Fun and games and Adventure Travel Live
Just wanted to say a big thanks to everyone who came along to my talks at Adventure Travel Live yesterday. It was fun talking to you all and I hope I helped inspire you all to go off and have your own amazing adventures.
A hearty thanks as well to Chris and all the guys at Escape Events for inviting me along in the first place.
A number of highlights from the day:
The parking officers trying to figure out where to put the parking ticket on the Dragoman overland truck parked out front. (There’s a pic above)
Chatting to Alastair and Stephen from Oz Bus about their plans for the company. (Keep your eye out for an info evening at Australia House very soon.)
Meeting Geoff Hann from Hinterland Travel. He runs tours to Iraq. Chatting to him shelling out £3,000 to ignore Foreign Office warnings, drive along roads the Americans avoid and skipping on travel insurance because no-one will cover you anyway suddenly makes sense.
Another thing that became abundantly clear is that if I want to get serious about this speaking thing I’ve got to get a sexy appellation to stick after my name. In the program notes and on the boards outside the theatres I was simply listed by name. Everyone else had adventurer, explorer or trailblazer tacked on the end.
And if I really want to walk in these rarefied circles I need to get myself a scarf – a sort of light weight explorer-y kind of one that looks dashing and keeps out the dust during the inevitable Saharan sandstorm that’s only seconds away, even in SW1.
Kind of like the one I saw Benedict Allen wearing when he swished past yesterday.
The Blog!
February 2nd, 2010 at 5:20 pm
I’ve heard a bit about Hinterland Travel from news articles and such like. Just had a browse of their website, and the range of trips is quite mouthwatering! The idea of an organised tour doesn’t hugely appeal, but in these sorts of places I think I could make an exception…
February 2nd, 2010 at 5:58 pm
Hi Simon – I agree. I’m not one for going on tours. And the price is a bit steep. (But understand why considering they have to hire armed escorts!)
Still, it has me a bit excited about the possibility of popping into Northern Iraq (ie Kurdistan) for a bit of independent travelling. So much so that I just booked a return ticket to Diyabikar in Eastern Turkey to try my luck.
February 2nd, 2010 at 6:40 pm
Brilliant! Safe travels when it comes.
February 4th, 2010 at 9:45 am
You don’t have a scarf???
I had always imagined you had a scarf. I shall have to rethink you …
February 12th, 2010 at 3:17 pm
I traveled along Turkey’s borders to the south and the east last summer, and I can warmly recommend it. Diyarbak?r is a funny place with its ancient walls and friendly Kurdish people mumbling something about not being Turkish. It’s often extremely hot during the summer, even by Australian standards!
Heading into Northern Iraq was extremely tempting to me. It’s so easy. You just go down to the minibus terminal and ask your way around, and the paperwork will be handled at the border. In the end I realized I had more than enough on my schedule already, so I stayed in Turkey, but I will go back eventually. If the Kurds on the Iraqi side are half as friendly as the ones in Turkey, I’ll feel extremely safe and welcome there as well.
There are great things to see in Turkish Kurdistan as well. To me, Mount Nemrut was the highlight. I put together a (lengthy) photo travelogue from the trip, Nemrut/Kurdistan begins at
http://www.pvv.org/~bct/ataturk/imagepages/image63.htm
There are some bits from Diyarbak?r as well, images 89 through 99.
Happy trails!
Bjørn