triangle and down through no-man’s-land to Luang Prabang. And a visit to Siem Reap in Cambodia to cap it all off!
Travelling with old friends Pam and Ken Turner and Alan Guignon, visiting: ZHONGDIAN, LIJIANG, DALI, JINGHONG, LUANG PRABANG, AND ANGKOR WAT
MARRAKECH
(Click on Link above for the story)
September 2006
On arriving at the Villa des Orangers, an authentic 1938 townhouse just outside the souk, I enter through a nondescript door and into an Arabian nights dark reception area before being ushered into the courtyard. As I sit, I hear only the falling of the fountain. A faint sense of incense wafts through the air. Are the oranges tied on up so high in the trees or are they growing in pots that beautifully? The walls with Arabic design are not sparkling with new paint but there‟s an air of authenticity here. I sense that this is going to be good.
Beijing has been catapulted well and truly into the 21st Century since I last visited here on business trips from Hong Kong twenty years ago. I arrive in Zurich amazingly fresh after twelve hours of flying in daylight on Lufthansa from Beijing via Frankfurt to stay with the Aumuellers. Juergen meets me and takes me home to see Birgit and my God-daughter Joya-Lara, now seven. Next for a busy four days visiting the de Pietra’s in Lugano. After all the hospitality and activity in Switzerland, I’m happy to do very little in Milan over the weekend while I wait for my flight to Marrakech on Monday.
Three Countries and a Wedding
(Click on Link above for the story)
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(Click on Link above for the story)
APRIL 2001
" . . . . back in the hotel before midnight - dead to the world in a comfortable bed at last, I was roused by a knocking, and a quiet voice on the other side of the door. “We need you to get dressed and come to the lobby. There‟s an emergency.” Drowsily, but with haste, I dress, and thinking that there is a fire, open the door and ask, “Why?” Composed, the hotel clerk softly answers “There are men in the hotel with guns.”
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(Click on Link above for the story)
Our only port of call in Greece is Santorini, which rises out of the Aegean Sea and guards the mythical lost City of Atlantis.
Travelling with Lee, the other ports of call are: CATANIA IN SICILY, ROME, NAPLES, DUBROVNIK, VENICE
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(Click on Link above for the story)
January 2007
A year ago, my old travelling companion Alan Guignon emailed me an itinerary (as he is wont to do) for an escorted tour (yes, an escorted tour) that included a week floating down the Mekong River in the comfort of a newly built boat - it was leaving from an unknown port in China meandering through the jigsaw of countries around the Golden Triangle and down through no-man’s-land to Luang Prabang. And a visit to Siem Reap in Cambodia to cap it all off!
Travelling with old friends Pam and Ken Turner and Alan Guignon, visiting: ZHONGDIAN, LIJIANG, DALI, JINGHONG, LUANG PRABANG, AND ANGKOR WAT
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MARRAKECH
(Click on Link above for the story)
September 2006
On arriving at the Villa des Orangers, an authentic 1938 townhouse just outside the souk, I enter through a nondescript door and into an Arabian nights dark reception area before being ushered into the courtyard. As I sit, I hear only the falling of the fountain. A faint sense of incense wafts through the air. Are the oranges tied on up so high in the trees or are they growing in pots that beautifully? The walls with Arabic design are not sparkling with new paint but there‟s an air of authenticity here. I sense that this is going to be good.
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(Click on Link above for the story)
September 2006
Visiting: BEIJING, SWITZERLAND, MILAN AND MARRAKECH
Beijing has been catapulted well and truly into the 21st Century since I last visited here on business trips from Hong Kong twenty years ago. I arrive in Zurich amazingly fresh after twelve hours of flying in daylight on Lufthansa from Beijing via Frankfurt to stay with the Aumuellers. Juergen meets me and takes me home to see Birgit and my God-daughter Joya-Lara, now seven. Next for a busy four days visiting the de Pietra’s in Lugano. After all the hospitality and activity in Switzerland, I’m happy to do very little in Milan over the weekend while I wait for my flight to Marrakech on Monday.
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(Click on Link above for the story)
June 2004
Word of the pending marriage of Alexandra, the daughter of old Amex friends, Hector and Dolores in Madrid became the Genesis for my travel plans for 2004. So Europe was to be my destination one more time. I had no inkling that this visit to Madrid would also take me to Salamanca, Ávila and Segovia with amazing connections to my Catholic schooling of more than fifty years ago.
Visiting: SHANGHAI, CORNWALL, SPAIN
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The Kimberleys - Cruising on the Orion
TASMANIA - "My Sister and Me" - with Anne and Trevor Schramm -
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BOROBUDUR AND AMANJIWO IN CENTRAL JAVA
(Click on Link above for the short story)
(Click on Link above for the story)
May 2006
I have been bobbing along in shark infested sparkling waters on the expedition cruise ship Orion – a 100 metre ocean going mega-yacht for nearly a week now. I’m sailing with Andrew and ninety fellow adventurers along the remote, rugged Kimberley coast of Western Australia for eleven days. We go ashore in zodiacs to view wildlife and explore some of the most pristine parts of the planet. At times we get wet. But what the hell? It’s part of the fun!
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(Click on Link above for the story)
March 2007
The latest in a series of Short Stories by would-be Travel Writer Michael Musgrave, on board the “Orion” Gourmet Food & Wine Expedition Cruise from Hobart to Sydney in March 2007,
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(Click on Link above for the short story)
APRIL 2007
I'm staying in what many would think was a wonderful Small Luxury Hotel but for me it is irritating. The Eugenia is a small hotel of twelve rooms is in the Sukhimvit area in a quiet residential street in Bangkok. It is a wonderful example of an old house being lovingly restored to century-old condition.
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BOROBUDUR AND AMANJIWO IN CENTRAL JAVA
(Click on Link above for the short story)
I am staying at Amanjiwo, one of the “cutting-edge” Aman Resorts in Indonesia. The architects designed the complex magnificently to be located within sight of the eighth-century Borobudur Temple here in Central Java. Walk in the front door, and there the temple stands in all majesty before you on the horizon.
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| Borobudur Temple |
