Detail of inlay and carving, Taj Mahal

Random Posts

Join the Dots . . . . !
Join the dots and make a picture, win a major prize ! As the caption always read in the children’s comics puzzle page I used to love, I’m a great one for connections. Searching a page of scattered pinheads for patterns drove me crazy but the lure of the …
Back Country Crossroads in Hungary
Hungary, through many eyes, is a country of extremes. It lies on the fringes of Europe, unlike most European countries it is landlocked, and commonly experiences scorching heat in the summer and tree-cracking cold in winter. The Hungarian language is also one of a kind with no near relations; this …
Money for nothing and your chicks for free ! (apologies to Dire Straits !)
The notion that working as a tour leader is one long paid holiday has in fact a proportion of truth in it, but only a relatively small one, comments Bob Cranwell. You do get to go to some fabulous places, many of which you might never have got to under …
Svartisen 1
Svartisdal, for Bob Cranwell, imbued a sense of place. I was so lucky to learn this little part of history at a time when so much of it was still open to my enquiry. I was on my first trip of many driving a 10 metre bus on camping tours …
Drama in Tiger Leaping Gorge by Carl Welsby
In the mid 1990’s a company I was working for as a tour leader wanted to capitalise on the Channel 4 TV series “Beyond The Clouds”, the name referencing a mis-translation of “Yunnan” (South of the Clouds), a province of southwest China. I would be the first person from the …
Quetta, Train to Chaman – Ceri
Train to the Afghan border. The big adventure, the first of 1985, began the next day, on Weds 2nd. We’d had the idea to go to Chaman, a small village about 70 miles away, very close to the Afghan border. Podcast version here -see also written content of Bob’s story