Frankly, I’d been too busy to really consider a holiday, but when Michelle suggested a fortnight in Vietnam, I thought I’d give it a go. Armed with the latest Lonely Planet we came up with suggestions for ground content which I sent to Anne at Travel Indochina to develop a full itinerary. Three weeks later, following vaccinations and visa photographs,…
Author: Garry Burns
The Chef’s Table – Radiance of the Seas
We returned from a month in the states for one day of laundry and bill-paying before jetting off to Sydney and a taste of new age cruising on Royal Caribbean’s latest behemoth to base in Sydney for the summer – the newly refurbished Radiance of the Seas. I pity those diners who risk a booking in Peter Gilmore’s outstanding Quay…
Oman
My introduction to Doha was a half-day guided city tour showcasing the sea-front Corniche, Dhow Harbour , The Old Souq (Market), Equestrian Club, Falcon Market, Fruit and Vegetable Market, Fish Market, Traditional Market and the city Centre Mall. Thoughts of Doha were overall positive, but qualified. I concluded that Doha is a “Work in Progress”; clean, but a little sterile, and…
Machu Picchu to Cuzco – Day7
Thursday: We checked out early and high-tailed to the depot to catch the 8am bus up the mountain so we could explore the citadel before the flood of day-trippers arrived from Cuzco around 10am. After roaming through the terraces, dodging happy-snappers and wandering alpacas, we slowly gravitated to the path leading higher up the mountain towards the Sun Gate. Intipunku, the Incan…
Machu Picchu – Day6
Wednesday 6am. The phone delivered the wake-up call exactly as requested and we had commenced dressing for breakfast when we received a second call advising that our driver was waiting at Reception to rush us to the Ollantaytambo station for the re-scheduled Vistadome journey to the ‘lost city’ of Machu Picchu. As Michelle hurried off to settle our account I stuffed…
Sacred Valley of the Incas – Day5
Tuesday: A buffet breakfast at 7am in the antique-littered hotel dining room afforded the spectacle of an Indian woman shuffling across the frosty hotel lawn carrying tall bundles of folded cloth. Finding a sunny patch, she placed her bundle down and smoothed out two blankets on the crisp, white-covered grass, one for her pile of brightly coloured blankets, the other…
Reserva Amazonica – Day3
Sunday. Very little disturbs me more than being dragged from a deep sleep before the sun approaches the general vicinity of a yardarm, so imagine my general pissedoffedness at being woken at 5am by an Interpreter banging on the wall of our cabana in Reserva Amazonica. Choosing not to believe we had deliberately eschewed the 1/2 day Lake Sandoval tour…
Amazon to Yucay – Day4
Monday. After breakfast we joined a party of departing guests for the upriver cruise to the port at Puerto Maldonado and the short drive to the airport. Whether it was the oppressive humidity or simple tiredness, there was little chatter among the nearly departed. A two-hour wait culminated in the arrival of the plane and we were once again flying above…
Lima to the Peruvian Amazon – Day2
Saturday. With our pickup and airport transfer scheduled for 0630, we lingered over a buffet breakfast and wandered the hotel admiring its examples of pre-Columbian relics and replica statuary. Outside the atmosphere was typically Lima-heavy. The all-pervading mist from the cool Pacific trapped over the flat urban landscape by the distant Andes mountain range. The airport drive seemed much longer…
Lima – Day1
Friday. The arrival in Lima was a mildly disorienting experience. It was the culmination of a six hour flight from Mexico City and occurred just short of midnight. Collected by our driver-guide for the short visit we were ferried through the fog to our hotel in the beachside district of Miraflores, sleep deprivation and the pervasive mist casting the initial…