Bhutan is split into 19 districts, each of which is administered from a Dzong, or fortified monastery. These are hugely important structures, most of which date back to the 17th Century and as well as being important structures they are also very beautiful. They have commanding positions in the landscape
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When I was a small boy, growing up in the Borders, my father and I shared a passion for geography, maps in particular. We had in the house an enormous Reader’s Digest Atlas, green and gold and to me it was a door to endless adventures. We used to pour
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“It was still dark as we arrived at our watch point in the upper Lamar Valley, Yellowstone National Park and climbed the short distance to set up our scopes.. We train our optics on an area on the far side of the river valley, among the sage scrub. For the
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“There we were, at the summit of Picotta – a mountain to the north of Silves in The Algarve, Southern Portugal – the sun was beaming down and we were sweaty with the effort of getting there. The perspiration, I knew, could be to our advantage. I shoved my hands
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Northern Tanzania is exceptional – filled with Nature Reserves and National Parks it is simply one of the best wildlife viewing areas in the world. Anyone who watches wildlife programmes will have seen stunning scenes from this area, with amazing wildlife scenes taken in the Serengeti, Ngorongoro Crater, the Maasai
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We set out into Johnstone Straight with high hopes that we might see Orca. The captain seemed pretty confident, but fog was making us slightly nervous. Fifteen minutes later, there they were!! Not just one or two but lots of them, as two families had come together to socialise and
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My long-awaited trip to Botswana provided me with a myriad of experiences which I had only dreamt of. This is not a diary or day by day report; it is a mixture of the experiences I encountered and the emotions they evoked. Every day was spent making memories for me to
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Surprises! My tour-leading year often starts, first of all, with Extremadura in spring and you might think that with 22 holidays to this magical destination there might be no more surprises. How wrong – Ring Ouzel and Ferruginous Duck were new for starters! Open Country Highlights Yet it’s the staple
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