No. 4: July 2004

DOUBLE WHAMMY

PAUL MANSFIELD picked up two awards in the Visit USA Association Media Awards at the Dorchester last month. His Daily Telegraph article on the civil rights trail in Alabama won the award for best newspaper feature, and he was also named Travel Journalist of the Year 2004. Be nice if this made it easier to enter the country without an I-Visa, but thinking about it, the reverse is likely to be the case… Meanwhile he's just back from New England, Bournemouth and Florence, where he overheard the following remark by an American woman in a restaurant. 'This red wine is too hot. Can I get a diet coke, please?' Only joking. Please don't take his awards away.

Contact: PAULMANS1@aol.com.

CUBAN CLASSICS ON WHEELS

CHRISTOPHER P BAKER's coffee-table book Cuba Classics: A Celebration of Vintage American Automobiles (ISBN 1-56656-546-4 USA/ISBN 1-4050-1335-4 UK) has been released in hardback by Interlink Publishing (www.interlinkbooks.com), and in the United Kingdom by Macmillan Caribbean (www.macmillan-caribbean.com). In this 190-page pictorial essay featuring more than 150 images, Baker pays homage to Cuba's astonishing wealth of antique cars, revealing the time-worn splendor of classic American automobiles spanning eight decades. From Model-T Fords and '40s-era Buick Roadmasters to late '50s Edsel Citations and Chevrolet Impalas with fins sharp enough to draw blood, Cuba Classics evokes the nostalgic and seductive world of Cuba's car culture. Robert Holmes, twice SATW's Photographer of the Year, wrote the Foreword, concluding with the words: "Whether your interest is old cars, Cuba, or good photography per se, this exquisite coffee-table book will not disappoint. For a writer of Baker's ability to demonstrate equal talent as a photographer is an enviable accomplishment. Cuba Classics will become a classic in its own right." Review comments have been equally glowing. Martin Cruz Smith (author of Gorky Park and Havana Bay) wrote: "This is the most beautiful, most sympathetic book about Cuba I have seen for years. It's terrific!"

Contact: cpbaker@earthlink.net.

BY SEA, BY BIKE AND ON FOOT

JUDY ARMSTRONG has just completed photographic and writing sessions on sea kayaking in the Outer Hebrides, mountain biking in France and hill walking in both France and the Scottish Highlands. She will be in Britain through summer and France through autumn, and would be delighted to do more of the same on request.

Contact: judy.journalist@virgin.net, or ring 01751 417371.

SNOW IN SUMMER

Although seldom caught unprepared, FELICITY MARTIN admits to having got “a wee bit cold” on 19-20 June while photographing the Lowe Alpine Mountain Marathon - at Glen Carron in the NW Highlands - when a blizzard in the mountains caused a third of the teams to drop out.

She survived with all fingers intact and continued north to Orkney to shoot a lot more pics in the almost continuous midsummer daylight. Quickly slipping into island hopping mode, she found the smaller isles ideal for coastal walking and traffic-free cycling. Her two tips: keep your cycle helmet on while walking through a bonxie colony and remember a torch for exploring chambered cairns.

Now back home, she’s writing up commissioned features, but would welcome further enquiries as there are so many angles to these surprisingly verdant islands.

Contact: felicitymartin@sol.co.uk; Telephone: 01764 684454.

SOLANGE MEETS THE ONION MEN

Free beer today? calling all pilgrims to Winchester... To find out more about the city (and the beer), give me a call, says SOLANGE HANDO.

Do you prefer cider or seaweed (food or wrap)? I've just been to Finistère, not the 'end' but the 'beginning of the land', say the Bretons, and I can tell you about Roscoff or Quimper, thalassotherapy or the onion men.

Now I'm in love with Auvergne, having relaxed in Vichy, rushed around Clermont-Ferrand and learned all about volcanoes in the shadow of puy de Dôme.

And of course, Jordan is still on offer. Any takers? Hurry before the crowds return.

Contact: solange.travel@ukonline.co.uk.

MADRILENO MADNESS

SARAH DAWSON has just returned from a full and lively break in Madrid to research a cultural weekend feature where as a diversion from her daytime tours of the three incredible and internationally acclaimed museums, the Prado, Thyssen Bornemisza and the Queen Sofía National Art Centre, she was delighted to be spirited around the city on the back of a Madrileno's motorbike.

As well as enjoying the arts and culture she partied in true 'mad' Madrileno style and experienced plateful's of delicious tapas, several glasses of local beer, many different bars and taverns and at least three night-clubs. And all in one evening/morning!

She has been persuaded to get back to basics and leave her Clarins and creature comforts at home at the end of July to go camping at the Big Chill festival in Malvern Hills, Herefordshire.

Following this, she's off to the Portuguese islands - the Azores - to write about the enjoyment and healing benefits of a swimming with dolphins holiday, followed in September by a weekend break feature in Seville.

Contact: sarahdawson@onetel.net.uk.

MARI's ON THE MOVE

MARI NICHOLSON is just off to France to write a piece about the places that have inspired some of the great painters, including Monet and Dufy. We're being accompanied by an art historian. We're looking at the landscape that inspired, not discussing the finer points of the paintings so the articles will not be academic, but can be if needed. If anyone else out there is interested, please contact me.

Had a brilliant trip through Lazio and Tuscany in early June. Lazio is the neighbouring province to Tuscany where you're less likely to bump into C-list celebs and MPs. Cheaper too and equally beautiful. Travelled one week in Tuscany using local transport and would like to find someone interested in an article on "doing" Tuscany this way. Italy has one of the best rail and bus network I've travelled on - and it is very inexpensive! Ideal for non-drivers or folk who don't want the hassle.

Ninety years ago five crowned heads of Europe attended, this year the Ministry of Sound. What is the connection? Cowes Week on the Isle of Wight, the holiday island that behind the scenes has been re-inventing itself. It has just staged one of the UK's best music festivals this year and has now booked the Ministry of Sound for Cowes Week. For those who still think the island is wrapped in a cocoon of Victoriana, think again. Cowes Week, Garlic Festival, Extreme Sports - it's all happening in the middle of the Solent, 7 minutes from the mainland by fast catamaran and only 2 hours train and cat from London.

The Gota Canal that runs from Stockholm to Gothenburg has trips lasting 3 days on turn of the 20th century boats. I shall be embarking on this mini-cruise in three weeks time, stopping for a few days in Gothenburg on the way out and a few days in Stockholm on the way back. SAS issue tickets through one gateway and out the other. Not many people get to do this trip as it only runs during the summer months. I'm happy to take on commission for either city breaks, the cruise or all combined. Any takers?

Contact: maritravel@beeb.net.

RESEARCHING MUSEUMS

A rock concert in Copenhagen's Tivoli Gardens and cave paintings in the Pyrenees have been just two highlights for GILLIAN THORNTON in recent weeks. She's also enjoyed a few unusual and impressive museums - the National Maritime Museum, Cornwall, the Cassissium blackcurrant museum at Nuits St Georges, and Vulcania in the Auvergne, the world's only volcano museum.

Currently seeking information on other unusual museums across Britain and Europe, plus any attractions she may have missed in Devon's South Hams, for commissioned features.

Contact: gillian.thorntons@btinternet.com, or ring 01582 468771.

BACK HOME

NICK CHANNER has just returned from a 2,000-mile circular car tour of Western Canada taking in Alberta, British Columbia, the Canadian Inside Passage and Vancouver Island - or 'Road through the Rockies' as he prefers to call it. This was a holiday but he hopes to get some work out of it. Bears crossing the road in front of him, the seedy side of Vancouver witnessed from the window of his hotel bedroom, rapidly spreading forest fires and a bitterly-fought election with liberals and conservatives neck-and-neck helped to make it a memorable adventure. Back home, Nick is working on an AA walking/cycling guide to the Heart of England, retracing parts of JB Priestley's 'English Journey' of the 1930s for newspapers and magazines and getting ready to record a documentary on 75 years of the YHA for Radio 4 in the autumn.

Contact: nickchanner@freeuk.com.

ME TOO

TERRY MARSH is back home, too, after a week organising the Isle of Man Walking Festival, immediately followed by ten days in Picardy researching and photographing a regional feature. On a beautiful and still morning, he found himself standing in the very clearing in the forest of Compiègne in which the Armistice was signed on 11th November 1918 – quite moving, especially as his grandfather played football against the Germans on Christmas Day a year earlier (Germany won).

Now it's heads-down to work on a Walking and Cycling Guide to the North West of England before heading back to France in September to visit the Country of the Cathars. Hopefully, October will bring a trip to Canada, walking and hiking around Vancouver before taking a three-day train journey to Toronto – he might even go looking for that seedy side of Vancouver Nick Channer spotted!

Contact: terrymarsh@wpu.org.uk.

THE FACE WHO LAUNCHED A THOUSAND GUIDEBOOKS

Following in the sandalprints of Brad Pitt, our hunky hero PAUL MURPHY continues his one-man crusade to turn Malta from wooden horse to thoroughbred stallion with forthcoming pieces in the Times, Independent on Sunday and Interval World. Aside from recent trips to Cologne, Sri Lanka and, of course, Malta - providing articles for regular clients, Bella and Take A Break magazines respecively - Paul has been working like a Trojan updating his own guidebooks on Malta (AA Spiral series), Malta (InsideOut guide) and … London (AA/Fodors Exploring series). You can read all about his Seven Natural Wonders of the West for South West Trains e-motion magazine (coming next Seven Man-Made Wonders!) and has Pembrokeshire, Cornwall and maybe French family campsites and Greek islands in his sights for this summer.

Paul is also currently working on a very unusual type of guidebook for which he is seeking contributors. Can you tell me the 10 coolest places you must hang out at this summer? Are you a regular with Condé Nast and the Sunday Times? Are you a fan of Philip Starck hotels and Barcelona's über-style bars? Do you write regularly about Sandy Lane and Reids? If you have answered yes to any of these then you're probably no use to me because what I want is cracking copy on crap places (ie mass market Mediterranean-style resorts).

Contact: paulw.murphy@tiscali.co.uk.

HARRODS COWGIRL

JEANNINE WILLIAMSON was a runner up in the recent Visit USA Media Awards 2004 for an article on learning to be a cowgirl in Texas, which appeared in Quicksilver magazine.

Last month she was appointed as the travel writer for the new Harrods Estates magazine, a glossy lifestyle publication being launched in September that will be distributed in the UK and overseas by the "top people's store" estate agency.

Her recent projects include a German feature fest, looking at Frankfurt, Munich, Dusseldorf and Bremen, and a trip to Denmark focusing on Scandinavian style in Copenhagen.

Contact: Jeannine@motcombemedia.demon.co.uk.

ALL AT SEA

Somebody's got to do it....so ROBIN MEAD (Tel: 020 8346 3772) and VAL FIELD (Tel: 01424 753181) have taken on the onerous task of spending large chunks of the summer and early autumn on cruise ships - comparing some of the newer vessels introduced by cruise lines, exploring new destinations, and taking their usual portfolios of photographs. Destinations include Iceland and Greenland in July, the Eastern Mediterranean in August, the Western Mediterranean in September, and the Canary Islands in October. No, of course they won't be spending their time eating, drinking, or sunbathing. This IS work, you know!

ONE MAN'S SLOVENIA

ROBIN McKELVIE is back at his desk in South Queensferry for most of the summer following six weeks in Slovenia writing the Bradt guide to Ljubljana and the Bradt guide to Slovenia, as well as a week's sea kayaking off St. Kilda.

In July Robin is taking the Royal Scotsman around the Highlands and popping into Paris, while in September he is back in Slovenia finishing off the Bradt guides. Plans for later in the year include a month in South Africa. Robin is open to any invitations to new or emerging destinations, which he covers for over 20 magazines and newspapers worldwide.

Contact: robinmckelvie@hotmail.com.

OUTDOOR MAGNESS

ALF ALDERSON is looking forward to seeing the first issue of the new magazine 'Outdoor Adventure' roll off the presses in late August since he's the mag's contributing watersports editor.

"Like the ad says, the mag does what is says on the tin - this won't mean anything to US readers of course, but let's see if they can work out what us 'whacky Brits' mean by that..."

Alf is on the lookout for ideas for travel pieces, gear reviews, news items etc. for the mag, so if you think you have anything contact him at alf@alfalderson.co.uk.

Contact: writer@joecawley.co.uk.

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