Category: Projects
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Caucasus By Train: UK To Georgia/Armenia In Under A Week (Part Three)
This is Part Three of my account of travelling by train from the UK across Europe and Turkey to the Caucasus. If you just got here, start with Part One, which details the 72-hour journey from London to Istanbul. The final part of this series is all about how to do it yourself – that…
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Caucasus by Train: UK To Georgia/Armenia In Under A Week (Part Two)
This is Part Two of my account of travelling by train from the UK across Europe and Turkey to the Caucasus. If you just got here, start with Part One, which details the 72-hour journey from London to Istanbul. Otherwise, continue reading to find out how I got from Istanbul to the Georgian capital of…
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Help Tom Finish What He Started
I’m writing this post from a rural guesthouse near the city of Sisian in southern Armenia, where I’ve just finished a lovely breakfast of freshly-picked raspberries, cheese curds, sour cream, new season honey, and gata (a type of regional sweet pastry). Yum. This guesthouse, run by Mher Azoyan and his family on the site of…
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Caucasus by Train: UK to Georgia/Armenia In Under A Week (Part One)
Planning a trip to the Caucasus – perhaps to hike some of the Transcaucasian Trail – but concerned about the carbon footprint of flying there and back? I’m with you. Hiking has a small environmental footprint (depending on your shoe size). Air travel has a big one. But the good news is that, if you’re…
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Yet Another Defender Camper Conversion: DIY 2-Berth 110 In A Weekend
Quick back-story: several years ago I was the lucky recipient of the Land Rover Bursary, an expedition grant administered by the Royal Geographical Society. As well as a generous pile of cash, JLR’s Special Vehicle Operations built us a bespoke expedition Land Rover Defender 110 called Georgina. Pretty neat, right? Land Rover Owner magazine thought…
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Introducing The Armenian National Trail: A New Village-To-Village Hiking Route
On May 16 2023, in the leafy surrounds of Yerevan Botanical Gardens, the Armenian State Tourism Committee and HIKEArmenia announced their intention to create the Armenian National Trail, a new national hiking route across Armenia. In attendance were government officials, tourism development representatives, long-time members of the hiking community… and the small crew of trail…
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Breaking: Former Traveller Recreates Feeling Of Adventure At Home (Again)
The moment I decided to stop travelling, put down roots, and buy a house (on the pretext that I needed somewhere to store my bikes and camping gear), some deeply buried part of my brain started looking for ways to make it feel like I was actually still travelling. I’m certainly not the first. And…
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#FlightFree2020: Well, That Was Easy – Or Was It?
When, on January 1st, I and many others committed to not flying for a year, none of us imagined 2020 would see 90% of air traffic disappear and the biggest reduction in aviation emissions since the invention of flight. Perhaps predictably, smug people on Twitter soon began making sarcastic jokes about how everyone might as…
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The story of the volunteers hacking a 3,000km path across the Caucasus Mountains
I recently penned this 1,500-word piece for Horizon Guides, whose founder Matt I’ve known for many years. Their mission is to expand our understanding of the world through guides, journals and curated travel experience – a mission that has much in common with my own. There is no particular blueprint for creating a long-distance hiking…
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#FlightFree2020: Travel Blogging And The Multiplier Effect
There’s an elephant in the room with my #FlightFree2020 pledge. My work is tied inextricably to the international travel industry, which in turn relies heavily on flying. In other words, if I continue to do my job well, I will increase overall aviation emissions – whether or not I myself take any flights – as…