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Royal Geographical Society Event: Discovering People, Jan Morris

Journalist, historian and novelist Jan Morris will share her love of writing and travel with an audience at the Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) on Tuesday 15th April.

It promises to be an enlightening evening: Jan Morris “one of the most remarkable literary careers in the second half of the twentieth century” (The Guardian), has been writing for over fifty years and is a major figure in journalism travel writing in Britain and the United States. Major reporting landmarks include coverage (as James Morris) on the British ascent of Everest the day before HRH Queen Elizabeth’s Coronation in 1953 – an event that touched the world. Since then she has gone on to write over thirty books about her travels around the world, covering the British Empire, Europe, Venice, Hong Kong, Sydney, Spain to name a few.

Described in the New York Times as “perhaps the best descriptive writer of our time”, Jan Morris is renowned for her unique writing style – her use of peculiar words, her personal perspective and her descriptive and imaginative prose which captures the spirit of the place she is writing about. In her own words she says “The best way to find out about a place is wander around. Wander around, alone, with all your antennae out thinking about what’s happening and what you see and what you feel”.

Date: Tuesday 15th April 2003

Time: 7.00 pm

Location: RGS-IBG, 1 Kensington Gore, London SW7 2AR

Details: An informal interview, travel writer and journalist Jan Morris talks to Libby Purves about her love of travel and writing.

Cost: £5 per ticket

Ticket Request: Events Hotline on +44 (0) 20 7591 3100 or email: events@rgs.org To view more details, visit: www.rgs.org

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New Hawaiian Cruises Planned

Hawaii depends on tourism for roughly a quarter of its economy, and since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the industry has suffered. Looks like a new US spending bill will help to bring jobs and more cruising opportunities to the Hawaiian Islands and will overturn a federal law that prohibits foreign-built ships from sailing exclusively among U.S. ports.

While many ships sail between the islands – including two of Norwegian ships – they are all foreign-flagged, and are therefore required by U.S. law to put into a non-U.S. port during an American itinerary. The Norwegian ships stop at Fanning Island in Kiribati, about 600 miles (960 kilometres) south of Hawaii. The only cruise ship that offered solely Hawaiian cruises, the US company American Classic Voyages, went bankrupt a few weeks after 9/11. Norwegian Cruise Line (actually Malaysian owned) plan to take up this space and sail exclusively among the islands without a foreign stop.

Meeting News from Ontario

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact: Svatka Hermanek:

shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.

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Mutual Aid

Maggie wrote in to say: “I enjoy reading all the stories of travelling around the world. I am planning on walking the pilgrim route to Santiago De Compostela starting in France at the end of May 2004. Has anybody done this journey? Any advice would be more than appreciated”.

If you can have walked all or part of the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela and can help Maggie, please e-mail her on: mechthild@InfoAve.Net

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Gary wrote in to say: “I'm going to be touring England and Scotland on a recumbent bike later part of May and June '03. I'm going to stay in B&Bs' and youth hostels. I'll be flying into Heathrow Airport. What's the best way for me to get to Colchester from London airport? 1) Bike from airport and figure out a way to stash my bike box. Or….

2) Catch a train from the airport and unbox my bike in a B&B in Colchester and hopefully store my bike box their for my return trip. My plan is to bike up through the Shetland Islands and then return back to my bike box in late June. If there is anyone who would like to visit with me or ride part of the way, drop me an email on: garyleffler@hotmail.com

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Need help? Want a travelling buddy or advice about a place or country – want to share something with us – why not visit our Mutual Aid section of the Website: Mutual Aid

Travel Quiz

Win a Trailblazer Handbook on Trekking in Corsica by David Abram who was a wonderful speaker at the London February Globetrotter meeting. See http://www.trailblazer-guides.com for info on Trailblazer guidebooks. They are an excellent series.

Some people have said the quiz is difficult, we say do some research, try google.com or Ask Jeeves, if you need help with the answers.

1. To which country does Corsica belong?

2. Which famous French leader was born in the 18th century in Corsica?

3. Which Italian island is 12 km to the south of Corsica?

4. Corsica has almost 1,000km or 2,000km of coastline?

5. The GR20 is a walking track true or false?

Your Name:

Your e-mail address:

Meeting News from Texas

Our speaker last month was Norman Ford (Founder of the Globetrotters Club) who gave a wonderful presentation about present slides from his cycling trips. Plans for the Copper Canyon trip where also discussed. Everyone had a blast.

This month on March 18th Joei Carlton a travel writer,will share her adventures with us.

For more information about the Texas Branch: please Contact texas@globetrotters.co.uk or call Christina at 830-620-5482 or register for email updates at click here at our website.

PLEASE NOTE NEW LOCATION

We will meet at the VFW Hall on Peace Street instead of the library on Common St.

The hall is across from the entrance to Cypress Bend Park where the April 2002 picnic was held.

Peace Street is between the library and the river off Common St. Turn on Peace Street – the Fairgrounds are across the street so you can only turn one way. There is a sign for the VFW hall on the corner. Go to the dead end (cemeteries on both sides) and turn right into the parking lot for the VFW hall.

Mark your calendars – Dates of future meetings: April 12th,

The VFW folks will open their bar so we will not go to the Hoity Toit after the meeting. If you like, bring some nibbles to share for conversation time following the meeting – since we will miss the peanuts from the Toit.

For more information about the Texas Branch: please Contact texas@globetrotters.co.uk or register for email updates at our website (click here) or call Christina at 830-620-5482

If anybody would like to enquire about meetings or help Christina, please contact her on: texas@globetrotters.co.uk

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So You Think You’re Well Travelled?

Here’s a little Beetle quiz based on airport codes. See how many you get right! Go on, have a guess!

Which cities are served by airports with the following codes:

  1. DEN
  2. OSL
  3. SIN
  4. GIG
  5. KIN

For the answers, see at the end of the e-newsletter.

Marches For Peace: London and Panama

Marcin, from Poland, but alliteratively travelling in Panama sent the Beetle this message: Hola Hombres, after only 3 hours in Panama, my host Johnny from Haiti and I went to the demonstration against the war in Iraq. It’s good that Panama also want to show that something is wrong in our world. There weren’t too many people but the atmosphere was great and the first time I saw nuns, priests and old ladies with rosary beads on the demonstrations walking along with young communists with Che Guevara flags, Indians, feminists everybody in the same spirit and I hope that our effort can make a change.

The Beetle attended the London march: who knows how many people plodded along the London streets – the organisers say 2 million, the police much less than that. It took three hours to walk from Blackfriars Bridge to Hyde Park at a slow shuffle. The atmosphere was marvellous, people of all age, race, shape, colour attended. Despite the cold and the bad sound system, it felt like attending a historic moment.