滨苍听Madagascar, filmmaker 听captures imagery听from remote villages to the wilds of Masoala National Park.

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Podcasts might be the solo traveler鈥檚 best companion. On a slow bus ride through Thailand, or waiting out a long layover in Munich? Just plug in your headphones, thumb an app, and suddenly you鈥檙e in the middle of an engaging conversation. Or maybe you鈥檙e stateside, stuck in traffic during your morning commute, and need a story to whisk you back to a foreign land. A good episode can do that, too. Here are some of our favorite travel and adventure-themed podcasts to help you pass the time, no matter where you are.

The Trip

In January, Anthony Bourdain鈥檚 partners at Roads and Kingdoms released the first season of a new behind-the-scenes travel podcast called , hosted by co-founder Nathan Thornburgh, a former Time foreign correspondent. The show dives into the quirkier side of adventure travel, covering topics like KFC chicken sandwiches in Pakistan, cave dwellers in southern Spain, and bone digging in Madagascar. Bourdain calls it 鈥測our passport to all things weirder, deeper, further.鈥�

Line We Loved: 鈥淭hat鈥檚 where it began鈥攐n a mud path in the jungle. It鈥檚 what the Amazon feels like the Amazon should be: a lot of mud, screaming insects, a bunch of leaves cutting up your face.鈥�

Wild Ideas Worth Living

After 20 years as a freelance adventure journalist, Shelby Stanger switched lanes in 2016 to create her own travel podcast. features weekly interviews with well-known explorers, entrepreneurs, scientists, and more鈥攆olks like Burton CEO Donna Carpenter, climber Chris Sharma, and shark-attack survivor and photographer Mike Coots.

Line We Loved: 鈥淧eople think of sharks as these man-eating creatures that just want to rip flesh from you. But when I photograph sharks, I鈥檓 not trying to focus on the teeth or the jaw, but putting that focus right on the eyeball to show that sharks have life and they鈥檙e intelligent.鈥�

Skift

Geared toward professionals in the travel and tourism industry, isn鈥檛 exactly designed to inspire your next trip to Fiji or Norway, but it will clue you in on what鈥檚 happening in the industry鈥攍ike $65 one-way trans-Atlantic flights from Norwegian Air. Plus, industry insiders will tell you why you shouldn鈥檛 write off cruises, what hotels are learning from Airbnb, and how the term 鈥渁dventure travel鈥� gets misused.

Line We Loved: 鈥淲e鈥檙e seeing a real trend for not just how hotels are going to look after us in terms of accommodation, but how are you going to amuse us as a family unit? [There are] cooking lessons with kids, foraging with kids, diving and snorkeling as a family. The new breed of family hotels is delivering.鈥�

She Explores

Host and former #vanlifer Gale Straub to women of all ages and across all spectrums who鈥檝e discovered a love for the wilderness. The stories in She Explores feel raw and real. You鈥檒l hear from a hiker who lost her trekking partner, a young woman with Lyme disease, a wilderness guide with an eating disorder, and personal accounts of race, failure, and sexuality.

Line We Loved: 鈥淚 feel like I鈥檓 part of the weather. Being outside, in the elements, in the weather, really informs my artwork.鈥�

Taste Trekkers

, a podcast that launched in 2012, is based on a simple idea: Host Seth Resler chats with chefs and foodies from around the world about their favorite places to eat. You鈥檒l learn about the history of ballpark hot dogs, what to order for breakfast in Jerusalem, how to find the tastiest food truck in Portland, and a whole lot more. The takeaway? You can eat like a local, no matter where you go.

Line We Loved: 鈥淚n one of the mountain cities of Crete, they have a potato festival. It lasts three days, with music and different kinds of recipes. Fried potatoes, baked potatoes. Potatoes everywhere.鈥�

The World Wanderers

Launched in 2014 by a twentysomething Canadian couple, covers Ryan Ferguson and Amanda Kingsmith鈥檚 globetrotting adventures, from Myanmar to Wales to North America. They also interview other travelers who cross their path, like a family with two toddlers who live on the road and a backpacking foodie.

Line We Loved: 鈥淲e arrive at our Airbnb, and the whole fish-eye lens [must have been] used, and we鈥檙e actually staying in what is basically a closet.鈥�

Women Who Dare

国产吃瓜黑料 racer wanted to hear more stories of women doing inspiring things. So she decided to collect them herself. Last year, she set out on a five-month, 5,700-mile bicycle ride from California to Maine, interviewing everyone from a polar explorer to a geoscientist to a garage gear entrepreneur along the way. The first episode of Women Who Dare debuted March 6, so you can get in on the ground floor.

Line We Loved: 鈥淎fter all that stress about finding water, crossing the Cascades turned out to be incredibly easy. I just sat and pedaled and then pedaled some more.鈥�

Switchbacks

Elizabeth and Cole Donelson, a young married couple from Kansas City, Missouri, spent a year visiting all 59 national parks in the United States, an epic journey they documented on . The podcast is entertaining even if you鈥檙e not planning a visit to a national park, but it鈥檚 especially helpful if you are. They offer tips on budgeting, easy-access campsites, and their favorite bucket-list adventures. Though they visited their last park in August 2016, the Donelsons are still putting out a show with updates from a recent trip to Panama and insights they learned on the road.

Line We Loved: 鈥淢ake sure you have a book or a card game鈥攚e liked the Settlers of Catan dice game鈥攊n the tent. You can鈥檛 just stare at the ceiling while the rain is pouring down.鈥�

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For some of us, a 鈥減rivate island鈥� means pristine, golden beaches without another soul in sight and a lavish cabana where you鈥檒l sleep to the sound of ocean waves. But private islands don鈥檛 have to be just for the ultra-elite. From far-flung luxury hideouts to more affordable, easy-to-reach cottages, here are six private islands you can rent for the night.

Miavana, Madagascar

Located on Nosy Ankao, off the northeast coast of Madagascar, the five-star resort of opened this June. Dubbed a luxury eco-resort, the place runs on solar power and was built with sustainable materials like thatch and grass. The resort is made up of 14 oceanfront villas, a communal square, and an infinity pool on the edge of the Indian Ocean. Your nightly rate鈥攕tarting at $2,500鈥攊ncludes meals, butler service, and guided outings like kite surfing, snorkeling through shipwrecks, and whale watching.

Lanai, Hawaii

One of the most pristine and secluded of the Hawaiian Islands, Lanai is a 90,000-acre private island purchased in 2012 by Larry Ellison, CEO of Oracle. In 2016, reopened after a massive renovation, offering views of a marine sanctuary to go with extravagant accommodations. Rooms start at $1,075 a night. Out of your budget? Try the 11-room , a historic inn in the old pineapple plantation town of Lanai City, where rooms start at $186 a night and include breakfast. While on Lanai, you can hike to secluded beaches, snorkel among spinner dolphins, or mountain bike rugged red-dirt roads.

Cuckolds, Maine

is a two-room establishment inside a restored 19th-century lighthouse, about 15 minutes by boat from the town of Southport, Maine. Breakfasts and afternoon tea are included in your stay. You can book the east- or west-facing suite for $500 per night, or get the whole island to yourself for a loftier rate (whole-island rentals start at $1,450). By day, take a sail or kayak tour of Boothbay Harbor.

Kokomo Island, Fiji

This new luxury resort opened in March on a private island owned by Australian billionaire Lang Walker. Located among Fiji鈥檚 Kadavu Island Group, is a 140-acre tropical haven with white-sand beaches and lush rainforests, accessed via seaplane or helicopter from Fiji鈥檚 mainland. You鈥檒l snorkel and dive through the Great Astrolabe Reef, the fourth largest in the world, trek through the rainforest, and sleep in private beachfront villas with infinity pools overlooking the ocean. It鈥檚 pricey鈥攕tarting at $1,995 a night鈥攂ut your rates include all meals, plus butler and nanny services.

Eagle Island, Georgia

To get to , you鈥檒l leave from a dock in the fishing village of Darien, Georgia, and take a 15-minute boat ride to your own private ten-acre island. This isn鈥檛 a resort鈥攊t鈥檚 a three-bedroom, two-bathroom house that can sleep up to 12 people and starts at $475 a night鈥攂ut you鈥檒l get resort-like services, including a stocked kitchen, kayak and boat rentals, and a friendly boat captain named Andy who answers your questions. Watch the sunset from a hammock, hike a nature trail around the island, or go crabbing off the dock.

Hatchet Caye, Belize

, a seven-acre private island an hour-long boat ride from the coastal town of Placencia, Belize, is home to a laid-back resort that first opened in 2011. Here, you can book one of eight oceanfront cabanas or four rooms in the main house starting at $433 per night, or you and up to 30 friends can reserve the whole island for $3,000 a night. Spend your time atop a kayak or paddleboard, or book a trip with the on-island dive shop to dive among whale sharks in the Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System, the second largest coral reef in the world. The resort鈥檚 restaurant serves good ceviche and fried lionfish tacos.

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Easy Does It

What a tough guy can learn from an island off Belize

EXACTLY 12 HOURS after walking out the front door of our Brooklyn apartment into a snowstorm, my wife and I stood on the dock at St. George's Caye Resort, in Belize. I was holding my fly rod while she sipped a fruity cocktail and teased me about my bombastic claim that commercial flights do not count as real travel. Any self-respecting adventure traveler, I often say, needs to follow his flight with a couple of days on a train or the top of a bus in order to feel as though he's actually gotten somewhere.

My perspective on the issue was not well supported by St. George's Caye. It's only a 20-minute boat ride from Belize City, yet it feels like a place that should take a couple of days to reach by outrigger canoe. The two-mile-long island is sandwiched between the Belize Barrier Reef and hundreds of square miles of mangrove swamps and bonefish flats that support raucous colonies of seafaring birds and a few local manatees. You could count the permanent human population on your fingers and toes. But my wife didn't need to mention any of this or cite the relevant statistics. Instead, she simply pointed to the school of tarpon lolling in the shallows 30 feet away.

For the rest of the trip I continued to eat my words鈥攁long with immense amounts of spectacular food, such as spiny lobster delivered directly to the kitchen by local fishermen. Between meals鈥攕erved communal style, on the beach, by a smiling crew in flip-flops鈥攚e joined a few planned expeditions. There was snorkeling and diving on the reef; a night cruise in search of crocodiles; and fishing for bonefish and permit with a private guide. But, mostly, we took off on our own makeshift adventures. The resort provides plenty of kayaks and sailboats without the fees, rules, and boundaries that too often turn island getaways into chaperoned walks on the beach. We discovered secluded sand, secret swimming holes, hungry schools of fish, and a curious manatee. At night, we kicked back in one of a dozen thatch-roofed cabanas. We could hear the Caribbean roll in just beyond our front porch. Beyond that, nothing. This self-respecting adventure traveler slept well.

GET THERE: St. George's Caye Resort (om) provides guest transport from Philip S.W. Goldson International Airport. Cabanas for two from $218, including meals and local rum punch. One-tank dives, $60; half-day fishing trips, $325.

Fire on the Mountain

Playing in the shadow of a volcano in Papua New Guinea.

Papua New Guinea

New Britain's Tavurvur volcano gets feisty

IN 1994, a 2,257-foot volcano erupted on the island of New Britain, Papua New Guinea, burying the city of Rabaul under seven feet of ash and prompting 30,000 people to evacuate. Only 3,000 returned, leaving the town essentially like Kauai pre鈥揅aptain Cook, only with more pyrotechnics: The island is populated mostly by members of some 50 indigenous tribes, and the resident volcanoes, Tavurvur and Vulcan, are still very much active. Go now and you can lounge on a black-sand beach and watch Tavurvur burp up lava and small columns of ash as many as four times an hour.

I arrived two years ago to find an ashy town鈥攖he swimming pools were gray鈥攕et on an active caldera with countless adventure options just beyond the city limits. One can scuba-dive at a reef wall that served as a berth for Japanese submarines in World War II; sample grilled crocodile at a sustainable farm in New Britain's jungle; or take a helicopter flight over inland waterfalls so remote, nobody has bothered to name them. But the highlight of New Britain is the paddling. On my third day in Rabaul, I drove five minutes south to Matupit Island and rented a dugout canoe with a guide from the Tolai tribe. We paddled across Simpson Harbor while a hot ash cloud boiled overhead. Afterwards, my guide brought me back to the Tolai village and served me bananas poached in coconut milk, which he said was a traditional feast commemorating the arrival of Fijian missionaries鈥攚hom the Tolai ate.

GET THERE: Air Niugini flies here at least twice daily from Port Moresby, on the south side of PNG's mainland (from $300; ). Lodging in Rabaul is limited to the Hamamas Hotel (doubles from $59; ). Ask the staff about tours of the OISCA farm ($18 with crocodile lunch; ) and rides to Matupit. The Tolai guides will find you; a day trip is $9.

Vieques Rising

Puerto Rico's Vieques has come a long way from when the Navy played war games on its beaches.

Back in 2001, the Navy was still using Puerto Rico's Vieques for war games on the beaches. There was just a handful of restaurants and hotels on the 21-mile-long, four-mile-wide Caribbean island, and it was the kind of place where guests didn't wear shoes. Today, the Navy is gone and the old bombing ranges have been designated a national wildlife refuge. Now, Vieques is exploding in a different way: New roads are being built; old ones are getting paved. One of the military's old bunkers is now a sports bar by day and a disco by night. Swanky hotels, like the W, which opened in March (doubles from $379; ), and restaurants, like El Quenepo (787-741-1215), are popping up.

But don't worry. While it's now possible to have the resort experience, Vieques is still funkier and more laid-back than most Caribbean islands. Book a 肠补产补帽颈迟补鈥攐ne-room cottage鈥攁t La Finca (doubles from $125; ), a clean but rustic joint with outdoor showers and mismatched towels. Then head for the sand. There are more than 50 beaches鈥攑erfect for everything from kayaking (Green Beach) to snorkeling (the islet of Blue Beach) to paddling at night in one of the biggest bioluminescent bays in the world (Puerto Mosquito, a.k.a. “Bio Bay”). The best way to see the latter is in a clear canoe from the Vieques 国产吃瓜黑料 Company (two-hour rentals, $45; ), which, should you start getting antsy for more action, can also set you up with decent mountain bikes to explore all the old military roads ($25 per day) or take you kayak fly-fishing for tarpon ($150).

Twilight Zone

Happily lost on a Croatian island haunted by vampires.

Lustava

Northern Lustava

Dalmatian dinner, Croatia

Dalmatian dinner.

BY THE TIME we reached Lastovo, we were made of salt water and octopus. For a week, my family鈥�14 of us, from age 78 down to 16鈥攈ad sailed along Croatia's Dalmatian coast in a 100-foot Turkish gulet, gorging on grilled fish and pickling ourselves with local wine. We'd come far from the cruise ships of Dubrovnik and left the nightlife of Korcula behind. Lastovo (pop. 800) was the last and most remote island, one big national park with, from the look of the charts, great sheltered kayaking. But even our guide, adventure writer Maria Coffey, had never been.

We'd heard there were vampires on Lastovo鈥攊n the 1700s, the island had a little problem with vukodlaci, undead corpses that rose, as our guidebook said, “to visit the beds of bored wives and pleasure them in the night.” This sounded fine to some of our clan, but the island still emitted a creepy vibe. Even today, one of Lastovo's biggest celebrations involves the ritual humiliation of a straw puppet led through town on a donkey.

Sure enough, the crags showed little sign of life鈥攋ust crying gulls and the colorful towels of naked Germans, the predominant pink-skinned species here, found sprawled along Dalmatia's rocky coast. But the little harbor of Skrivena Luka was a miracle, a still blue bay ringed with stone cottages. At the lone restaurant, Porto Russo, the proprietor brought out homemade verbena-infused Croatian grappa, then white wine (from his own grapes), home-cured olives, and local squid cooked for hours pod pekom鈥攗nder a metal bell in a wood-fired outdoor oven. Later, in Lastovo Town, a 15th-century wonderland of vineyards and minaret-topped churches teetering on the island's summit, the local street sweeper鈥攚ho still uses a broom鈥攄ragged us into his courtyard for thick, sweet coffee.

Did we come here by plane? Was the World Cup still going on? What was my name again? The Dalmatian islands aren't exactly off the beaten path, but in Lastovo you can feel like you sailed in and discovered them yourself.

GET THERE: Hidden Places owners Maria Coffey and Dag Goering guide ten-day kayaking-and-sailing trips along the Dalmatian coast for $4,550 per person ().

Sweet Bondage

There's no vacation quite like a Colombian-prison-island vacation.

BETWEEN 1960 AND 1984, visitors to Colombia's Isla Gorgona arrived shackled and blindfolded and slept behind barbed-wire fences, on wooden bunks without mattresses. The 2,500 inmates of Gorgona Prison were warned that, if they escaped, the venomous snakes on the tropical island would kill them and, if they braved the ocean, the sharks would get them instead.

Today, the lush, 6.5-square-mile island, 30 miles off Colombia's Pacific coast, is a national park; the lodging here has been managed since 2006 by the winner of the Colombian version of the TV show The Apprentice. Which is to say, this is one strange escape. I arrived last September via speedboat from the coastal town of Guap铆. Upon touchdown, military police searched my bags for alcohol (it interferes with the requisite antivenin) and weapons. The other guests鈥攖he island hosts 130 at a time鈥攚ere mostly schoolchildren and besotted couples, enjoying king-size beds in the updated guard quarters by the beach.

I spent my days exploring: first, the grisly ruins of the mammoth stone penitentiary, said to be modeled after a Nazi concentration camp and now overrun with capuchin monkeys and foot-long basilisk lizards, then the dense tropical jungle that covers 85 percent of Gorgona, for which the island provides obligatory boots. There really are pit vipers and coral snakes here, as well as easier-to-spot (and mostly harmless) boa constrictors.

The trekking's good and the kayaking better鈥擨 spent a few afternoons dipping into the equatorial water as blue-footed boobies and frigates flew overhead鈥攂ut the main activity on Gorgona is diving. The island has a fully equipped dive center, and I'd regularly see 20 to 30 moray eels at any site, many as thick as my thighs. Gorgona's nature preserve extends to a six-mile radius around the island, so fish and turtles are plentiful, intrepid, and big. But size is relative. From July to September, humpbacks come to Gorgona's banks to mate and calve, and to see them breach and slap the surface with their gargantuan tails is to forget that once this was a place no one ever, ever wanted to go.

GET THERE: Three-night packages, including three meals daily, island transfers, and flights from Cali to the coastal town of Guap铆, in the Cauca department, from $463 (). Two-dive day trips from Gorgona's dive center, $90. Kayak rentals, $5 per hour.

King Kauai

Lush greenery, volcanoes and an endless supply of hidden beaches.

The Big Island has size on its side, not to mention fun volcanoes. Oahu has the storied North Shore. And Maui鈥攚ell, let's just say that the honeymooners storming its beaches year after year don't come for nothing.

But little Kauai has it all: lush greenery, volcanoes, small towns not yet overrun, and a seemingly endless supply of hidden beaches for surfing, snorkeling, and sunbathing.

This year, all those options are more accessible than ever. On the island's north shore, the St. Regis Princeville opened its doors last October (doubles from $385; ); after taking over the historic Princeville Resort, St. Regis revamped the whole place with a classy retro look. (Think coconut palm floors and a new spa and restaurant by 眉ber-chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten.)

But you don't go to Kauai to lounge. Join the locals for stand-up paddleboarding in Hanalei Bay鈥攖here's a great SUP surf break by the Hanalei Pier鈥攐r along the flat calm of the Hanalei River. Kayak Kauai offers lessons and boards (rentals from $42 per day; ). In the nearby Hanalei National Wildlife Refuge, a coastal wetlands teeming with endemic bird species, you'll find the Okolehao trail鈥攁 windy, two-mile path offering views of Hanalei Bay and the mind-blowing Na Pali coastline. If it's surf you're after, head 45 minutes south to Poipu, rent a board at Nukumoi Surf Co. ($6 per hour; ), and try the Poipu Beach surf break, one of the island's best. Afterwards, crash just 50 yards away at the year-old Koa Kea, the first and only boutique property here (doubles from $299; ).

Trippin' on Indo

Short-term memory loss in the South Pacific.

Indonesia

Shrines decorated for the Hindu Odalan festival.

Indonesia

Lembongan traffic

LEMBONGAN ISN'T EXACTLY out of the way鈥攋ust seven miles southeast of tourist-clogged Bali鈥攂ut it stays perfectly out of your way. Nothing about the place gets between you and your vacation. A three-square-mile speck of coral reefs, empty beaches, and hillside bungalows, the Indonesian island is what Henry Miller meant when he said of Big Sur, California, “There being nothing to improve on in the surroundings, the tendency is to set about improving oneself.”

The easy access from Bali鈥攑lus the presence of several consistent surf breaks and dive spots鈥攈as given Lembongan a small but steady tourism economy to supplement the traditional kelp farms. My wife and I thought it might be a nice change of pace during our 16-day honeymoon on Bali. It ended up being the highlight of our trip.

It's hard for either of us to say exactly why. I know we surfed and took a beginner scuba excursion. But mostly what we have are hazy recollections of long naps, afternoon strolls, and laughing over dinner about how we'd managed to fill another day doing … er, well, we were never quite sure. And still aren't. We barely even have any photos from our stay. That's Lembongan's gift: letting you let go.

I imagine this empty-mindedness is the sort of self-improvement people seek from meditation retreats. But this retreat has cold beer and a really hollow reef break鈥攆rom what I can remember.

GET THERE: Island Explorer Cruises offers day trips to Lembongan for $85 per person, including food and activities, and beachside bungalows for two from $90 per night ().

Have Lots, Want Not

The curious challenge of living it up on a private island in Fiji.

Fiji

Three acres of paradise: Wadigi

Indonesia

Wadigi's open air suites

I HAD TWO WHITE-SAND beaches and an infinity pool that overlooked an endless sea. I had a boatman ready at a moment's notice to take me snorkeling, water-skiing, windsurfing, fishing, or paddling in a glass-bottom kayak. I had two chefs waiting to prepare any whim; an open-air villa; an on-call masseuse; and a statuesque hostess who greeted me with a fruity cocktail in a fresh-cut coconut. In other words, I had Wadigi, a tiny islet in Fiji's Mamanucas, at my command.

I'd been sent there by a dive magazine to experience the singular indulgence of a private island. And, as a chronically underpaid writer, I planned to soak up every last perk. But after a couple of days of diving among spiky lionfish at half a dozen world-class sites, dinners with too many courses to count, and enough gin-and-tonics to get me kicked out of any self-respecting American bar, a funny thing happened: I found myself doing absolutely nothing.

As it turns out, when you have everything you might want, your wants start to subside. OK, so I never did get bored with that glass-bottom kayak, but I spent most of my free hours simply lolling around and contemplating the preposterous views. On my last evening, instead of ordering extravagant cocktails and back-to-back massages, I ate all the home-baked cookies in the jar and then simply sat in the pool watching the sun dip below the horizon and the clouds sweep across the mirror-still sea.

GET THERE: From $2,327 per day for two, including meals, most activities, and lodging; two-tank dives, $100;

New Outposts

Seven island getaways to fit every fantasy.

Anguilla

The Viceroy, Anguilla

FISH
Islas Secas, Panama
A group of 16 private islands, Islas Secas sits 25 miles off the Pacific coast, close to the wahoo, marlin, and grouper crowding Hannibal Bank. On land, the place is Gilligan's wildest dream, its seven solar oceanfront yurts holding only 14 guests. Go for the surfing or diving, but mainly go fish: Last winter, fishing director Carter Andrews helped a guest set seven world records here. In a week. Six nights, $6,600 per person;

SAIL
Scrub Island, British Virgin Islands
This 230-acre private island, which opened in February, is the first new resort in the BVIs in 15 years. At the heart is a 53-slip marina, the perfect base to launch a sailing excursion of the BVIs. Or stick around in one of the island's 52 rooms to enjoy day sailing, diving, hiking, and three restaurants. Doubles from $359;

DIVE
Shearwater Resort, Saba
Set some 2,000 feet atop Saba, a five-square-mile volcanic island in the Neth颅erlands Antilles, Shearwater offers panoramic ocean views but is only a ten-minute drive from the docks. There, dive boats will take you out to some of the Caribbean's best snorkeling and scuba. (Ask Shearwater about custom packages.) The newly renovated rooms offer flatscreens, iPod docks, and wi-fi. Doubles from $175;

WATERSPORT
Viceroy Hotel and Resort, Anguilla
With three restaurants and three pools, you might be inclined never to leave the grounds of this year-old, 35-acre resort on the shores of both Barnes and Meads bays. But do: The 3,200 feet of coastline on the two bays offers spectacular sailing, snorkeling, and swimming. Doubles from $595;

SURF
The Atlantis Hotel, Barbados
Following a complete refurbishment in 2009, this swank, eight-room lodge on Barbados's east coast offers fast access to Sand Bank, a beginner-friendly beach break, and Soup Bowl, a tenacious reef break that Kelly Slater has called one of the best in the world. Doubles from $255;

MULTISPORT
The Landings, St. Lucia
A 19-acre waterfront resort on the northern tip of lush St. Lucia, the Landings offers complimentary 78-foot sailboats, snorkel gear, and sea kayaks . Pick up one of the latter and paddle 400 yards to little Pigeon Island for a hike to an 18th-century British fort. And don't forget to look inland: St. Lucia's Piton mountains offer some of the Caribbean's best hiking and vistas (you can see neighboring St. Vincent). Six nights, $1,755 per person, double occupancy;

INDULGE
Terre di Corleone and Portella della Ginestra, Sicily
Until recently, these properties were owned by mafia bosses Bernardo Brusca and Salvatore Riina. Thanks to a 1996 Italian law that uses government-seized mafia assets for social purposes, they've been converted into inns and cooperative farms producing fresh pasta, honey, legumes, and, of course, plentiful red and white wines. Doubles from $45;

Fresh Trips

Seven island getaways with the perfect balance of adventure and indulgence.

Belize

Off Ambergris Caye, Belize

PADDLE
Palau
Boundless Journeys' Oceania Odyssey starts with infinity-pool luxury at the Palau Pacific Resort, on Koror, before going rustic: For the next week, no more than ten guests camp on two smaller islands; snorkel over sunken World War II planes; sea-kayak the saltwater Black Tip Lake, accessed by marine tunnel; and dine on fresh-caught parrotfish. January鈥揙ctober; from $4,695 per person;

SAIL
Isle of Skye, Scotland
On the new seven-day Sailing & Walking Around Skye trip from Wilderness Scotland, local skipper Angus MacDonald Smith will ferry eight guests around Skye on his 67-foot yacht, Elinca, seeking out the old pirate anchorages, hailing passing fishermen to buy prawns, and cruising up inlets to launch guided hikes in the steep Cuillin Hills. Go in May or June for 20-hour days and peak seabird nesting. $1,400 per person;

MULTISPORT
Madagascar
Gap 国产吃瓜黑料s' Madagascar Experience focuses on inland beauty. From the capital of Antananarivo, your crew will head south by minibus, stopping to hike in lush rainforests, bike around (and swim in) Lake Andraikiba, and explore the eroded sandstone Isalo Mountains. March鈥揇ecember; $1,449 per person;

FISH
Seychelles
On Frontiers Travel's new six-day Desroches Island Flyfishing 国产吃瓜黑料, guests cast for hard-fighting bluefin trevally at offshore atolls by day and crash in private villas by night. Casting arm need a break? Explore the 3.5-mile-long island with kayaks, bikes, or snorkels and fins. $7,600 per person, double occupancy;

MULTISPORT
San Juan Islands
REI 国产吃瓜黑料s' San Juan Islands trip is a six-day mash-up through Washington's Puget Sound, including a 50-mile road-biking spin around Orcas Island, sea kayaking with killer whales near Sentinel Island, and one night at a remote campsite. (The other four are spent at the Lakedale Resort's tent-cabins, which have real beds.) From $1,899 per person;

DIVE
Half Moon Caye, Belize
On the seven-day Lighthouse Reef trip from Island Expeditions, you'll kick back in safari-style tents and napping hammocks strung in coconut groves on 44-acre Half Moon Caye, some 50 miles off the mainland. Of course, you'll probably spend most of your time in or on the water, diving the Blue Hole鈥攁 famous, 400-foot-deep well鈥攕norkeling in shallows, and exploring the reef by kayak. From $1,789 per person;

RIDE
Crete
Backroads' new six-day Crete cycling trip starts from Ir谩klion, on the northern coast, and ends, after 268 miles of pedaling, at Akrotiri Cape, in the west. In between, you'll spin past lush vineyards and olive groves and Venetian harbor towns, where fresh seafood and plush inns await. $3,598 per person, double occupancy;

The post Cay Party appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

We’ve been tracking the adventure travel world for more than three decades. Our latest discovery?

The planet is more wide open for exploration than ever. Whether you want to raft an unknown Himalayan river or link a few Colorado peaks in your own backyard, we have 30 adventures to stoke your wanderlust.

The New, New Places

Go here now—before the secret gets out

PANAMA
Azuero Peninsula
It seems everything is expanding in Panama. A $5.25 billion upgrade will more than double the Panama Canal’s capacity by 2014, tourism nationwide has nearly doubled in the past six years, and in 2005 alone more than one million visitors spent upwards of $1 billion in this tropical destination. The Azuero Peninsula, four hours southwest of Panama City, on the Pacific coast, is a direct beneficiary of the cash infusion. The still-uncrowded peninsula has been getting increasing attention, thanks to its surf-filled beaches and world-class tuna and marlin fishing. Popular digs for foreigners include Villa Camilla, a classy seven-room hotel built mostly from local materials (doubles from $300; meals, $50 per day; 011-507-232-6721, ).

BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA
Tofino
Take a province with more than 16,700 miles of coastline and a few hundred thousand snowboarders itching to embrace the coming summer and you get the British Columbia surf scene. Tofino, a sleepy town of 1,711 on Vancouver Island’s Pacific side, explodes into a mini-metropolis every season as a horde of surfers descends in pursuit of consistent beginner and intermediate breaks. For the student who wants to mix surfing with celebrity, there’s Bruhwiler Surf School, owned by one of Canada’s renowned big-wave riders, Raf Bruhwiler (two-and-a-half-hour group lessons, $75; 250-726-5481, ). At the Wickaninnish Inn, every room has an ocean view (doubles, $208鈥�$398; 800-333-4604, ).

CHINA
Yangshuo
Beijing may be the center of the 2008 Olympics universe, but the heart of China’s adventure-sport community sits more than 1,000 miles to the south, near Yangshuo (pop. 298,000). Climbers first began setting routes in the myriad karst peaks here in the 1990s; today there are about 300 established climbs. (Last fall, Briton Neil Gresham set the region’s first 5.14b.) After climbing, there’s caving, hiking, and mountain biking. And anglers can hire a guide鈥攚ho’ll use a trained cormorant鈥攖o catch fish at night. Get on belay with China Climb ($40 per half-day with guide; 011-86-773-88-11-033, ), then crash at the peaceful Yangshuo Mountain Retreat (doubles from $40; 011-86-773-87-77-091, ).

BULGARIA
Bansko
Get a piece of the Pirin Mountains while you still can. Bulgaria’s January 2007 admission to the European Union will only bolster its booming vacation-home market. Towns like Bansko鈥攚here property values have more than doubled in recent years鈥攁re where everyone’s buying. It’s no wonder: One of the most modern ski resorts in Bulgaria is nestled below 9,000-foot peaks with Jackson Hole鈥搒tyle off-piste steeps. Even if you don’t have a couple hundred grand to snag a condo, the resort’s multi-million-dollarupgrades make it visit-worthy. The new Kempinski Hotel Grand Arena (doubles, $213; ) has a mod Swiss-chalet vibe and a primelocation at the base of the gondola.

INDIA
Madhya Pradesh
Last November, Taj Hotels and CC Africa generated big-time adventure travel buzz when they opened Mahua Kothi, the first of five upscale resorts in central India, marrying the African safari with Indian hospitality. Bandhavgarh National Park, abutting the Mahua Kothi, is one of the most famous tiger habitats on earth, with centuries-old man-made caves that now serve as big-cat dens. After a day exploring the sal forests and bamboo jungle, guests chill out in one of 12 suites on the 40-acre property, which offers all the best amenities of a conventional luxury safari鈥攂ut with hookah pipes in the common area, private butlers in traditional costume, andin-room Ayurvedic massages ($600 per person, all-inclusive; 011-91-11-26-80-77-50, ).

The Classics

The definitive life list for intrepid travelers

TANZANIA

Kilimanjaro
One of the world’s tallest “walkable” mountains, this freestanding 19,340-foot massif draws some 30,000 wide-eyed鈥攁nd often ill-prepared鈥攈ikers annually. Though technical climbing is not required, it’s no stroll: A number of those who attempt the five- to nine-day push through rainforest to wind-flayed icefields turn back before reaching the top; about five die en route every year (often from altitude sickness). The payoff for summiters? Views of Africa, in all its brawny magnificence, in every direction. Guides are mandatory; book one in advance through a reputable company, and avoid touts pushing cut-rate outings via the tourist-trampled Marangu Route (the Umbwe Route and others get less traffic). For group treks, seek out experienced companies like Thomson Safaris, which offers hikes on less-traveled trails, with summit-success rates near 95 percent (from $3,990; 800-235-0289, ).

ARIZONA


The Grand Canyon
Few paddling experiences come close to matching the epic 297-mile Colorado River run from Lees Ferry to Lake Mead. There’s the monster whitewater (including Lava Falls, called the fastest navigable rapid in North America), the mile-high bisque- and red-hued rock walls, the tent-perfect beaches, and the sheer, walloping Great American West feel of it all. About 22,000 people a year raft a portion of the Colorado’s 277 Grand Canyon miles; most travel with one of 16 outfitters licensed by the Park Service, but those with strong river-running skills can arrange a private outing. Good news on that front: As of 2006, noncommercial launch permits are being awarded by lottery (800-959-9164, grca), replacing the laughable 25-year waiting list. Motorized or oar-powered rafts are the most common way to go, but purists say nothing beats the grace and responsiveness of a wooden dory. Veteran outfitter OARS offers 15- to 19-day full-canyon dory trips (from $4,535;800-346-6277, ).

NEPAL


The Annapurna Circuit

After years of violent unrest, a 2006 peace agreement between the government and Maoist rebels promises to return the tourism spotlight to this Himalayan wonder鈥攐ne of the original adventure travel meccas. No trekking route is more spectacular, or more accessible to reasonably fit hikers, than the three-week, roughly 200-mile inn-to-inn Annapurna Circuit. With a constant backdrop of 20,000-foot peaks, the trail loops from the semitropical city of Pokhara, over 17,769-foot Thorong La pass, on the edge of the arid Tibetan Plateau, and back to the terraced lowlands. Thanks to the d茅tente, U.S.-based outfitters have noticed a surge in interest in Nepal. Wilderness Travel will return to Annapurna this fall after a four-year absence (from $2,795 per person;800-368-2794, ).

FRANCE & SWITZERLAND

The Haute Route
Linking the two most iconic peaks in the western Alps鈥擬ont Blanc, in Chamonix, France, and the Matterhorn, in Zermatt, Switzerland鈥攖his famed seven- to ten-day, 70-mile high-country journey is best suited for advanced skiers who feel confident in dicey conditions. (If kick turns on icy steeps aren’t in your repertoire, consider waiting for summer and hike the route instead.) Nights are spent in small hotels and dorm-style alpine huts, where you’ll find goulash, beer, and the kind of conviviality that generally ends in off-key singing. Even if you’re an accomplishedski mountaineer who can parlais fran莽ais (quick, what does “Danger de mort!” mean?), it’s wise to hire a guide (consult ) or hook up with an outfitter like Selkirk Mountain Experience ($3,225; 250-837-2381, ). Prime ski-touring season is mid-April to mid-May.

ECUADOR

The Gal谩pagos Islands
Straddling the equator 600 miles off the west coast of Ecuador, these far-flung volcanic islands have been the focus of scientists and wildlife lovers since Charles Darwin first scratched his head here in 1835. Now that the Gal谩pagos have become one of the most popular destinations on the planet鈥�120,000 yearly visitors come to spy on the islands’ famous giant tortoises, fur seals, and blue-footed boobies鈥攖he Gal谩pagos National Park Service keeps tight control on where boat passengers disembark and how long they spend at designated land and underwater visitor sites. The best way to avoid crowds? Charter a private yacht that’s stocked with dive gear and sea kayaks. Mountain Travel Sobek can arrange private one- to two-week yacht charters (from $3,795; 888-687-6235, ). Or join 国产吃瓜黑料 Life’s new nine-day hiking trip, with overnights in small inns (from $2,095; 800-344-6118, ).

Epic Journeys

Work off your wanderlust the hard way

Kenya

On most days, the closest you’d get to sharing the trail with a Kenyan is probably several miles behind. Not so on this new running safari, a 12-day pounding that places you on twice-a-day runs with some of Kenya’s most gifted athletes. You’ll start in Eldoret, a city about 200 miles northwest of Nairobi and the heart of the country’s long-distance scene. Next you’ll team up with 1997 and 1998 Los Angeles Marathon winner Lornah Kiplagat in her hometown of Iten for runs through the verdant hills. The group聴not the champ聴sets the distance and pace. Most nights you’ll sleep in basic accommodations in villages and get your carb-to-protein ratio right with meat pastries called samosas. Move on to Mombasa, where, on March 24, the World Cross Country Championships unfold聴the first time Kenya will host the prestigious race. March 14聳25; $3,900; Micato Safaris, 800-642-2861,

INDIA

The Tons River

The Tons River roars from 20,000 feet in the Indian Himalayas with such sustained intensity聴think 55 miles of nearly continuous rapids聴that the river hasn’t seen a single paddler since whitewater pioneer Jack Morison first rafted it in the 1980s. Now the whitewater gurus at New Delhi-based Aquaterra 国产吃瓜黑料s have reopened the river to expedition-style, 11-day rafting trips, using upgraded equipment like self-bailing boats that were unavailable in Morison’s day. Start at Camp Lunagad, about 270 miles north of New Delhi, and spend the next seven days floating through chilly glacial runoff that boils into Class IV聳V rapids. Come evening, pitch tents in alpine meadows redolent of rhododendron and chir, and mingle with Gujar tribesmen. April 24聳May 4; $1,250; info@treknraft.com

COLORADO

The Colorado Trail

Of all the big hikes that run across U.S. wilderness, few pack as much awe per step as the Colorado Trail. But tackling all 482 miles from Denver to Durango, through six wilderness areas and eight mountain ranges, would take you about a month. Instead, concentrate your efforts during a ten-day romp along a remote 95-mile ribbon that runs just east of San Luis Peak to Molas Pass, in the southwestern part of the state. Start at Spring Creek Pass, 33 miles northwest of Creede amid the 13,000-foot-plus San Juan Mountains. Plan on grinding up to 15 miles a day along airy ridges, down steep gorges, and up winding switchbacks. You’ll spend four days cruising above tree line, at nearly 12,000 feet, and the closest you’ll come to a town (Lake City) is about 17 miles, which means tackling thousands of vertical feet each day with a heavy pack. Take a break and frolic in Snow Mesa, a flat, grassy expanse so huge it takes a few hours to cross. 303-384-3729,

COSTA RICA

There may come a time聴perhaps after your third endo over the handlebars聴when pedaling 160 miles across Costa Rica by mountain bike makes an overcrowded bus tour look appealing. But keep riding聴you won’t regret it. Head out from San Jos茅 for about 20 miles a day and 14,000 feet of total climbing to eventually reach the town of Nosara, overlooking the Pacific. For eight days you’ll pedal Specialized hardtails (or your own bike) into villages where people still get around by oxcart, spending nights in hotels, research stations, and a private home tucked into a misty cloudforest. Get off the bike to bushwhack through monster ferns to reach the summitof Cerro Chato, a 3,937-foot sleeping volcano. When you slip into a hot spring near the 5,741-foot Arenal Volcano, your sore muscles will melt away. $2,596 per person with your own group of four; Serendipity 国产吃瓜黑料s, 877-507-1358,

GREENLAND

Arctic Circle

When Fridtjof Nansen became the first to schlep across the Greenland ice cap, in September 1888, he studied Inuit culture, weathered minus-50-degree storms, and spent a cold, dark winter waiting for a ship to take him home. Today, adventurers can follow his tracks along the Arctic Circle using kites to pull them on skis聴at about 12 miles per hour聴under the guidance of polar explorer Matty McNair. Never skied behind a kite? You’ll spend a few days on Frobisher Bay, on the southeast coast of Canada’s Baffin Island, learning techniques that advanced skiers can pick up quickly. Then hop a two-hour flight to Greenland for a 345-mile trek, where the kites will help you pull a 150-pound pulk (loaded with tents, stoves, and beef jerky) in 20-below temps. The adrenaline rush will diminish the hardships as you rip in 24-hour sunlight through a landscape of dizzying white. May 1聳31; from $5,000; NorthWinds Polar Expeditions and Training, 867-979-0551,

Big Frontiers

Formerly off-limits, these territories are finally opening their doors

ALASKA

Adak Island

Shrouded in fog and mystery, most of this remote Aleutian isle went public in 2004, after its naval air station was closed and transferred聴lock, housing stock, and runway聴to the Department of the Interior and the native Aleut Corporation. Most of 280-square-mile Adak is now a federally designated wilderness and wildlife refuge. Bald eagles soar above dormant volcanoes, and 3,000 caribou (introduced during the Cold War as an emergency food supply) roam the moors. Roughly equidistant from Alaska and Russia, the “Birthplace of the Winds” is also a birdwatching hot spot聴nearly one-fourth of the 200 species recorded here are migrants found nowhere else in the Americas. High Lonesome Bird Tours leads expeditions ($4,600 per person for eight nights, all-inclusive; 800-743-2668, ), or check out .

Kurdistan

The typical headline out of Iraq is about roadside IEDs, not roadside attractions. Yet last fall this long-suffering autonomous region bordering Syria, Turkey, and Iran launched an irony-free international marketing campaign, “The Other Iraq,” to showcase its superb scenery, ancient history, and relative security. Virgin snow blankets the mountains, while the plains hold Sumerian ruins and the hospitable capital, Erbil, one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities. In December, Austrian Airlines began twice-weekly flights from Vienna to Erbil. For information, go to .

PERU

Cordillera Azul National Park

Imagine a forest primeval, with uncontacted jungle tribes and animals with no fear of humans. That Lost World still exists in this national park in the eastern Andes, established in 2001 after biologists from Peru and Chicago’s Field Museum recorded 28 new plants and animals聴including a bird species confined to the cloudforest atop a single mountain. Only three other scientific groups have since surveyed the 5,225-square-mile Cordillera Azul, which holds endangered jaguars and spectacled bears. In July, the Sierra Club will run a pioneering trip (non-members welcome) that includes an eight-day transect of the preserve by foot, bamboo raft, and dugout canoe ($3,395聳$3,795; 415-977-5522, ).

LAOS

Houaphan Province

Sealed off by the daunting Annamite Range and shackled by its past (unexploded wartime ordnance, guerrillas, reeducation camps), Houaphan聴in northeast Laos near the Vietnamese border聴lies beyond the typical backpacker trail. But a trickle of DIY travelers now seek out this lush outpost for its unaffected hill tribes and vaulting karst mountains. In Vieng Xai district, about 20 miles east of Xam Nau, you can explore the cave-riddled peaks that served as rebel fortresses throughout the Vietnam War. While the U.S. unleashed its bombing campaign, 23,000 Pathet Lao hunkered down in limestone caverns equipped with electricity, dorms, and weapons depots. The Lao Association of Travel Agents () can provide a list of tour operators.

FINLAND

Kvarken Archipelago

The 5,600 islands in the Kvarken Archipelago are literally in flux; released by the diminished weight of melting Ice Age glaciers, the seabed is rebounding from the Gulf of Bothnia at the rate of a third of an inch annually. The astonishing amount of uplift聴more than 900 feet over the last 10,000 years聴prompted UNESCO last year to designate some 480,000 acres as Finland’s first natural World Heritage site. Paddle the ever-changing labyrinth of emerging islets and expanding peninsulas, washboard moraines and shallowing lakes, then bunk down in a former pilot station on R枚nnskar. Bj枚rk枚 Wardshus () runs guided boat trips; offers travel info. But get there now: In a few millennia, the uplift will form a land bridge to Sweden.

Top Travel Innovations

Eight indispensable travel innovations

Solio Charger

Solio Universal Hybrid Charger

Singapore’s Changi Airport

With some 160 stores, 80 eateries (including a cigar lounge and live jazz bar), a Balinese-style swimming pool, leather “snooze chairs,” and massagesoffered 24/7 at the Rainforest Lounge, there’s no rush to claim your bags.

The MLC

Short for “maximum legal carry-on,” this handy bag holds up to a week’s worthof gear聴just enough for hitchhiking through Belize. Tuck away the ergonomic shoulder strap for a presto backpack. Two large compartments separate the clean stuff from the sweaty climbing gear; the coated reflective fabric repels rain. $148;

Want your trip to be socially sound and eco-friendly? The Green Globe program, launched by the World Travel & Tourism Council, certifies hotels and tour companies that meet top standards for everything from water managementto noise control.

Founded by a frustrated frequent flier, this time-tested site allows users to share info on how to get the most out of their bonus miles, with discussion forums for every major airline, a live chat for last-minute queries, and an option that helps you create a mileage-maximizing itinerary.

Ex Officio Give-N-Go Skivvies

Breathable, lightweight, moisture-wicking, and bacteria-resistant, these boxers and women’s bikinis won’t let you down. Super comfortable (made of nylon and spandex), they air-dry in a snap. Boxers, $25; bikini briefs, $16;

Solio Universal Hybrid Charger

This groovy solar-power station聴the size of a deck of cards, with interchangeable connector tips聴offers a one-stop charge for your camera, cell phone, PDA, GPS, and digital audio player. (One hour of sun equals one hour of iPod use.) $100;

A juicy source of inside information and tips about the good, the bad, and the disgusting. Check out the Hotel Hell stories about not-so-hot spots (like Room 15 at Nevada’s Caliente Hot Springs Motel, home to polygamist ceremonies), or skip to the Hotel Heaven tales (which for one woman included sunglasses-cleaning pool boys at the Grand Rotana Resort & Spa in Egypt).

Canon CP730 Selphy Compact Photo Printer

Create personal postcards in 58 seconds with thispaperback-size portable printer. It hooks up to any laptop or Canon camera(and some cell phones), churning out 300-dpi, four-by-six color photos on address-ready cards. $150;

Notes from the Guru

Take it from adventure travel trailblazer Richard Bangs: Understanding the world requires immersing yourself in it

If you could trace the roots of adventure travel to one person, Richard Bangs, 56, might well be the man. In 1973, back when big chunks of the world, like Russia and Eastern Europe, were virtually closed to Americans, he and high school pal John Yost headed to Ethiopia to explore the Omo River (a trip featured on the first cover of this magazine). What began as a last hurrah of youth morphed into the founding of a travel company, which eventually became Mountain Travel Sobek, one of the largest, most respected outfitters in the industry. Although Bangs is still a co-owner, he left MTS in 1991 to bring travel to the Internet, launching Microsoft’s now-defunct online adventure ‘zine Mungo Park in 1996 and going on to produce travel features for Expedia, Yahoo, MSNBC, and . His latest film project, a documentary on the vanishing crocodiles of the Nile, airs on PBS this summer. Senior editor STEPHANIE PEARSON recently caught up with him in San Diego for this as-told-to about the past, present, and future of wild journeying.

I was 22 in 1973 and had this notion to head to Africa to see if I could explore some rivers that hadn’t been navigated. It turned out to be such a magnificent experience that I decided to organize a little company to take people on extraordinary adventures. It was patched together in my mother’s basement in Bethesda, Maryland. We began to offer trekking, climbing, ballooning, diving—at that time there was no adventure travel landscape. The concept of travel with a purpose, travel with meaning, travel that would bring you back fitter, with a clearer mind, with a better connection to the world, did not exist.

国产吃瓜黑料 travel is in a much better place than it was 30 years ago. We owe a lot of our global interconnectedness to adventure travelers. People who started to wander the earth and appreciate its beauty were people who became activists. Now everybody talks about ecotourism and green travel. It’s all the rage. There are downsides and abuses, but it’s a good attitude, and it comes from people who are willing to step off the beaten track.

Is the world a smaller place? Absolutely. Within 24 hours you can get to almost anywhere on the planet. But all of this is good. Dark political things would happen when doors were closed. It’s very easy to be judgmental and raise the fear index when you don’t really know who the other person is. Mark Twain said it best: “Travel is fatal toprejudice and bigotry.”

What will adventure travel be like 30 years from now? I was in Bosnia a few months ago, and they have all these outfitters in places where the Croats and Bosnians were once lobbing mortars at each other. This is much harder to do when people are roaring with laughter as they roll down a river… 国产吃瓜黑料 travel is the fastest-growing segment of the travel industry. It’s increasingly impossible to find a country that does not have it. Places are opening up and landscapes are shifting all the time. I just received an invitation to Lebanon. We do a trip to the Gal谩pagos almost every week of the year now. Lots of people are doing things that were unimaginable a few years ago.

I’m an advocate of traveling with technology. I have an Iridium sat phone I take with me everywhere. If you need a moment of Zen, it’s easy to take off all your clothes and be as natural as you want, but when it comes to survival, sat phones have saved a lot of lives. In Namibia, a doctor broke both ankles on a trek and was in danger of dying. I was able to call an evac and get him out. The less you have to worry about your own survival, the more you can assimilate the actual experience. Technology in the field can give you an assurance of survival so that you can be more in the moment, more in the experience—so you can contribute and extract more.

国产吃瓜黑料 is a very elastic concept, but it has to deal with stretching your consciousness and going beyond your comfort zone. The world, or you, will not change if you are static. If you are willing to stick your neck out, try untried things, have that moment of unknown discomfort and sharpness, then you’re fully alive. When I did the first descent of the Zambezi, nobody considered it. Now when I go back to the Zambezi, there are thousands of people tumbling down. Everybody who rafts it has an amazing experience, and it makes a difference. It becomes transformative when you go beyond the concrete and the familiar.

Travel rejuvenates. It’s new, it’s very childlike, it keeps things fresh. Anything is possible. There could be dinosaurs around the corner. If you don’t travel, you deaden yourself. I continue to look at maps and get very excited by the places I haven’t been. The more you see, the more you recognize what you have yet to see.I have a long list. It’s an endless quest.

2007 Trip of the Year Winners

The best of the best

Overall Winner


Trek to the Source of the Tsangpo, Tibet

The last time trekking guide Gary McCue set out to explore far-western Tibet, he happened upon an acre-size hot spring that tumbled from a mountainside near Lake Manasarovar. “I’d never seen a boiling creek just come crashing out of a hole in the ground,” he says. But it’s just the sort of surprise the Tasmania-based author of Trekking in Tibet: A Traveler’s Guide has come to expect from this part of the world. Tourism may be booming聴the controversial new Qinghai-Tibet Railway helped bump up visitation to Tibet by 30 percent last year聴but much of this mysterious land of Buddhist temples and mist-shrouded peaks remains blissfully unexplored by outsiders. This spring, McCue will return to the Himalayas on a quest to reach the source of the Tsangpo River, the mightiest of four rivers that flow from the sacred 22,028-foot peak of Kailas. The 42-day exploratory trek is the first commercial expedition to a pilgrimage site very few Westerners have seen since a Swedish explorer hiked nearby in the early 1900s. After driving across the plains from Lhasa to Darchen, you’ll trek the perimeter of Kailas before camping in the Lha Chu Valley during the annual Saga Dawa full-moon festival. Then you’ll start the weeklong journey through a glacial valley to Tamchok Khabab, the river’s source. The trip ends with a visit to the temple-strewn Limi Valley, a newly opened region of western Nepal. “It’s hard to find wilderness this wild and remote that doesn’t require Reinhold Messner-level skills to reach,” says McCue. “It’s the closest you can come to what the explorers experienced 150 years ago.” OUTFITTER: Wilderness Travel, 800-368-2794, ; PRICE: $10,560聳$13,160; DIFFICULTY: Challenging; WHEN TO GO: May聳June

North America


Cross The USA On Two Wheels

This epic, coast-to-coast challenge takes you from Santa Barbara, California, to Charleston, South Carolina聴2,949 miles with 167,000 vertical feet of climbing聴in 33 grueling days. You’ll pedal on two-lane blacktop across the Mojave Desert, over Rocky Mountain passes, and through southern prairies en route to the Atlantic seaboard, staying in roadside hotels along the way. You’ll earn a lifetime’s worth of bragging rights (you’re averaging a century ride per day) and get a two-wheeled take on the classic American landscapes that most travelers experience only as a blur through the car window. Just be sure to remember to dip a toe in both the Pacific and Atlantic or your efforts might be in vain. OUTFITTER: Trek Travel, 866-464-8735, ; PRICE: $10,000; DIFFICULTY: Challenging; WHEN TO GO: September聳October

Polar Regions


Canoe With The Caribou In Alaska

The 23-million-acre National Petroleum Reserve, on Alaska’s north coast, holds the largest swath of unprotected wilderness in the U.S.聴and you needn’t look beyond its name to guess its primary purpose. But the region harbors much more than black gold: Half a million western arctic caribou march across its sprawling plains each year, along with grizzlies and wolves. On this 11-day trip, you’ll follow the herd by foot and in two-person canoes on the untamed Kokolik River, hiking where woolly mammoths and saber-toothed tigers once roamed. OUTFITTER: Equinox Wilderness Expeditions, 604-222-1219, ;PRICE: $4,495; DIFFICULTY: Moderate; WHEN TO GO: June

South America


Three Jewels Of Ays茅n, Chile

This isolated piece of Patagonia, where the population density is just 1.2 people per square mile, is framed by vast icefields that feed blue-green rivers and streams so pure you can drink from them. The 27-day, 132-mile expedition combines three seldom-traveled routes: the Cerro Castillo hike, where you’ll camp amid the basalt spires and crags that gave Castle Hill its name; the Ays茅n Glacier Trail, a year-old hut-to-hut circuit through an unspoiled wilderness dotted with glacial lakes; and on to the icefields surrounding 11,073-foot FitzRoy, where iconic Andean peaks rise dramatically from the frozen lowlands. OUTFITTER: Patagonia 国产吃瓜黑料 Expeditions, 011-56-67-219894, ; PRICE: $4,850; DIFFICULTY: Challenging; WHEN TO GO: January

Eastern Europe & the Middle East


Journey Through Ancient Oman

Just east of Saudi Arabia, on the Arabian Sea, centuries-old shepherd trails crisscross the rocky ridges and deep wadis of the Al Hajar range, which rises 10,000 feet above Oman’s placid northern coastline. It’s the Middle East that doesn’t make the nightly news, and it’s virgin territory for most American travelers. On this ten-day trip, you’ll trek and camp in lush valleys filled with date palms, in ancient sand-colored villages that blend seamlessly with the surrounding hills, and on a sugary beach where you can snorkel in a sapphire bay. OUTFITTER: KE 国产吃瓜黑料 Travel, 800-497-9675, ; PRICE: $1,995; DIFFICULTY: Moderate; WHEN TO GO: March聳April, November聳January

Western Europe

Giro Del Gelato, Italy

Finally, a trip that acknowledges the number-one reason we cycle in Italy. Vacations don’t get much sweeter than this eight-day ride through southern Piedmont with gelato-making genius Danilo Zecchin, of Ciao Bella Gelato. Pedaling an average of 40 miles per day on paved roads that roll through vineyards and over patchworked hills, you’ll work up just enough hunger for the copious Italian dinners, private wine tastings, and all-you-can-eat frozen treats. Recharge at 500-year-old castles and 17th-century farmhouses as the chef spills the secrets behind his sinful concoctions. Then pedal, gorge, repeat. OUTFITTER: Ciclismo Classico, 800-866-7314, ; PRICE: $3,995; DIFFICULTY: Moderate; WHEN TO GO: May

Asia

Discover Rinjani, Indonesia

If trekking near active volcanoes isn’t daunting enough, how about climbing a few聴including the 12,224-foot Gunung Rinjani, on the island of Lombok, east of Bali, via a scenic new route to its unexplored southern rim. On this ten-day trip, you’ll start in the village of Aibuka, scramble to the gorgeous Sengara Anak crater lake, then paddle inflatable rafts to the base of Gunung Baru (7,752 feet), an active young volcano in mid-lake. After topping that “warm-up” peak, you’ll soak in surrounding hot springs, then trek to Rinjani base camp. The push to the summit begins under a full moon at 2 a.m. and ends at about sunrise. OUTFITTER: No Roads Expeditions, 011-03-9502-3789, ; PRICE: $1,422; DIFFICULTY: Challenging; WHEN TO GO: May聳June

Bahamas, Mexico & Central America

Island-Hop In Nicaragua

If the crater lakes and verdant slopes of Nicaragua’s volcanoes have hosted few adventurers, it’s not for lack of suitable terrain. The playground potential in the rumpled topography of this fun mecca rivals that of its neighbors. This nine-day trip takes you island-hopping by kayak in Lake Nicaragua, hiking through a rainforest, and wandering among the pre-Columbian artifacts, caves, and rock art of Zapatera National Park. You’ll spend most nights in wilderness lodges, where howler monkeys provide the morning wake-up call. OUTFITTER: Mountain Travel Sobek, 888-687-6235, ; PRICE: $2,690聳$2,990 (plus $150 internal airfare); DIFFICULTY: Easy; WHEN TO GO: January聳February, October聳December

Oceania

Dive Into Palau’s Shark Week

Reef sharks in the midst of mating season are the headliners at Shark Week, the Micronesian Shark Foundation’s annual conservation-oriented celebration of these cartilaginous creatures. Expect cameos from silvertip, tiger, and hammerhead sharks, among others, as you explore the reefs and walls of underwater Palau on this ten-day, resort-based expedition. By day, a 28-foot boat will take you to dive sites, many of which are open only during this event; the nights are enhanced by lectures from experts on sharksand preservation. OUTFITTER: Oceanic Society Natural History Expeditions, 800-326-7491, ; PRICE: $2,990聳$3,490; DIFFICULTY: Moderate; WHEN TO GO: March

Africa

Paddle Madagascar

Long isolated from the flora and fauna of the African mainland, the world’s fourth-largest island teems with evolutionary anomalies, such as the 30 lemur species and countless other miscellaneous critters that exist nowhere else on earth. You’ll hear a cacophony of grunts and wails as you kayak the aquamarine water of the Indian Ocean through the newly designated Masoala National Park. Inland you’ll paddle on calm rivers and lakes through forest reserves on this 18-day adventure. In the tropical home of indiris, sifakas, and octopus trees, you’ll sleep in wilderness lodges and camp on palm-shaded beaches where you can snorkel in secluded lagoons few outsiders have seen. OUTFITTER: Explorers Corner, 510-559-8099, ; PRICE:$4,553; DIFFICULTY: Moderate; WHEN TO GO: October聳November

The post Spin the Globe appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Get ready for the new age of adventure on the world's wildest continent. Whether it's the Ugandan National Kayak Team leading raft trips on the raging White Nile or entrepreneurial young guides building stylish bush camps with an eye toward helping local communities, a fresh generation is redefining travel in Africa. Leave your pith helmet at home.

Mozambique: The New “It” Country

South Africa: The New Paradigm

Safari Camps: The New Aesthetic

国产吃瓜黑料 Guides: The New Adrenaline

Thrill Seekers: The New 国产吃瓜黑料s

The Isles Have It

After 16 years of civil war, Mozambique is back in the bliss business, with 1,500 miles of Indian Ocean coastline, thriving coral reefs . . . and peace at hand

“Tem for莽a,” said Abudo, in Portuguese. “O vento h谩-de soprar.”

Have strength. The wind will come.

The sail flapped listlessly as we drifted in the sun's growing heat. We'd hired the 70-year-old fisherman to sail us in his wooden dhow across a channel from Ilha de Mo莽ambique, a tiny speck off the northern coast, to a nearby isthmus of the mainland. Soon the wind did come, billowing the patched sails of nearby fishing dhows and winging them to sea. Beaching at a thatch village under coconut palms, we waded through tidal inlets to a spectacularly empty, several-mile-long curve of white beach. After snorkeling in the quiet shallows, avoiding enormous sea urchins, we hiked back to discover our dhow sprawled on its side on a sandy flat at least 500 yards from the water's edge.

“What do we do now?” I asked Abudo.

“Now we wait for the sea,” he replied.

听

Back in the fifties and early sixties, Mozambique then a Portuguese colony was on its way to becoming the Caribbean of Africa for white South Africans, landlocked Rhodesians, and others. After Portugal granted independence in 1975 commemorated in Bob Dylan's song “Mozambique” a new black socialist government came to power. Then came 16 brutal years of civil war.

Now, after more than a decade of peace, Mozambique is rebuilding, and tourism is one of its brightest spots. But you don't go there to zoom your crystalline lenses across the African savanna and zing off photos of the Big Five. During the war, bush fighters slaughtered many animals for food, and, as a result, there really isn't much big wildlife in the scrubby interior. Where you do find stunning wildlife is among Mozambique's palmy archipelagoes, coral reefs, and 1,500 miles of Indian Ocean coast that the civil war paradoxically kept pristine from development. Some 700,000 visitors arrive in the country annually (nearly double from 2001), many of them eco-tourists who've quickly spread the word.

During our year's stay in the capital city, Maputo, where my wife, Amy, was doing research on dance, we took advantage of the coastline most weekends. On our children's five-week Christmas school break, we flew deep into the subtropics, 12 degrees south of the equator. It was here, in 2002, that the World Wildlife Fund helped Mozambique establish Quirimbas National Park. This encompasses 11 of the 28 islands of the Quirimbas Archipelago, plus a large swath of the mainland's mangrove and miombo forests and the St. Lazarus Bank farther offshore, considered one of the world's premier diving and sportfishing locations.

The park is an experiment in eco-tourism, approved by the area's traditional fishing villages in order to preserve their way of life, manage marine resources, and develop basic services in a region with a life expectancy of less than 40 years. Rather than bringing in the masses, the park emphasizes limited, high-end tourism. Opened in 2002, the Quil谩lea Island resort offers elegant thatch-and-stone villas with access to empty beaches and some of the archipelago's best diving right offshore. The Medjumbe Island Resort, also on its own small island, gives easy access to bonefishing and scuba diving. At the Vamizi Island lodge, outside the park on a seven-mile-long island, you can luxuriate in a house-size villa. Backed by European investors, Vamizi collaborates with researchers from the Zoological Society of London to preserve the area's sea turtles and the mainland's elephant habitat.

In the clear waters of another island group, the Bazaruto Archipelago, off the southern coast and protected by a national park, you can swim (if you're lucky) with the threatened dugong a shy sea cow that supposedly inspired the mermaid myth. Upscale lodges here include the Benguerra and the Marlin.

My 51st birthday happened to find us on Ilha de Mo莽ambique, which lies partway between the Quirimbas and the Bazarutos. The Portuguese built their stronghold in East Africa on this tiny, 1.5-mile-long sliver of old coral and shipped out the interior's gold and ivory from here. Today there's still no place on earth like Ilha, which has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. Tree roots sprout from the broken walls of old coral-and-stone villas in its narrow streets, rusted cannonballs lie about the massive fortress, the tiny chapel of the Southern Hemisphere's oldest church overlooks the sea, and the ornate St. Paul's Palace seems untouched dusty furniture and all since the time of the Portuguese.

European artists and architects are rehabilitating old villas into small hotels. We stayed at the Escondidinho, which had been renovated by an Italian doctor. Under its portico, looking onto a courtyard where it's rumored slaves were once sold, a French ballerina and her computer-engineer partner who chucked it all to move to Africa run a bistro featuring a delicious cuisine that, like the island itself, takes its accents from Africa and Europe, Arabia and India.

At the hour Abudo predicted, the ocean refloated our dhow. Soon we were broad-reaching amid flying spray. We would land just in time for me to join a fast-paced game with Ilha's men's soccer team near the fortress walls. Then I would meet my family in the bistro for kid-goat stew and birthday flan. But for now, it was just the wind and the sea.

Access & Resources
Getting听There:听Fly South African Airways () from New York to Johannesburg to Maputo for about $1,400 round-trip. From there, it's a two-hour flight on LAM () to Pemba, the launch point for charter flights to the Quirimbas. (For the Bazarutos, flights depart from Vilanculos.) Prime Time: April September, with crowds peaking in August. Where to Stay: The Quil谩lea Island resort has nine villas ($400 per person; 011-258-2-722-1808, ). There are 13 chalets at Medjumbe Island Resort (from $345 per person; closed for renovations until March; 011-27-11-465-6904, ). Vamizi Island lodge has ten beach houses ($560 per person; 011-27-11-884-8869, ). Escondidinho, on Ilha de Mo莽ambique, is a ten-room guesthouse (doubles, $50; 011-258-2-661-0078, ). Benguerra Lodge offers 11 chalets ($395 per person; 011-27-11-452-0641, ). There are 19 chalets at the Marlin Lodge (from $213 per person; 011-27-12-460-9410, ).

Peter Stark's book Astoria: John Jacob Astor and Thomas Jefferson鈥檚 Lost Pacific Empire: A Story of Wealth, Ambition, and Survival will be published in March 2014 by Ecco.

国产吃瓜黑料 Capital

More than just the darling of Bono and the Bills, South Africa is breaking down barriers鈥攆rom cosmopolitan Cape Town to the wild superparks of the future

IT'S THE DREAMLIKE, cinematic power of Africa unfolding yet again. This time, it's late afternoon when the leopard emerges from the bush, 20 feet away, crossing the sandy wash with a lazy stride, pelt rippling in the golden light. Then the radio crackles and we're fishtailing across the 54-square-mile Ngala Private Game Reserve, on Kruger National Park's western edge. Another cat's been spotted, and Jimmy Ndubane, our Shangaan tracker, leads us straight to it. This one is anything but lazy; seconds after we see the white tip of its tail twitching in the grass, the beast leaps forward and zigzags explosively through the meadow. We hear its prey, a mongoose, screaming and, finally, silence. It's awful, it's beautiful, it's what you came for: Africa forever.

However unforgettable, such classic safari epiphanies explain only part of South Africa's allure. You could come for the climbing or surfing, to dive with great white sharks, or to experience the spectacular two-ocean sailing. (The sleek black hull of Shosholoza, South Africa's 2007 America's Cup challenger and the race's first African entrant, was hauled out on the dock across the harbor from my hotel room in Cape Town.) You could come to beat the crowds flooding Johannesburg for the 2010 World Cup soccer finals聴though you'll probably miss Oprah's glittery 2006 New Year's Eve bash.

The best reason, however, is hope聴the dream that things can get better in Africa, that South Africa is leading the way, and that you can be part of it. A dozen years after the nightmare of apartheid, South Africa can still be a tough, bitter environment. But Mandela's vision of a democratic, multiracial African nation is alive and well, and tourism, once the target= of a global boycott, is the fastest-growing area of the economy, providing 1.2 million jobs for the country of 47 million.

On a wide-ranging journey through the nation's wild and urban landscapes, my goal was to max out on the abundant pleasures on offer while witnessing that transformed face. This meant obligatory visits to sprawling, hustling Jo'burg and laid-back, spectacular Cape Town, cities where the street life is set to a booming kwaito beat and revolutionary history is so fresh it's like 1776 was yesterday. South Africa, of course, remains happy to outfit you in khaki, mix you a gin-and-tonic, and make your Hemingway fantasies come true. But in the bush, too, big ideas are taking shape. The first is black empowerment, the integration of economic realms long dominated by whites. The second is South Africa's role in the global movement to create vast “transfrontier” parks that transcend borders while restoring wildlife routes.

Both ideas are being enthusiastically enacted at Tembe Elephant Park, a 190-square-mile preserve just south of Mozambique. The co-owner of Tembe's serene lodge compound, former Durban private detective Ernest Robbertse, manages the operation in partnership with the Tembe tribe. And walls will be coming down: In 1989, war in Mozambique led South Africa to erect an electric border fence, cutting off Tembe's massive 220-strong elephant herd from much of its range. The goal is to remove that barrier, reuniting Tembe's herd with their relatives in Mozambique's Maputo reserve.

An even grander expansion is planned at Kruger National Park, where I took a revelatory, weeklong game drive with naturalist Mike Stephens, experiencing close encounters with lions, rhinos, and a fantastic array of birds. Vast as Kruger may be (it's bigger than Israel), it's part of a pipe-dream-in-the-making called the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, which will one day unite Kruger, Mozambique's Limpopo, and Zimbabwe's Gonarezhou in a superpark the size of Maine. “Hopefully,” one official told me, “we'll get herds the size of the Serengeti.”

For now, nothing I saw matched the luxurious wildness of Ngala. The lodge's 20 cottages are unfenced, so you must summon an armed guard if you want to leave your room after dark. This frisson of danger, along with manic four-wheel sprints cross-country looking for game (not allowed in Kruger), adds a keen adrenaline edge. Yet here, too, Ngala quietly preaches the transfrontier vision and, via its support of the Africa Foundation, social justice. In nearby Welverdiend, I saw the foundation's work: new schoolrooms and families piloting “hippo rollers,” easy-to-roll barrels, to the well.

Small steps, small connections. Will South Africa's future include prosperity, huge parks stretching over the horizon, and all its people experiencing Africa's riches, traveling in the footsteps of the wild herds of long ago? All I know is that I'm going back.

Access & Resources
Getting There: Fly to Johannesburg from New York on South African Airways () for about $1,200 round-trip. From there, fly to Durban to see Tembe Elephant Park. Conservation Corporation Africa's Ngala Private Game Reserve () is a two-hour flight from Johannesburg on Federal Air (011-27-11-395-9000, ). Prime Time: 狈辞惫别尘产别谤耸惭补谤肠丑. Where to Stay: Tembe Elephant Lodge offers ten safari-tent suites for $162 per person (011-27-31-267-0144, ). Ngala's 20 thatched chalets start at $280, including an overnight walking safari (011-27-11-809-4300, ). In Cape Town, try the hip little Kensington Place Hotel (doubles from $190; 011-27-21-424-4744, ), on the slopes of Table Mountain.

Bed, Bush, and Beyond

The latest safari camps aren't only rediscovering the rugged glamour and extravagance of canvas; they're also letting the community in on the action

Africa

Apoka Lodge // Uganda Good-quality digs were in short supply in Uganda until locals Jonathan Wright and his wife, Pamela, opened the remote Semliki Safari Lodge and Kampala's Emin Pasha Hotel. Now comes their latest addition, Apoka, in the northeast's Kidepo Valley National Park聴the choice place to see cheetahs. Ten elegant tent-cottages outfitted with locally made furnishings look out on the savanna聴a landscape traversed by the Karimojong, seminomadic pastoralists who receive a percentage of the lodge revenue and sell their crafts in the lodge store. Doubles from $640; 011-256-41-251-182,

Naibor Camp // Kenya The Art of Ventures, the company that started the groundbreaking Zen-like lodge Shompole in partnership with a group of Masai in southern Kenya, created nearby Naibor in 2004. The camp has recently been moved to the banks of the Talek River in the heart of the Masai Mara Game Reserve, flush with rhinos, cheetahs, hippos, zebras, and tons of birds. Its eight opulent canvas tents with verandas sit in a riverine forest, close to a wildebeest migration route. Doubles from $860; 011-254-20-883-331,

Onguma Camp // Namibia Built just outside Etosha National Park on a 50,000-acre private reserve, the luxury camp at Onguma has seven spacious tents incorporating wood, steel, and stone, all under billowing canvas ceilings. The U-shaped layout of tents, lodge, and a pool allows 24/7 views of a central watering hole. As in Kruger National Park, plans are afoot to remove fences between private reserves alongside Etosha to create one greater park. Doubles from $500; 011-264-61-232-009,

Nkwichi Lodge // Mozambique So lavishly remote is Nkwichi, the only way to reach it is by boat. Hidden on the eastern shore of the vast white-sanded Lake Malawi聴one of the world's largest freshwater lakes聴Nkwichi's six chalets (each with secluded open-air baths) are surrounded by the 370,000-acre Manda wilderness reserve, the perfect setting for exploring, canoeing, sailing the cerulean waters, or hammock time. The owners have helped the community with everything from growing vegetables to creating the reserve and developing a sustainable environment for tourism. Doubles from $320;

Marataba // South Africa Opened in 2005 on a private concession in Marakele National Park, a few hours north of Johannesburg, this 15-suite camp is owned by the Hunter family, which also runs the excellent Gorah in Addo Elephant Park, in the Eastern Cape. Set in a malaria-free landscape that quickly changes from veldt to mountain, Marataba has stonework reminiscent of African ruins聴and huge windows to take in the expanse of Big Five habitat. Doubles from $1,000; 011-27-44-532-7818,

Edo's Camp // Botswana In a 300,000-acre private reserve in the western Kalahari Desert, the four twin-bed tents of Edo's Camp overlook a water hole frequented by antelope and are the latest offering from esteemed outfitter Ker & Downey. Resident guides or the indigenous San people can help you track the seven endangered white rhinos relocated to the reserve from South Africa. Doubles from $660 (closed December through February); 800-423-4236,

Mequat Mariam // Ethiopia A two-bedroom tukul聴a round thatch-roofed hut of stone and mud聴sits at the edge of a cliff at nearly 10,000 feet, overlooking endless canyonland. This small piece of nowhere is Mequat Mariam, some 400 miles north of Addis Ababa. Mequat and its sister property, Wajela聴a seven-hour trek away, with photo ops of baboons聴are the work of Tourism in Ethiopia for Sustainable Future Alternatives, which supports nearly 300 local families. From $35 per person; 011-251-11-122-5024,

Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge // Rwanda Virunga Lodge, with its gorgeous vistas of the lakes and volcanoes of Parc National des Volcans, set the standard for comfort in gorilla-watching country, and it will soon have company: the Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge, set to open this spring. The brainchild of the people behind Governors' Camp, in Kenya, Sabyinyo is owned by a trust that helps support 6,000 households in the area. Doubles from $600; 011-254-20-273-4000,

Lupita Island Resort and spa // Tanzania The 14 open-air suites, each with a plunge pool, are carved into a hillside on lush Lupita Island with views across Lake Tanganyika. For off-island awe, take a four-hour drive to Katavi, one of the mainland's most remote savanna parks, or try a two-day trip on a lake cruiser to chimp-filled Mahale Mountain National Park. Doubles from $1,300; 011-255-27-250-8773,

Shumba camp // Zambia Wilderness Safaris, winner of multiple conservation and community-involvement awards, never does things in small measures. So it's no surprise that it opened four camps at once in Kafue National Park, one of the biggest reserves in Africa. All are intimate; the best of the quartet is Shumba, in Kafue's remote northwestern corner. Its six immense safari tents on raised platforms have four-poster beds and inviting couches looking onto sweeping savanna and wetlands. Doubles from $1,480; 800-513-5222,

Additional reporting by Danielle Pergament

Access & Resources
Since these lodges are remote, it's usually wise to book them as part of a bigger, customized itinerary聴your best bet is to have a reputable outfitter plan the logistics for you. Lodges can direct you to favorite outfitters, or you can try these recommended companies (check out the Web sites to see what each specializes in): Abercrombie & Kent (800-554-7094, ), Bushtracks Expeditions (800-995-8689, ), Explore Africa (888-596-6377, ), Ker & Downey (800-423-4236, ), Mango African Safaris (888-698-9220, ), Maniago Safaris (800-923-7422, ), Micato Safaris (800-642-2861, ), Africa 国产吃瓜黑料 Company (800-882-9453, ), Uncharted Outposts (888-995-0909, ), Volcanoes Safaris (770-573-2274, ), Wildland 国产吃瓜黑料s (800-345-4453, ).

The Wild Bunch

Nine Stellar guides with new-school safari smarts鈥攁nd a commitment to conservation鈥攖ake adventure and altruism where they've never been before

Phil West
The Nairobi-based West, 31, who guided for Kenya's Lewa Wildlife Conservancy before striking out on his own, is as passionate about ethnobotany as he is about tracking leopards. His custom-designed East African safaris might include a six-day walk through the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy and two Masai areas, Il Ngwesi and Lekurruki Masai, plus rafting down Kenya's Ewaso Ng'iro River. Like most outfitters, West has arrangements with local tribes and parks, so nights can as easily be spent in a tent or a lodge and days spent ambling or driving.

Grant and Brent Reed
The two South African brothers, Grant, 32, and Brent, 33, come from a family of naturalists聴which explains their safari savvy and bird and reptile expertise. (Grant has been collecting snakes since he was five.) Cofounders of Letaka Safaris, the brothers offer everything from walking safaris to birdwatching in Botswana. But for a triple shot of adventure, sign up for one of the nine-day Wildguides courses at their Okavango Guiding School. Participants of all skill levels learn how to handle rifles, track animals on foot, and find their way back to camp on their own, while becoming versed in geology, fauna, and conservation issues of the lush Okavango Delta. ,

Endale Teshome
Born in Ethiopia, Teshome, 31, herded goats in the remote Bale Mountains until his teens. After guiding on his own, he joined Ethiopian Rift Valley Safaris, studying his nation's ancient and cultural history along the way. If it's the vastly diverse flora and fauna of the south you want to see, that's his home turf. In the north, Teshome tours rock-hewn churches聴places few foreigners have seen.

Craig Doria
South African Doria, 44, guided for ten years in Zambia, where he helped create an anti-poaching unit in the national parks, a passion he's carried to Tanzania, his current base. He's written two books about snakes and also collects DNA for wildlife research. His deluxe tented-camp- and lodge-based safaris, tailored to clients' interests, include hikes, driving, sailing, and more.

Derek Shenton
The third generation of his Zambian family to go into guiding and conservation, Shenton, 41, has built two camps, Kaingo and Mwamba, deep in the game-rich South Luangwa National Park, the launchpad for his guided walks and drives. The stylish Kaingo offers big-game close-ups. (Shenton's forte is tracking cats.) Three hours away by foot is the simpler but equally wild Mwamba. Shenton is a founding member of the South Luangwa Conservation Society, which fights poaching, offers job training, and educates children about wildlife.

Peter and Tom Silvester
The Silvester brothers, from Kenya, merge hipness with high ideals. Peter, 42, runs Royal African Safaris, an ultra-luxe outfitter operating in East Africa, Botswana, and South Africa. Frequented by celebs, CEOs, and royalty, RAS specializes in custom itineraries. (Guides usually visit clients in their home country to iron out details.) Guests stay in tented camps or at lodges like Loisaba, a 60,000-acre community ranch run by Tom, 39, who works it in tandem with the local Laikipiak Masai and Samburu and offers clients everything from mountain biking and camel safaris to rafting. A portion of the profits goes to wildlife research and the community. ,

Corbett Bishop
Originally from Texas, Bishop, 35, moved to Tanzania in 1994 to lead trips up Mount Kilimanjaro and, two years later, started a safari company there, offering mobile luxury camping and camel- or donkey-assisted treks. Bishop's most recent project, the two-year-old Ol Tukai Conservancy, funds both community development and conservation projects; it's named for a village in a critical wildlife corridor between Tarangire and Lake Manyara national parks.

Beyond Kakhi

Two-story rapids, hot, spouting lava, a frenzy of sharks, lions in the dark鈥攊f it's thrills you're after, you'll find them in Africa

Rafting
White Nile, Uganda
There's a simple way the guides at Nile River Explorers measure waves on the White Nile: If a 16-foot raft disappears entirely, the wave is about the size of a two-story building. But while the river's 30,000-cubic-feet-per-second flow (roughly three times that of the Colorado) creates monster rapids, there are swimmer-friendly calm spots in between, and NRE's guides include charter members of the Ugandan national kayak team. The 18-mile day trip begins with five Class IV聳V rapids, each with placid, crocodile-free pools below. Day trips, $95; luxury tented accommodations at the Nile Porch from $54; 011-256-43-120-236,

Hiking
Ol Doinyo Lengai, Tanzania
Allan Mbaga, Tanzanian owner of African Outdoor Expeditions, has worked with David Breashears and Imax film crews on Kilimanjaro, and he'll take you up Ol Doinyo Lengai, a 9,235-foot peak north of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. You'll spend two days climbing steeply through volcanic ash and lava rock; near the top, hikers pitch camp in the inactive south crater before exploring the north crater's steaming vents and magma pools. The five-day trek includes a visit to Lake Natron, where flamingos flock by the thousands. $1,900, all-inclusive; 011-255-744-263-170,

Surfing
Southwest Madagascar
This May through October, African Surfaris will guide clients around the planet's fourth-largest island聴considered one of the last undiscovered surfing outposts. The trip starts in the Toilara Reef region near the southwestern town of Toilara, just 25 miles north of Flame Balls聴a hollow 200-yard-long left reef break two miles offshore. Ten-day trips from $1,600, including airfare from Johannesburg, lodging, meals, and boat trips; 011-27-82-836-7597,

Fly-fishing
Zambezi River, Namibia
Cast a fly on the Zambezi, where 15-pound dagger-toothed tiger fish prowl. The posh Impalila Island Lodge, at the confluence of the Chobe and Zambezi rivers, is not only the best place to find the ferocious fish; it's also within striking distance of Victoria Falls and beast-rich Chobe National Park. Seven-day trips with Aardvark McLeod from $4,000, all-inclusive, from Johannesburg; 011-44-1980-840-590,

Lion Tracking
Tsavo East National Park, Kenya
In 1898, two lions ate scores of railroad workers near what is now Tsavo East National Park. Today, area lions regularly kill livestock in nearby settlements, which is why in 2002 Earthwatch Institute launched its Lions of Tsavo program. Volunteers join American and Kenyan scientists to track and study the cats during night drives in order to help people and prides coexist. Thirteen-day trips from $3,249; 800-776-0188,

Horse Trekking
Malawi and Zambia
This fall, Malawi and Zambia are set to create the Nyika Transfrontier Conservation Area, a 13,500-square-mile international peace park. The best way to explore this remote region is by horseback on a mobile safari: two nights at the upscale Chelinda Lodge, followed by a week of galloping through montane grasslands and forested valleys, and hoofing it to the top of 8,553-foot Nganda Mountain. Ten-day trips from May through October, $3,090, including lodging, meals, and riding; 011-44-1-837-82544,

Diving
Port St. Johns, South Africa
Each winter, as the water temperature drops along South Africa's eastern coast, millions of sardines rocket the 300 miles from East London to Durban聴serving as the main course for sharks, seals, whales, and superpods of 5,000-plus common dolphins. June and July are the best months to catch the frenzy. Six-day dive trips from $1,800, including lodging, diving, and meals at iNtaba River Lodge; 011-27-21-782-2205,

The post Africa Now appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

A CLUSTER OF VILLAGERS has gathered at the brink of a stair-stepping, 20-foot cataract on Madagascar’s Ikopa River. Sensing the intentions of extreme kayakers Brad Ludden, 23, and his teammates鈥擱ush Sturges, 19, and Tyler Bradt, 18鈥攁n old man wearing a blue loincloth shuffles out of the crowd. “Merci, merci,” he says in halting French. He bears no markings of rank or religion, but when he speaks, the others are silent. Chanting in his native Malagasy tongue, he reaches to the sky, gathers something invisible, and transfers it to Brad and Tyler by gesturing in an age-old ritual that looks suspiciously like jazz hands.

madagascar

RICE AND SHINE: The crew near the capital, Antananarivo

This is the Madagascar we were after: the one confirming rumors that the France-size avatar of biodiversity is also hiding powerful magic and some of the best whitewater the world has never seen. Thanks to our guide, Gilles Gautier, finding the Ikopa鈥攁 string of potent yet forgiving Class V rapids similar to those on the popular Zambezi River, in southern Africa鈥攚as like unearthing the Hope Diamond on the first dig. “It’s better than the Zambezi, better than New Zealand, even,” raves Ludden. The three other rivers we ran鈥攖he Lilly, the Mandraka, and the Sahatandra, with its three days’ worth of granite gorges and welcoming villages鈥攚ere also rare finds.


Long a destination appealing to Darwin wannabes鈥攁s the world’s only natural habitat for lemurs and tenrecs (a kind of shrew)鈥攖his Indian Ocean island of 18 million inhabitants showed off its forbidding terrain to the world during the 1993 Raid Gauloises adventure race. Recently it’s become a magnet for other thrill seekers. The draw? Springing from the country’s mountainous north-south backbone are thousand-foot granite monoliths and waterways ranging from Sierra-style steep creeks to massive, 100-yard-wide rivers. The dense eastern jungles teem with horny chameleons, exotic birds like the blue coua, and half-dollar-size orb-web spiders, which spin robust webs across narrow rivers (prompting my arachnophobic paddling companions to execute do-or-die rolls). In the west, the dry hills and red rivers are home to 16-foot Nile crocodiles. Madagascar is notorious for red mud, but the southern winter (June through August) is dry and temperate.


With a new focus on tourism, the island’s infrastructure is slowly improving. After four decades free from French colonialism鈥攎ostly spent in sub-Haitian poverty induced by kleptocratic dictator Didier Ratsiraka鈥攖he newly elected, pro-business president, Marc Ravalomanana, is working hard to triple Madagascar’s protected lands and has signed agreements听that will bring U.S. air carriers to the capital city of Antananarivo (“Tana” for short). Ecotourism is on the rise, adventure camps are springing up across the country, and a new industry of Maldives-style private-island hideaways is blossoming in the Mozambique Channel.


Despite being sucked deep below the final 20-foot drop, Ludden, Sturges, and Bradt all survived the rapid on the Ikopa they’d later christen “Heaven and Hell.” With or without a shaman’s blessing, pitching off into unknown Malagasy rivers isn’t for everyone, but there’s plenty more adventure to be had in the new Madagascar. Such as:

Rafting & Trekking

RAFTING THE MATSIATRA

Gilles Gautier is your man to float any of 13 rivers in Madagascar’s backcountry, where villages are still completely cut off from modern civilization. The premier multi-day float is on the Matsiatra, which runs south of Tana through rolling grasslands for more than 100 miles鈥攁t least half of which contain Class III whitewater鈥攂efore joining the Mangoky River to reach the western coast. During the 12-day trip, your cuisine is as likely to include vampire bat as foie gras. Take note: Crocs aren’t shy. “They’ll swim right up to the raft but turn away at the last second,” says Gautier. “We’ve never had an incident.”


TREKKING THE PARKS

After taking in the palace ruins in Tana, head three hours east to the national parks around P茅rinet, with their nine species of lemur, including the largest, the indri. In P茅rinet, the Vakona Lodge offers thatched luxury and a good bottle of Bordeaux. If you want to see it all鈥攖he eroded sandstone of the Isalo Massif, humpback whales breaching in the Indian Ocean off 脦le Sainte Marie, and the famous stand of baobab trees in Morondava鈥� contact John Spence at Aardvark Safaris to customize a tour.

Rock Climbing & Island Exploration

CLIMBING THE HIGHLANDS

Gautier offers guests two climbing camps: one on the island of Nosy Hara, near the northern city of Antsiranana, featuring 100-foot cliffs rising from the beach; the other, Tsarasoa, three hours south of Fianarantsoa at the base of the 2,500-foot Tsarasoa wall. It was here that Gautier brought climber Lynn Hill and her all-woman crew to pioneer a new route in 1999. For nonclimbers, mountain biking, trekking, and paragliding are the best ways to enjoy these highlands.


EXPLORING THE ISLANDS

South African expat Richard Walker’s 18-bungalow masterpiece blends into the 54-acre island of Tsarabanjina鈥攐ne of a dozen in the nearly uninhabited Mitsio archipelago, an hour and a half northeast by motor launch from the resort-island hub of Nosy Be. Beaches here are connected by a tide-carved lava shelf鈥攁n ideal jumping-off point for scuba diving, fishing, sailing, and wakeboarding. Tsarabanjina provides everything you need鈥攁nd nothing you don’t鈥攆or a vibe that’s part decadence, part shipwreck fantasy.


Iranja鈥攁n hour and a half by boat southwest of Nosy Be鈥攕its on what is surely among the world’s most eye-catching landmasses: two islands connected by a mile-long ribbon of sand that submerges with the incoming tide. Twenty-nine bungalows鈥攖he largest with four wicker-furnished octagonal rooms鈥攁ll overlook the ocean. On many nights, endangered hawksbill and green sea turtles crawl onto the beach to lay their eggs.

Access & Resources

madagascar

RAFT
(011-261-20-22-351-01), Gilles Gautier’s company, charges about $90 per person per day, all-inclusive, for trips on any of the 13 rivers it floats.

PARK IT
Build a 15-day custom tour, including stays in P茅rinet and Isalo national parks, with (011-44-1980-849160) for $4,250 per person.

CLIMB
MadaMax charges $50 per person per night at both camps鈥擭osy Hara and Tsarasoa鈥� including full room and board in tents or simple bungalows.

STRAND YOURSELF
Doubles at start at $140 per night, including three meals and snorkeling. Doubles at start at $285 per night, including air conditioning and a mini-bar. Both can be booked through Aardvark Safaris.

The post Red Island Revival appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

Of course they do—they get to trek with camels. But you can, too! We’ve got the COOLEST TRIPS, TOP TEN TRENDS, EXPERT ADVICE, AND BEST NEW PLACES TO GET LOST IN 2003. So what are you waiting for? Giddyup!




Let the Pros Be Your Guides




Get Lost in the Back of Beyond




Say Hello to the Wild Life




The Next Best Thing to Actually Living There




Go the Extra Green Mile




Take the Multisport Approach




No Whining Allowed




Blazing New Trails by Mountain Bike




Water is the Best Element




Our Next Thrilling Episodes




Remote Trips Right Here at Home




Three Helicopter Epics




Six New Additions to the 国产吃瓜黑料 Travel Map




What’s Up in the World’s Danger Zones

Star Power

Let the pros be your guides

BIKING THE TOUR DE FRANCE [FRANCE]
What’s better than watching this year’s 100th anniversary of the Tour de France? Riding it, just hours ahead of the peloton. You’ll pave the way for a certain Texan vying for his fifth straight victory, pedaling 10- to 80-mile sections of the race route through villages packed with expectant fans, and over some of the toughest mountain stages in the Pyrenees and Alps. At day’s end, ditch your bike for luxury digs in villages like Taillores, on Lake Annecy, and the Basque hamlet of St.-Jean-Pied-de-Port. OUTFITTER: Trek Travel, 866-464-8735, . WHEN TO GO: July. PRICE: $3,575. DIFFICULTY: moderate to strenuous.

MOUNT EVEREST ANNIVERSARY TREK [NEPAL]
This May, commemorate the 50th anniversary of Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay’s historic climb to the summit of Everest by spending more than a month trekking and mountaineering in Nepal. Starting in Tumlingtar, you’ll hike beneath Himalayan giants like 27,824-foot Makalu, and strap on crampons to climb the 20,000-foot East and West Cols, and cross 19,008-foot Amphu Laptsa pass into the Everest region. At trek’s end in Thyangboche, Hillary’s son, Peter, will preside over a ceremonial banquet, while the man himself (now 83) will join in by sat phone from Kathmandu. OUTFITTER: World Expeditions, 888-464-8735, . WHEN TO GO: April-June. PRICE: $3,690. DIFFICULTY: strenuous. CRUISING THE SEA OF CORTEZ [MEXICO]
To celebrate 25 years in the adventure business, Wilderness Travel has called on Ÿber-mountaineer Reinhold Messner and Amazon explorer Joe Kane to headline a weeklong cruise in the Sea of Cortez. When you’re not on the shallow-draft, 70-passenger Sea Bird, you’ll snorkel with naturalists as they track sea lions off Isla Los Islotes and spot gray whales in Bah’a Magdalena. Sea-kayak around uninhabited islands and hike desert arroyos, then spend evenings swapping expedition tales with Messner and Kane. OUTFITTER: Wilderness Travel, 800-368-2794, . WHEN TO GO: March. PRICE: $4,595. DIFFICULTY: easy.

CYCLING THROUGH THE TUSCAN VINYARDS [ITALY]
Might want to add another front chainring to your bike before embarking on this hard-charging eight-day affair in Toscana, birthplace of cycle touring. Thanks to the expertise of former Giro d’Italia winner Andy Hampsten, this 400-mile route is designed for riders who are as serious about their Brunello as they are about their hills. From coastal Maremma, you’ll pedal little-trafficked backroads past farmhouses and monasteries, resting your climbing legs and dining like a Medici at wine estates and 12th-century hamlets. Four nights will be spent at a vineyard for a thorough indoctrination in winemaking (and tasting). OUTFITTER: Cinghiale Tours, 206-524-6010, . WHEN TO GO: September. PRICE: $3,000. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

KAYAKING THE YELLOWSTONE RIVER [USA]
Drop into Craten’s Hole with freestyle-kayaking phenom Ben Selznick. Bozeman local and winner of the Gallatin Rodeo 2002, Selznick is your guide on a seven-day tour of Montana’s most famous whitewater. After warming up on the Gallatin River’s Class II-III waves, you’ll graduate to the steep creeks off the Yellowstone, ranging from Class II to V. At night, ease your sore shoulders poolside and fireside at the Chico Hot Springs and Rock Creek resorts. OUTFITTER: GowithaPro, 415-383-3907, . WHEN TO GO: July. PRICE: $4,500. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Far Out

Get lost in the back of beyond

Big wig: a Papuan prepares for a tribal dance

SHAGGY RIDGE TREK [PAPUA NEW GUINEA]
If you were to drop off the face of the earth, you’d probably land in Papua New Guinea’s steamy Finisterre Mountains. Rising 13,000 feet out of the sweltering lowlands, the mountains’ flanks are choked in jungle thicket that few have ever fully explored—not even the locals. Be among the first. Hike and camp for seven days on tangled game trails and World War II supply routes to Shaggy Ridge, an airy fin of rock 4,900 feet above the Bismarck Sea. Be prepared to answer a barrage of questions from Papuan villagers who rarely, if ever, see outsiders. OUTFITTER: World Expeditions, 888-464-8735, . WHEN TO GO: August, September. PRICE: $2,150. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

THE ULTIMATE FLY-FISING ADVENTURE [MONGOLIA]
You’ve got much more than a fish on when you’ve nabbed a taimen, a specimen that regularly grows to five feet long and dines on prairie dogs and ducks. If you’re not up for hunting the world’s largest salmonid for a full week on the Bator River, you can cast for lenok, the brown trout of Mongolia; ride horses or mountain bikes; or just enjoy the good life in your ger, a woodstove-heated yurt with two beds and electricity. Outfitter: Sweetwater Travel Company, 406-222-0624, . When to go: May-June, August-October. Price: $5,200. Difficulty: easy.

RAFTING THE FIRTH RIVER [CANADA]
Caribou know no boundaries. Every June, the 150,000-strong Porcupine herd leaves the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and migrates into the Yukon’s roadless Ivvavik National Park. And because the Class II-IV Firth bisects the park, you’ll be awestruck when thousands cross the river in plain view. Other big game are afoot, too—musk ox, barren land grizzlies, and wolves—and in such high concentrations that the region is often referred to as North America’s Serengeti. With long Arctic days and three- to four-hour river sessions daily, you’ll have plenty of time on this 12-day trip to hike the gently sloping 6,000-foot Brooks Range and fish for arctic char. Outfitter: Rivers, Oceans, and Mountains, 877-271-7626, . When to Go: June. Price: $3,995. Difficulty: moderate.

RIO NEGRO & AMAZON ADVENTURE [BRAZIL]
The upper Rio Negro is your portal back in time on this 11-day adventure that plumbs the deepest, darkest corners of the Amazon Basin. From the former Jesuit outpost of Santa Isabel, you’ll motorboat on the Negro’s blackened waters through virgin rainforest, camping alongside Tucanos Indian settlements stuck in a 19th-century time warp. Off the water, you’ll trek with native Brazilian guides into the rugged tepuis (3,000-foot plateaus), prowling for medicinal herbs used by local shamans. Resist the urge to swim: Football-size piranha call the Rio Negro home. OUTFITTER: Inti Travel and Tours, 403-760-3565, . WHEN TO GO: year-round. PRICE: $2,750. DIFFICULTY: easy.

RUNNING THE KATUN RIVER [RUSSIA]
If you’re looking for bragging rights to a truly remote river, consider the glacier-fed Katun. This 90-mile stretch of whitewater drains from the southern slopes of the 13,000-foot Altai Range, dropping fast through alpine tundra, 300-foot granite canyons, and continuous sets of Class III-IV pool-drop rapids. After a long river day, your evening entertainment at camp consists of traditional Russian dancing and a steamy riverfront bana (sauna). Outfitter: Bio Bio Expeditions, 800-246-7238, . When to Go: July. Price: $2,800. Difficulty: moderate.

COAST TO COAST IN BALBOA’S FOOTSTEPS [PANAMA]
Cross a continent in less than two weeks? Improbable but true when you retrace the route 16th-century conquistador Vasco N煤帽ez de Balboa used to transport riches across the Isthmus of Panama. Five days of hiking, from the Caribbean village of Armila through the Darien Biosphere Reserve, take you to the Chucunaque River, where you’ll board dugout canoes and navigate a maze of flatwater channels past Ember‡ Indian settlements. Four days later, you’ll find yourself on the other side: a wide stretch of beach where Balboa “discovered” the Pacific in 1513. OUTFITTER: Destination by Design, 866-392-7865, . WHEN TO GO: May, December. PRICE: $3,290. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Close Encounters

Say hello to the wild life

A scarlet macaw perched in the rainforests of Belize

EXPLORING REEF AND RAINFOREST [BELIZE]
Mingle with everything from crocs and tapirs to jabiru storks and hawksbill turtles on this eight-day whirl through Belize. After three days on the mainland, gawking at toucans and parrots at the Crooked Tree Bird Sanctuary and dodging howler monkeys at the Mayan ruins of Lamanai, you’ll be whisked 55 miles offshore to a tented base camp on undeveloped Lighthouse Reef. Spend your days snorkeling, kayaking, and scuba diving within more than 70 square miles of pristine reefs. OUTFITTER: Island Expeditions, 800-667-1630, . WHEN TO GO: December- May. PRICE: $1,929. DIFFICULTY: moderate. WALKING WITH BUSHMEN [BOTSWANA]
See the backcountry of Botswana and all its attendant wildlife—with a twist. On this nine-day safari, you’ll tag along with Bushmen on their daily hunting-and-gathering forays (while still bedding down in luxe lodges and camps). Following the lion-cheetah-leopard-elephant-giraffe-zebra spectacle in the Okavango Delta, you’ll head north for a night to stay in the River Bushmen’s new camp, where you’ll search for medicinal plants or hunt with bow and arrow. Farther south, in the arid Central Kalahari Game Reserve, San Bushmen will show you how they survive on roots and prickly pears. OUTFITTER: Africa 国产吃瓜黑料 Company, 800-882-9453, . WHEN TO GO: April-November. PRICE: $1,925-$2,595. DIFFICULTY: easy.

SWIMMING WITH HUMPBACK WHALES [TONGA]
It’s been said that life is never the same after you’ve looked into the eye of a whale. Here’s how to find out: Every year between June and October, hundreds of humpbacks congregate in and around the turquoise waters of Vava’u, a group of 40 islands in northern Tonga, in the South Pacific. For seven days, you’ll bunk down in Neiafu at night, and by day slide into the water and float quietly while mammals the size of semis check you out. OUTFITTER: Whale Swim 国产吃瓜黑料s, 503-699-5869, . WHEN TO GO: August- October. PRICE: $1,180. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Immersion Therapy

The next best thing to actually living there

REMOTE HILL TRIBE TREK [VIETNAM]
Despite the boom in adventure tourism in Vietnam, few travelers venture into the far-northern hill country, some 200 miles north of Hanoi. You should. Following overgrown buffalo paths and ancient Chinese trading trails, you’ll hike steep terrain for 120 miles over 11 days, traveling north from Cao Bang and staying with Nung villagers in huts on stilts. Save some film for Ban Gioc Falls, on the border with China, and Pac Bo Cave, Ho Chi Minh’s legendary hideout. Outfitter: World Expeditions, 888-464-8735, . When to go: October-March. Price: $1,490. Difficulty: moderate.

TREKKING THE ATLAS MOUNTAINS [MOROCCO]
The M’goun Gorge is so narrow in places, you can’t see the sky—let alone the craggy summits of the nearby 12,000-foot Atlas Mountains. But they’re never out of sight for long on this ten-day trip through small Berber burgs in Morocco’s most fabled range. Over four days of hiking, you’ll climb Tizi n’ A茂Imi, a 9,528-foot pass, and sleep in Berber farmhouses en route to the Valley of A茂Bou Guemez, a rare oasis where you’re welcomed as family. OUTFITTER: Living Morocco, 212-877-1417, WHEN TO GO: May. PRICE: $2,950-$3,050. DIFFICULTY: easy.

BARACOA-GUANT脕NAMO CYCLE TOUR [CUBA]
Ride beneath the radar on this Canadian outfitter’s weeklong, 300-mile bike tour of Cuba’s northern coast, past black-sand beaches and nature reserves. The towns en route—Mayar’, a village immortalized by Cuban crooner Compay Segundo, and lush Baracoa—see few tourists and fewer cyclists, so you’ll have La Farola, a winding mountain pass known as “Cuba’s roller coaster,” all to yourself. Use caution when hydrating: Rum’s cheaper than water. OUTFITTER: MacQueen’s Island Tours, 800-969-2822, . WHEN TO GO: April, December. PRICE: $2,595, including round-trip airfare from Toronto. DIFFICULTY: moderate to strenuous.

SNOWSHOEING THE RHODOPE MOUNTAINS [BULGARIA]
Haven’t heard of the Rhodopes? No surprise. Obscurity has helped keep these 7,000-foot peaks in southern Bulgaria among the least visited in Europe. You’ll spend four to seven hours a day snowshoeing along ancient footpaths, through deep drifts and pine forests, to the slopes of Mount Cherni Vruh. Medieval monasteries and village guesthouses provide shelter on this eight-day trip, and Bulgarian perks include homemade sirine (a local feta cheese) and chance sightings of the Asiatic jackal. Outfitter: Exodus, 866-732-5885, . When to Go: February, December. Price: $775. Difficulty: moderate.

It’s Only Natural

Go the extra green mile

RAFTING THROUGH THE R脥O PL脕TANO BIOSPHERE RESERVE [HONDURAS]
Hail the monkey god on this 12-day rafting expedition through the R’o Pl‡tano Biosphere Reserve in eastern Honduras, a primordial jungle where more than 100 archaeological sites are covered with petroglyphs of the primate deity. On the R’o Pl‡tano, you’ll run Class III-IV rapids and float through serene limestone grottos, encountering en route the full Animal Planet menagerie of macaws, tapirs, spider monkeys, anteaters, and, with any luck, jaguars. At trip’s end, you’ll “hot dance” in a Garifuna Indian village. OUTFITTER: La Moskitia Ecoaventuras, 011-504-441-0839, . WHEN TO GO: December-August. PRICE: $1,430-$1,765. DIFFICULTY: moderate. DOCUMENTING RARE RAINFOREST PLANTS [CAMEROON]
Thanks to 4,000 resident species of plants, Cameroon’s 6,500-foot Backossi Mountains are a horticulturalist’s dream. Join scientists from England’s Royal Botanic Gardens and Bantu guides for 13 days to help inventory rare forest flora such as endangered orchids, edible fruits, and a new species of bird’s-nest fern. You’ll camp in a nearby village or bunk in a community hall and learn to prepare local fare, including plantains, fu-fu corn, and cassava. OUTFITTER: Earthwatch Expeditions, 800-776-0188, . WHEN TO GO: March-May, October-November. PRICE: $1,295. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

EXPLORING NAM HA [LAOS]
The Lao equivalent of a national park, the 858-square-mile Nam Ha National Biodiversity and Conservation Area in northwestern Laos offers some of Southeast Asia’s wildest rafting and trekking. Spend ten days paddling Class III whitewater on both the Nam Ha and Nam Tha rivers, sleeping in villages and bamboo-and-thatch bungalows at the Boat Landing Ecolodge, and trekking with local guides deep into the jungle, on the lookout for tailless fruit bats and Asiatic black bears. OUTFITTER: AquaTerra Ventures, 011-61-8-9494-1616, . WHEN TO GO: June-January. PRICE: $1,150. DIFFICULTY: easy to moderate.

ECO-TRAIL SAFARI IN KRUGER NATIONAL PARK [SOUTH AFRICA]
Go trekking with rangers on the newly designated Lebombo Eco-Trail, which runs for more than 300 miles along the previously off-limits eastern border of South Africa’s Kruger National Park and Mozambique. You might encounter rhinos, zebras, and even the lowly dung beetle in Africa’s most biodiverse park. You’ll also trek into nearby 200-million-year-old Blyde River Canyon and stalk lions on a walking safari. OUTFITTER: Sierra Club, 415-977-5522, . WHEN TO GO: September-October. PRICE: $3,695-$3,995. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Variety Packs

Take the multisport approach

Skiing the extra mile: Norway’s version of the Alps

CROSSING THE PATAGONIAN ANDES [CHILE AND ARGENTINA]
The Edenic R铆o Manso Valley, at the southern tip of South America, is pure Patagonia—high, open country surrounded by ancient alerce forests (think redwoods) and populated by gauchos and trout. How you choose to play on this nine-day camping trip—rafting the Manso’s Class IV-V rapids, casting for rainbows, or horseback riding along the riverfront trail—is up to you as you venture west from the altiplano of Bariloche toward the chiseled fjords of coastal Chile. OUTFITTER: 国产吃瓜黑料 Tours Argentina Chile, 866-270-5186, . WHEN TO GO: December-March. PRICE: $2,900. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

MUSHING WITH THE GREAT WHITE BEAR [NORWAY]
You take the reins on this 12-day dogsledding sojourn across the frozen island of Spitsbergen, Norway, 600 miles from the North Pole. When the huskies are resting, keep busy by snowshoeing amid gargantuan icebergs, cross-country skiing over glaciers, and spelunking blue-green ice caves. Defrost at night in a lodge made of sealskin and driftwood, expedition-style tents (you’ll be snug beneath reindeer-fur blankets), and a Russian ship intentionally frozen into the pack ice. Your only neighbors will be the island’s 4,000 polar bears (in case of emergency, your guide’s got the gun). OUTFITTER: Outer Edge Expeditions, 800-322-5235, . WHEN TO GO: March-April. PRICE: $3,990. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

POST ECO-CHALLENGE MULTISPORT [FIJI]
The professional adventure racers have gone home, so now you can spill your own sweat on the 2002 Eco-Challenge course. This new ten-day trip gives you access to some truly wild, made-for-TV terrain: mazy jungle trails, precipitous singletrack, and idyllic beaches. After sea-kayaking two days to the island of Malake, where spearfishermen bring up walu for dinner on a single breath of air, you’ll mountain-bike 25 miles over rugged terrain from the village of Ba to Navilawa. Next up is a two-day trek through lowland rainforests to the summit of 3,585-foot Mount Batilamu, followed by Class II-III rafting on the Navua River, from the coral coast to the interior village of Wainindiro. After all this, you’ve earned two days of beachfront R&R on the little-visited island of Kadavu. OUTFITTER: Outdoor Travel 国产吃瓜黑料s, 877-682-5433, . WHEN TO GO: May-October. PRICE: $1,999. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Take It to the Top

No whining allowed

The frozen zone: Argentina’s Perito Moreno Glacier

CONTINENTAL ICE CAP TRAVERSE [ARGENTINA]
Patagonia’s 8,400-square-mile slab of ice wasn’t even explored until the 1960s, when British explorer Eric Shipton crossed it first. Starting in El Calafate, on the shore of Lago Argentino, this arduous 16-day backpacking/ski-mountaineering trip cuts through Parque Nacional Los Glaciares, where you’ll cross rivers and crevasses, ascend 4,830 feet to Marconi Pass, do time on ropes, crampons, and skis, and set up glacial camps along the spine of the Fitz Roy Range. The payoff? A wilderness fix on the gnarliest mass of ice and granite this side of the South Pole. OUTFITTER: Southwind 国产吃瓜黑料s, 800-377-9463, . WHEN TO GO: November-March. PRICE: $3,395. DIFFICULTY: strenuous. SURFING EPIC WAVES [THE MALDIVES]
Board where few have surfed before: off the Indian Ocean’s remote Huvadhoo Atoll, site of several world-class breaks. Huvadhoo is a two-day voyage on a dhoni, a 60-foot, five-cabin, live-aboard wooden yacht, from the capital, Male; along the way, cast off the deck for tuna, marlin, and bonito. Once at the Huvadhoo, be ready for eight-foot-plus waves, especially near the atoll’s largest island, Fiyori, where there’s a fast (and dangerous) right break. OUTFITTER: Voyages Maldives, 011-960-32-3617, . WHEN TO GO: April-September. PRICE: $85 per day (typically a 7-, 10-, or 14-day tour). DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

RAFTING THE BRAHMAPUTRA RIVER [INDIA]
With 112 miles of Class III-V+ Himalayan runoff, the Brahmaputra, the lower portion of the legendary Tsangpo in Tibet, is one of the planet’s ultimate whitewater challenges. And a relatively new one at that—the first commercial rafting expedition was launched late last year. You’ll spend nine days blasting down emerald-green hydraulics (the Class V Breakfast Rapid is famous for flipping rafts), camping on sandy beaches, and passing through Namdapha National Park, home to one of Asia’s most varied tropical forests. OUTFITTER: Mercury Himalayan Explorations, 011-91-112-334-0033, . WHEN TO GO: November-February. PRICE: $3,300, including internal airfare. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

Get Wheel

Blazing new trails by mountain bike

Sandstone heaven: on the rocks in Cappadocia

RIDING THE RUGGED NORTHEAST [PORTUGAL]
A good set of knobbies and generous helpings of local beef and nightly port will help you tackle this eight-day inn-to-inn tour through Portugal’s wild northeast corner. Dodge cows on Roman pathways, follow craggy singletrack alongside the Douro River, and spin along trails once used by smugglers trafficking coffee beans to Spain. The grand finale is the wide-open wilderness of the remote Serra da Malcata—land of pine-topped peaks, wild boar, and little else. OUTFITTER: Saddle Skedaddle Tours, 011-44191-2651110, . WHEN TO GO: May-July. PRICE: $1,120. DIFFICULTY: strenuous. MOUNTAIN-BIKING CAPPADOCIA [TURKEY]
In our opinion, any trip that starts off with two nights in a traditional cave hotel has promise. See for yourself on this six-day, 180-mile ride through Cappadocia in central Turkey. Thank three-million-year-old volcanic eruptions for the otherworldly terrain: impossibly narrow sandstone spires (called fairy chimneys) and towns that plunge 20 floors underground. Happily, the riding is as varied as the views. You’ll pedal along dry riverbeds, slickrock, and narrow jeep tracks en route to each day’s destination—luxe campsites or charming village inns. OUTFITTER: KE 国产吃瓜黑料 Travel, 800-497-9675, . WHEN TO GO: May. PRICE: $1,695. Difficulty: strenuous.

SECRET SINGLETRACK [BOLIVIA]
It was only a matter of time before Bolivia’s ancient network of farm trails, winding from village to village high in the Andes, found a modern purpose: mountain biking. On this new 14-day singletrack tour through the Cordillera Real near La Paz, intermediate riders can rocket down 17,000-foot passes, contour around extinct volcanoes, and rack up an epic grand-total descent of 54,000 feet. Nights are spent camping at Lake Titicaca and in local pensions like the Hotel Gloria Urmiri, where natural hot springs await. OUTFITTER: Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking, 011-591-2-2313-849, . WHEN TO GO: May-September. PRICE: $1,750. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

COPPER CANYON EXPEDITION [MEXICO]
There’s lots to love about the 6,000-foot descent into Mexico’s Copper Canyon by bike—and gravity is only part of it. Get down in one piece and you’ll have a week’s worth of technical riding ahead of you in a canyon four times the size of Arizona’s Grand. Cool your toes on fast, fun river crossings near the village of Cerro Colorado, visit the indigenous Tarahumara, and bunk down in a restored hacienda built into the canyon walls. OUTFITTER: Worldtrek Expeditions, 800-795-1142, . WHEN TO GO: September-April. PRICE: $1,599. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

The Deep End

Water is the best element

SAILING ON THE ECLIPSE [PALAU]
Captain John McCready’s 48-foot Eclipse—outfitted with a compressor, dive tanks, sea kayaks, and rigs for trolling—is your one-stop adventure vessel for exploring this South Pacific archipelago. After picking up the sloop near the capital, Koror, give yourself at least six days to explore Palau’s protected lagoon in the Philippine Sea, dive along miles of coral walls, and kayak and hike some of the more than 200 limestone Rock Islands. By the time you reboard each evening, chef Charlie Wang will have your pan-seared wahoo waiting. OUTFITTER: Palau Sea Ventures, 011-680-488-1062, . WHEN TO GO: November-June. PRICE: $4,200 for the entire boat (which sleeps four passengers) for six days, including captain, dive master, and cook. DIFFICULTY: easy.

SEA-KAYAKING THE MASOALA PENINSULA [MADAGASCAR]
Once a refuge for pirates, Madagascar’s rugged northeast coast has been reborn as Parque Masoala, the country’s newest and largest national park. For nine days, you’ll explore the calm coastal waters by sea kayak, watching for humpback whales, snorkeling the coral reefs, spearfishing for barracuda, combing the shorelines of deserted islands, and sleeping in one of two rustic tented camps. Onshore, scout for lemurs in the rainforest with Malagasy guides. OUTFITTER: Kayak Africa, 011-27-21-783-1955, . WHEN TO GO: September-December. PRICE: $1,080. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

SNORKELING AND SEA-KAYAKING NINGALOO REEF [AUSTRALIA]
A virtually untouched alternative to the Great Barrier Reef, Western Australia’s Ningaloo Reef is a 162-mile close-to-shore coral barrier protecting the white-sand beaches and high-plateau shrublands of Cape Range National Park from the Indian Ocean. Mellow two- to four-hour paddling days on this five-day romp up the coast are punctuated by snorkeling in 70- to 80-degree turquoise waters (never deeper than 13 feet), swimming with whale sharks just outside the reef, and hanging at the plush moving camp. OUTFITTER: Capricorn Kayak Tours, 011-618-9-433-3802, . WHEN TO GO: April-mid-October. PRICE: $450. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

KITESURFING SAFARI [BAHAMAS]
Steady winds, warm waters, and world-class instructors—essential ingredients for a perfect kitesurfing vacation—exist in plenitude among the numerous tiny islands off Abaco in the Bahamas. During this weeklong clinic, you’ll master board-off tricks and 360 jump turns, learn to sail upwind more proficiently, and critique videos of your kite moves over coconut-rum drinks at the seven-cottage Dolphin Beach Resort on Great Guana Cay. OUTFITTER: Kite Surf the Earth, 888-819-5483, . WHEN TO GO: mid-January-May. PRICE: $990, including airfare from Fort Lauderdale and all gear. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

Future Classics

Our next thrilling episodes

Everest’s seldom-scene cousin: Tibet’s Kawa Karpo

CLIMBING MUZTAGH ATA, “FATHER OF ICE MOUNTAINS” [CHINA]
Already been to Everest Base Camp? Next time, head to Muztagh Ata, a raggedy 24,754-foot summit in the Karakoram Range in China’s Xinjiang province. The five-day trek (instead of yaks, you’ve got camels!) starts at 12,369 feet, climbing through grasslands and river valleys to Camp One at 17,388 feet—where not one but ten glaciers converge in a vast expanse of ice and snow. Outfitter: Wild China, 011-86-10-6403-9737, . When to go: September- October. Price: $2,710. Difficulty: strenuous. PILGRIMAGE TO KAWA KARPO [TIBET]
Mount Kailash gets all the press—and all the Western trekkers. But this May, another sacred Buddhist route, the annual pilgrimage to Kawa Karpo, a 22,245-foot fang of snow and ice, will open to Western visitors. The 18-day camping trek climbs out of semitropical rainforest and Tibetan villages before circling the peak’s base. Snow leopards live here, too, but if you don’t catch a glimpse, at least you’ll leave with a lifetime’s supply of good karma. OUTFITTER: High Asia Exploratory Mountain Travel Company, 203-248-3003, . WHEN TO GO: May, July, October. PRICE: $3,800-$5,000. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

TREK THE VILCABAMBA [PERU]
Now that they’ve limited tourist permits on the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, we’re left wondering, What else is there? How about a 17-day camping trek to Peru’s lost city of Victoria, a 600-year-old ruins discovered in 1999 and encircled by 19,000-foot peaks of the Cordillera Vilcabamba. You’ll log some 40 miles over ancient Incan walkways along the Tincochaca River, and then climb 15,000-foot Choquetecarpo Pass. Once at Victoria, you’ll have the excavated homes and ceremonial sites all to yourself. OUTFITTER: Wilderness Travel, 800-368-2794, . WHEN TO GO: May-June. PRICE: $3,895. DIFFICULTY: strenuous.

All-American

Remote trips right here at home

THE ALASKAN CLIMBER [ALASKA]
Many peaks in the Chugach Mountains of southeast Alaska remain unnamed and unclimbed. Your objectives are the 12,000-foot summits of Mount Valhalla and Mount Witherspoon, but even with a ski-plane flight into the range, you’ll still spend 20 days hauling, trekking, and climbing on this self-supported trip. Outfitter: KE 国产吃瓜黑料 Travel, 800-497-9675, . When to Go: April. Price: $2,895, including flights within Alaska. Difficulty: strenuous. DOGSLEDDING AND WINTER CAMPING [NORTHERN MINNESOTA]
Forget your leisurely visions of being whisked from campsite to campsite: Dogsledding is serious work. During four days in the wilderness bordering the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, you’ll learn how to handle your team of malamutes and brush up on winter camping techniques. Outfitter: The Northwest Passage, 800-732-7328, . When to Go: January-February. Price: $895. Difficulty: moderate.

RAFTING THE OWYHEE RIVER [NEVADA, IDAHO, AND OREGON]
This 17-day, 220-mile trip on the rarely rafted, Class II-IV Owyhee takes you down one of the longest and most remote stretches of runnable river in the Lower 48, through rugged canyon country. Need something shorter? Several sections can be run in four to seven days. Outfitter: River Odysseys West, 800-451-6034, . When to Go: May. Price: $3,735. Difficulty: moderate.

HALEAKALA CRATER SEA-TO-SUMMIT HIKING EXPEDITION [MAUI]
Go from sea level to 9,886 feet on this three-day trek from Maui’s sandy shores, through Hawaiian rainforests, to the moonlike floor of Haleakala Crater. You’ll climb 11 miles and 6,380 feet on the first day alone—good thing horses are hauling your gear. Outfitter: Summit Maui, 866-885-6064, . When to Go: year-round. Price: $1,190-$1,390. Difficulty: moderate.

GRAND GULCH TRAVERSE [UTAH]
What’s better than backpacking the 52-mile length of the Grand Gulch Primitive Area in southeastern Utah? Llama-trekking for much of the same seven-day route, past ancient Anasazi ruins and more recent historic landmarks—including Polly’s Island, where Butch Cassidy, some say, crossed the Gulch. Outfitter: Mountain Travel Sobek, 888-687-6235, . When to Go: April. Price: $2,590. Difficulty: moderate.

Elevator, Going Up

Three helicopter epics

MOUNTAIN-BIKING THE CELESTIAL MOUNTAINS [KAZAKHSTAN]
Just as your quads begin rebelling during this two-week, 300-mile traverse of the Tien Shan—the fabled 21,000-foot mountain range that separates Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan from China—a midtrip bonanza brings relief: A Communist-era cargo helicopter will whisk you to the top of the 12,000-foot “hills” for two days of screaming singletrack and goat-trail descents. Outfitter: KE 国产吃瓜黑料 Travel, 800-497-9675, . When to Go: July-August. Price: $2,395. Difficulty: strenuous.

RAFTING IN THE HOOKER RANGE [NEW ZEALAND]
Rarely boated, the upper reaches of southwestern New Zealand’s Landsborough River and the nearby Waiatoto are so remote that the only way to the put-ins is by helicopter. You’ll spend seven days roaring down Class III and IV rapids on both rivers, fishing for brown trout, searching for keas (the world’s only alpine parrot), and camping under the gazes of 10,000-foot peaks Mount Deacon and Mount Aspiring. Outfitter: Mountain Travel Sobek, 888-687-6235, . When to Go: March, December. Price: $3,190. Difficulty: moderate.

SHOOTING THE COLUMBIA MOUNTAINS [BRITISH COLUMBIA]
Spend four days coptering from Adamant Lodge in the Selkirks to remote 10,000-foot hiking trails in the Columbia Mountains for a photography workshop with widely published outdoor lensmen Chris Pinchbeck and Paul Lazarski. After pointers on lens selection and composition, shoot sunrise-lit alpine meadows till your film runs out. Outfitter: Canadian Mountain Holidays, 800-661-0252, . When to Go: July. Price: $2,360. Difficulty: easy.

Most Likely to Succeed

Six new additions to the adventure travel map

SURFING THE WILD EAST [EL SALVADOR]
Though the civil war ended 11 years ago, it’s been difficult to access El Salvador’s remote eastern point breaks on your own. Now you can hook up for eight days with Punta Mango’s local guides to surf Los Flores, La Ventana, and other perfecto Pacific peelers. OUTFITTER: Punta Mango Surf Trips, 011-503-270-8915, . WHEN TO GO: year-round. PRICE: $394-$818. DIFFICULTY: moderate. EXPLORING ISLANDS AND VOLCANOES [NICARAGUA]
Once a war-torn dictatorship, Nicaragua is now drawing scads of expatriates to its safer shores. Hike and mountain-bike around belching 5,000-foot volcanoes on the Pacific side, and kayak, fish, and loll in natural hot springs on islands in Lake Nicaragua. OUTFITTER: Nicaragua 国产吃瓜黑料s, 011-505-883-7161, . WHEN TO GO: November-September. PRICE: weeklong trips start at $600. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

RAFTING THE SOCA RIVER [SLOVENIA]
Spilling from the Julian Alps, the roiling Soca has long been a backyard destination for Europe’s whitewater intelligentsia. With improved infrastructure and an exchange rate favorable to Americans, now’s the time to hit this Class II-IV river. OUTFITTER: Exodus Travel, 800-692-5495, . WHEN TO GO: June-September. PRICE: eight-day trips, $715. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

BIKING AND BOATING THE DALMATIAN COAST [CROATIA]
Sail from island to island in the Adriatic Sea, stopping to cycle the nature reserves and medieval villages, safe again after a decade of political strife. OUTFITTER: Eurocycle, 011-43-1-405-3873-0, . WHEN TO GO: April-October. PRICE: eight-day cruise, $690-$740. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

MOUNTAIN-BIKING IN THE JUNGLE [SRI LANKA]
While the northeast is still volatile, don’t discount a southerly traverse of the island by mountain bike, through lush jungles and over cool mountain passes. OUTFITTER: 国产吃瓜黑料s Lanka Sports, 011-94-179-1584, . WHEN TO GO: year-round. PRICE: 15-day trip, $985. DIFFICULTY: moderate.

TRACKING GORILLAS [GABON]
Onetime host to warring guerrillas but permanent home to the peaceful lowland gorillas, Lop茅-Okanda Wildlife Reserve is the jewel of Gabon, nearly 80 percent of which is unspoiled forest woodlands. OUTFITTER: Mountain Travel Sobek, 800-282-8747, . WHEN TO GO: February-March, August. PRICE: $6,490 (19 nights). DIFFICULTY: easy.

Cautionary Trails

What’s up in the danger zone

When it comes to foreign travel, how risky is too risky? It’s hard to know. But the best place to start researching is the U.S. State Department (). At press time,* these 25 countries were tagged with a Travel Warning advising against nonessential travel. Here’s the lowdown on what you’re missing—and just how dicey things really are.

RISK LEVEL:
1听听听听GENERALLY SAFE
2听听听听SIGNIFICANTLY RISKY
3听听听听EXTREMELY RISKY

AFGHANISTAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Despite the U.S.-led Operation Enduring Freedom, now in its 18th month, Taliban holdouts still lurk in a country once known for great hospitality (and hashish).
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Trekking in the Hindu Kush’s remote, red-cliffed Bamiyan Valley, where the Taliban destroyed two monumental fifth-century Buddhas carved into mountain rock
RISK: 3

ALGERIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Terrorism in this oil-rich country has dropped off slightly in recent years, but there is still risk of sporadic attacks in rural areas and on roadways, especially at night.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Hiking in the El Kautara Gorges and the jagged Ahaggar Mountains, near the town of Tamanrasset
RISK: 2

ANGOLA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
An April 2002 cease-fire put a stop to the 25-year civil war, though millions of undetonated mines are still believed to litter the countryside.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Checking out Operation Noah’s Ark, an effort to relocate elephants and giraffes from Namibia and Botswana to the savannas of Quicama National Park in the northwest
RISK: 2

BOSNIA-HEREGOVINA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
The 1995 Dayton Accords ended the war between Muslim Bosnians, Serbs, and Croats, but UN troops remain to control localized outbursts of political violence, which are sometimes directed toward the international community.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Some of the best—and cheapest—alpine skiing in all of Europe at the Dinari Range’s 6,313-foot Mount Jahorina, site of the 1984 Winter Games
RISK: 1

BURUNDI
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Decades of ethnic strife between Hutus and Tutsis have killed hundreds of thousands. The resulting poverty and crime can make tourist travel dangerous in this small, mountainous nation.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Scuba diving in Lake Tanganyika, at 4,710 feet the world’s second-deepest lake (after Russia’s Baikal) and home to some 600 species of vertebrates and invertebrates
RISK: 2

CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
After independence from France in 1960 and three decades under a military government, C.A.R. was turned over to civilian rule in 1993. Still, it remains beset with instability and unrest.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Bushwhacking and hiking with Pygmy guides through the rainforests of Dzanga-Ndoki, arguably the most pristine national park in Africa
RISK: 2

COLOMBIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Dubbed “Locombia” (the mad country) by the South American press, Colombia is rife with cocaine cartels, guerrilla warfare, and more kidnappings than any other nation in the world.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Encounters with the pre-Columbian Kogi people while trekking through dense jungle and the isolated 19,000-foot Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta Mountains
RISK: 3

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Though rich in diamonds, gold, and timber, this equatorial country is still in tatters—famine, millions of displaced refugees (since Mobutu’s despotic 32-year rule ended in 1997).
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Mountaineering in the Ruwenzori Mountains on 16,763-foot Mount Stanley, Africa’s third-highest peak
RISK: 3

INDONESIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Anti-Western terrorist attacks in Bali and separatist violence in West Timor, the province of Aceh, central and west Kalimantan, and Sulawesi have destabilized the world’s largest archipelago.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Surfing Sumatra’s legendary breaks off the island of Nias and jungle trekking in Gunung Leuser National Park
RISK: 2

IRAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Despite inclusion in Bush’s “axis of evil” and the U.S.’s suspension of diplomatic relations, Iran is generally safe—though travel to the Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Iraq borders is best avoided.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Skiing in the 12,000-foot-plus Elburz Mountains, where the resort in Dizin receives more than 23 feet of snow annually and lift tickets cost $4 a day
RISK: 1

IRAQ
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Even if you wanted to go to Iraq, no U.S. commercial flights enter the country that’s ruled by the world’s most infamous dictator.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Canoeing the Marshes, the historic ecosystem at the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers—birthplace over 10,000 years ago of the Mesopotamian civilization
RISK: 3

ISRAEL
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Israel has been a hotly contested geopolitical and religious crucible since 1948, but the two-and-a-half-year Palestinian intifada has produced more suicide bombings than any other period.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Scuba diving to the underwater ruins of Herod’s City at Caesarea, along the palm-fringed Mediterranean coast
RISK: 2

IVORY COAST
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE
Once the most stable West African country, this coffee-producing nation suffers from falling cocoa prices and clashes between Christians and Muslims.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING
Trekking through the virgin rainforests of Ta茂 National Park, home to the threatened pygmy hippopotamus
RISK: 2

Be aware that the State Department also posts advisories about unstable regions in many other countries, like Kyrgyzstan and Nepal. Carefully check the Web site’s postings and consult with well-informed tour operators before finalizing any travel plans.
*This information is current as of January 14, 2003

Compiled by Misty Blakesley, Amy Marr, Dimity McDowell, Sam Moulton, Tim Neville, Katie Showalter, and Ted Stedman

Cautionary Trails, PT II

RISK LEVEL:
1 GENERALLY SAFE
2 SIGNIFICANTLY RISKY
3 EXTREMELY RISKY


JORDAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Jordan is considered the least dangerous Middle Eastern country; still, threats of random violence (witness the October 2002 killing of an American Embassy employee) remain high.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

World-renowned sport and trad climbing on the 1,500-foot sandstone walls in Wadi Rum, and camel-trekking with the Bedouin in the country’s southern desertscape
RISK: 1



LEBANON
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Home to the terrorist group Hezbollah, Lebanon has a history of anti-U.S. violence, and there have been recent protests, sometimes violent, in major cities.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Skiing the 8,000-foot-plus peaks and six resorts in the Anti-Lebanon mountain range, then heading to the coast to swim in the Mediterranean
RISK: 2



LIBERIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Though a democratic government took power in 1997, ending an eight-year civil war, this developing West African nation is plagued by clashes between government forces and dissidents.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Safaris to Sapo National Park, Liberia’s only national park and one of the last rainforest refuges for bongo antelopes and forest elephants
RISK: 2



LIBYA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Seventeen years under U.S. sanctions, convictions in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, and rising crime make travel to Libya a tricky proposition.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Safaris to the Ubari Sand Sea, land of shifting, 300-foot dunes and salt lakes
RISK: 2



MACEDONIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

A geopolitical hot spot, this mountainous Balkan country is still smoldering with ethnic tension, most recently between Albanian rebels and Macedonian forces.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Spelunking among the dripstone formations and stalagmites in the caves around 3,000-foot-plus Matka Canyon
RISK: 1



NIGERIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Though nearly 16 years of military rule ended in 1999, this oil-rich West African country suffers from rampant street crime, ongoing religious and ethnic conflicts, and kidnappings.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Trekking through rolling grasslands and exploring the volcanic 3,500-foot Mandara Mountains along the border with Cameroon
RISK: 2



PAKISTAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

In 2002, members of the Taliban, who had crossed the vertiginous Hindu Kush from Afghanistan, are believed to have instigated a rash of anti-Western terrorism in Islamabad and Karachi.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Completing the classic three-week trek to the base camp of pyramidal K2 in northern Pakistan, leaving from Askole and crossing the Baltoro Glacier
RISK: 2



TAJIKISTAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

A mountainous and unstable “stan” in the heart of Central Asia, Tajikistan is thought to be home to the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) terrorist group.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Climbing untouched glaciers and rock faces in the Pamir Mountains, where first ascents of 17,000-foot-plus summits abound
RISK: 2



SOMALIA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Ever since dictator Siad Barre was ousted in 1991, anarchy has ruled this drought-prone East African nation. Warring factions are still fighting for control of the the capital, Mogadishu.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Deep-sea tuna fishing in the waters off Somalia’s 1,876-mile coastline, the longest in Africa
RISK: 3



SUDAN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Nearly 40 years of civil war, coupled with famine, have made Sudan extremely unstable, especially in the oil-producing Upper Nile region. Americans have been assaulted and taken hostage.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Scuba diving in the Red Sea to famous shipwrecks and coral atolls, first explored by Jacques Cousteau in the sixties
RISK: 3



VENEZUELA
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

Opposition to President Hugo Ch谩vez and a nationwide strike have destabilized this tropical country, causing acute oil shortages and triggering violent protests in Caracas.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Trekking through humid jungles and the vast savannas of the Guiana Highlands to 3,212-foot Angel Falls, the highest waterfall in the world
RISK: 2



YEMEN
WHAT’S THE TROUBLE

This country on the tip of the Arabian Peninsula has been plagued by anti-American sentiment since long before the 2000 attack on the USS Cole.
WHAT YOU’RE MISSING

Exploring the coral beaches of Socotra, the largest Arabian island, which abounds with flora, including frankincense, myrrh, and the dragon’s blood tree
RISK: 3



Be aware that the State Department also posts advisories about unstable regions in many other countries, like Kyrgyzstan and Nepal. Carefully check the Web site’s postings and consult with well-informed tour operators before finalizing any travel plans.

*This information is current as of January 14, 2003



Compiled by Misty Blakesley, Amy Marr, Dimity McDowell, Sam Moulton, Tim Neville, Katie Showalter, and Ted Stedman

The post Nomads Have More Fun appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

LONG A FAVORITE DESTINATION among canyoneers, the French colony of R茅union, east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, is nicked with dozens of tumbling whitewater slots that run from 10,069-foot Piton des Neiges, the island’s highest point, to the coast. But until Brad Ludden, fellow pro paddlers Ben Selznick and Seth Warren, and a crew from extreme-sport film producer Teton Gravity Research showed up, apparently no one had yet thought to bring along a kayak. For the R茅union sequence of Valhalla, TGR’s second kayaking film—which will tour the United States in April—the trio of twentysomething boaters spent three weeks last December clambering over huge, slick boulders and rappelling 500 feet down into fissures such as Takamaka Canyon to scout and reach long, cascading water slides and waterfalls.

Ben Selznick in Trou Blanc Canyon

“A lot of the time we were totally focused on kayaking, so we didn’t think about the height,” says Ludden, who would ordinarily have no trouble pointing his boat over a 30-foot waterfall. “But sometimes we were so scared that we didn’t think about kayaking.”
To put in to R茅union’s Class VI rivers, Teton’s production crew coached Ludden, Selznick, and Warren—none of whom were expert climbers—down sheer cliffs to narrow ledges. They carabinered kayaks to their harnesses on the way down to the water; once there, they gingerly stepped into their boats and sealed their skirts before unclipping from the ropes and shoving off. Landings were trickiest in Bras Rouge Canyon, on the west side of the island, where pools below the falls turned out to be just five feet deep. After one Hail Mary off of a 40-foot-high cataract, recalls Selznick, “I landed OK, but then looked behind me and saw all this sediment rising up from the river bottom. I was like, ‘Whoa. That was close.'”

The post Foam Noir appeared first on 国产吃瓜黑料 Online.

La Digue

Seychelles, Indian Ocean Say you were alone on an isle packed with Euro honeymooners. You too might fall for a dark-hulled, double-ended Digwaz beauty.

Another lonely beach in the Seychelles

Access & Resources
LA DIGUE IS FOR LOVERS. Or so it seemed as I boarded a salty-looking schooner for the four-mile crossing from the neighboring island of Praslin. The benches around me were full of young, affluent, mostly European couples who, if they weren’t snuggling, nuzzling, or fully making out, were videotaping each other for later delectation. And once we’d arrived on this smallest of the Seychelles’ “major” islands, I had to agree: It’s a pretty romantic place, with its turquoise lagoon, its two dozen white-sand beaches, and most of all its towering granite rock formations. I, alas, was solo, not en couple, something the locals could never quite accept. “Madame is not coming down this morning?” the woman who served breakfast at my hotel kept asking. No, Madame wasn’t.



The Freudian term for my behavior during my first few days on the island is, I believe, sublimation. Each morning I set off on little bike rides—they can hardly be otherwise on La Digue, where there’s only one five-mile-long road—that somehow morphed into epic, Conradian quests. One day I rode down the windward side of the island and then, at road’s end, found myself scrambling off-trail to find a coastal route from Anse Caiman to Anse Cocos, two of the island’s most remote and unspoiled beaches. The distance was negligible—perhaps half a mile—but the terrain was fantastically rough, a jumble of pink granite monoliths the size of houses, and it took me several hours of tropical bouldering (flip-flops only) and full-contact bushwhacking to claw my way through the jungle.

Another day, after a heart-pounding dip in the breakers at Grand Anse, a favorite boogie-boarding and surf spot, I off-trailed it to the Nid d’Aigles, or Eagle’s Nest, the spectacular lookout at the top of the island. Fleets of low, moist clouds, a result of the southeast monsoon, were streaming in off the Indian Ocean at a dizzying clip. At dusk, the flying foxes came out—not flitting like bats but gliding between the fruit trees—and then the moon to light my ride home.

By day four, though, I was getting lonely. My hands were raw (from bouldering, you understand), and my legs looked like I’d been through some medieval rite of self-mortification. And then, just in time, I found her.

Access & Resources: La Digue

Private motor vehicles aren’t allowed on three-mile-long La Digue. By special dispen-sation, the island priest bops around on a Vespa, but everyone else rides mountain bikes. Be prepared for sticker shock: from $5 cigarettes to $35 paperbacks, the Seychelles are pricey.

GETTING THERE: Air Seychelles (800-677-4277; ) flies to the main island of Mah茅 from major cities in Europe (round-trip from Paris costs about $800). There’s no airport on La Digue, so unless you spring for Helicopter Seychelles’ chopper from Mah茅 (about $120, 011-248-37-39-00; ), you’ll need to take a ferry or an Air Seychelles Twin Otter to the neighboring island of Praslin, then head to La Digue via ferry (Inter-Island Ferry Service; 248-23-23-29). Mountain bikes are available for about $7 a day in La Passe, at Chez Michelin (248-23-43-04) and other places.

WHERE TO STAY: At La Digue Island Lodge (248-23-42-32; ), aging bungalows go for $265颅$380 a night. Better deals are Chateau St. Cloud ($180; 248-23-43-46; or e-mail stcloud@seychelles.net), centered on a restored plantation house; and L’Ocean ($250; 248-23-41-80; or e-mail hocean@seychelles.net) at Anse Patates; and Choppy’s Beach Bungalows on Anse La R茅union ($150; 248-23-42-24; or e-mail choppys@seychelles.net).

WILD LA DIGUE: The $2 entry fee to L’Union Estate includes passage to Anse Source d’Argent, the magnificent boulder-strewn beach featured in all those Bacardi ads. La Digue ranks high on the list of the Seychelles’ top dive spots; check out the island’s only dive center, at La Digue Island Lodge. Gerard Payet (look for him on the dock in La Passe) will set you up with snorkeling trips to 脦e Coco, Grande Soeur, Petite Soeur, and F茅licit茅(about $40, including lunch). For deep-sea fishing and multiday yacht cruises, call Mason’s Travel (248- 23-42-27; ) or Travel Service Seychelles (248- 23-44-11; ).

ISLAND EATS: Most restaurants are attached to hotels. The two exceptions, Zerof and Loutier Coco, serve French-Creole dishes such as curry spiced with piment.

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Rarotonga

Cook Islands, South Pacific Hoist a frosty fruity, sniff the hibiscus, imbibe the swaying palms. The South Seas are still the spot for Everyman’s tropical fantasy.

Access & Resources

I was floating about eight feet above a sandy-bottomed reef, staring into the Day-Glo face of a sunset wrasse, when the notion struck me. Fish are not generally known for their prodigious brains, yet when you come face-to-face with poisson of the non-man-eating variety in their natural element, a strange exchange can take place. This one, for instance, seemed intrigued. Unlike the octopus that had shot under a rock, fast and bulbous, when I’d surprised it only moments earlier—shedding light on that obscure adage “Never trust a mollusk”—the wrasse seemed to want to dialogue. Most of his neighbors were too busy munching on coral to care, but he was trying to make a connection. When I blinked, he blinked back. When I raised my eyebrows, he emitted a stream of bubbles. Something was happening here. One small step for me, perhaps, but one giant leap for piscine-hominid brotherhood.

You could call it a eureka moment, I suppose, but it was really nothing more than the product of many hours of painstakingly indolent and hedonistic study. I had come in search of the True Essence of Nowhere, and had adhered to a strict regimen of snorkeling, lollygagging, and consuming exotic fruits, big blue drinks, and much fresh fish (sorry, bro). My wilderness study area, in this case, was the island of Rarotonga, a lush, craggy mountain of green that erupts out of the otherwise wide blue expanse of the South Pacific. At a humble 40 square miles, Rarotonga is the largest of 15 atolls, volcanic outcroppings, and sandy mounds that make up the Cook Islands, a far-flung group of landmasses that hover between French Polynesia to the east and New Zealand to the southwest. Which is a diplomatic way of saying the middle of nowhere. So I’d come to the right place.

Nowhere, I found, has its advantages. Being in the middle of it means that McDonald’s, Sheraton, Starbucks, Wal-Mart, Chanel, and the like have yet to establish beachheads, and that walking around in a loud floral shirt is construed as a fashion-do.

It also means that dogs and roosters pretty much run the joint. Roosters let you know this by crowing at 5:30 a.m. and at precise 20-minute intervals thereafter for the next 13 hours. Dogs let you know this by taking their own sweet time crossing the road—usually at the exact moment you’ve had the first of many lazy island epiphanies like “Hey, I’m driving 30 miles an hour on an island in the middle of nowhere. What do I have to worry about?” Roosters and dogs have their own worries, though. Due to their annoying punctuality, roosters get a lot of stuff thrown at them, so they’re a little skittish around humans. When it comes to dogs, well, as one guidebook flatly states, “Dogs are sometimes eaten by young men on drinking sprees”—in some parts of the world a fashion-don’t.

My search for the True Essence of Nowhere was arduous and thorough. The art of doing nothing is very hard work. You have to unhinge the shackles of time and space and bob on the slipstream of whatever slipstreams bob on. Rarotongans make it look easy. When not tending the papaya and taro crops that dot most patches of cleared land, or managing a host of businesses in the bustling, postage-stamp-size capital of Avarua, or cruising Muri Lagoon in an outrigger to inspect the traditional nets and traps they’ve been using for centuries, they can usually be found plinking ukuleles and singing old Maori folk songs to the wind. They’re not slacking, they’re just…passing time. It’s no wonder the standard greeting on the island is Kia orana—”May you live on.”

My wife, who threw herself into the search with vigor, became obsessed with finding the perfect abandoned shell—no easy task. Rarotonga is the tip of an ancient dormant volcano girdled by 20 miles of submerged coral and rock. The nubbly white-sand beaches are therefore spangled with a fresh crop of seaborne detritus with each new tide. You’ll never see more shells, and you’ll never drive yourself more crazy.

It was a benign lunacy. Myself, I became transfixed by the waves. On the west coast of the island, near the village of Arorangi, the reef is only about 200 yards offshore. You can sit for hours and muse on fish brains while watching meaty turquoise rollers pound the barrier with metronomic precision, only to flatten out like backwash on their final dash to the beach. I took about 30 snapshots of this phenomenon (known in common parlance as, uh, breaking waves). Hear me, fellow pilgrims: I was trying to capture that sublime moment when a wave flips up to a perfect pre-curl, like a jaw about to slam shut. I never got it right on film, but I could have watched them break for the rest of my days.

Our days, however, were numbered, and we caught only occasional glimpses of pure Nowheresville. Like the morning I opened the door of our bungalow in time to see a coconut fall and hit the sand with a tremendous thud. Or the afternoon we snorkeled the calm, cerulean lagoon at Aitutaki, an “almost atoll” about 140 miles north of Rarotonga, and communed with a school of bigeye bream. They just hung there, suspended in tight pods, beckoning me with their big freaky eyes, as if to say, “One of us, one of us…” (Oh yeah, they can think.)

Then one evening, while strolling on the beach as dusk succumbed to nightfall, we looked up and beheld the True Essence. Above us, the Milky Way had cracked open the heavens, spilling stars like snowflakes on black velvet. “Can you believe where we are?” I asked my wife. “No, I can’t,” she said. Pause. “But where are we?”

We were Nowhere and Everywhere at the same time. And we were doing nothing. And it felt great.

Access & Resources: Rarotonga

You know that Gilligan’s Island clich茅 of South Seas islanders as lei-wearing, ukulele-playing, hula-dancing happy people? Well, it’s not just a clich茅; here it’s a refreshing reality.

GETTING THERE: Fly Air New Zealand (800-369-6867; ), the only major carrier that lands in Rarotonga. Direct from Los Angeles takes just under ten splendid hours (prices start at about $1,200).

WHERE TO STAY: Crown Beach Resort in Arorangi (011-682-23-953; ) has 22 one- and two-bedroom wood-paneled and thatch-roofed villas with eat-in kitchens ($214颅$281 a night) perched directly on or just off the strand. Bungalows at the Muri Beachcomber ($93颅$138; 682-21-022; ) and Palm Grove ($69颅$108; 682-20-002; ) are only slightly less posh—think linoleum rather than stained wood. Most units come with kitchens, and many sit right by the beach. For those hitchhiking their way across the Pacific, the ack-packers International Hostel ($6.50颅$11; 682-21-847; or e-mail annabill@backpackers.co.ck) is surprisingly homey, with a big communal kitchen and a rooftop sundeck.

WILD RAROTONGA: Car, scooter, and bike rental shops (in Avarua try Budget/Polynesian Bike Hire, 682-20-895 or Avis, 682-22-833; car rental is about $22 per day) pop up all over the island, making transportation easy. You can snorkel almost anywhere, but the best site is on the south side off Titikaveka. Expect to see sunset wrasses, Moorish idols, yellow boxfish, and the occasional octopus. Barry Hill at Dive Rarotonga ($22颅$26; 682-21-873; ) knows every cave, drop-off, and wreck around the island, and has swum with humpback whales (“That’ll give you dreams for a week,” he says). If you’re keen to hook fish rather than swim with them, Trevor Yorke at Manatee Fishing Charters can take you out beyond the reef to troll for barracuda and dogtooth tuna ($27; 682-22-560).

ISLAND EATS: You can’t take a step without tripping over pawpaws (papayas), star fruits, bananas, or guavas. And then there are the fish: oysters, lobsters, wahoos, eels, yellowfins, scallops, green mussels, parrot fish—all just-off-the-hook fresh. Check out the Windjammer, Tumunu, and Flame Tree restaurants for steaks and seafood, fine New Zealand and Australian wines, and utensils. Other roadside attractions: the Ambala Garden & Caf茅 in Muri for organic breakfasts and lunches in a private botanical garden; in Avarua, Raro Fried Chicken, where the chicken-and-chips combo will easily satisfy your daily grease-‘n’-salt quota.

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Cat Island

Bahamas On this low-key string bean of land in the Out Islands, sip-sip and dominoes are about as rough as it gets

Access & Resources

MAYBE THERE’S SOMETHING on Cat Island that didn’t arrive by mail boat—some bag of cement, some chicken coop, some case of Gilbey’s gin, some straw-hatted old lady in a pretty calico dress. Anything is possible. But I came to Cat on the Sea Hauler, and so did a Chevy S-10 and a Ford F250 and an off-brand minivan, rolled aboard with much fanfare over two dry planks. And so did the gospel choir from the Dumfries Church of God and a side-by-side refrigerator marked “Frank” and a white sash window for “Mr. Butler Sr.” and somewhere on board a live squid, whose owner, a well-groomed businessman, described his missing charge as “a member of the octopus family.”


The Sea Hauler is a lovely old tug, diesel-soaked and coated in grime thick as bacon. We pulled out of Nassau on a hot, still afternoon, the conch sellers waving from Potter’s Cay pier on one side, a booze cruise颅load of sun-pickled tourists on the other. Captain Allen Russell steered us southeast, the Church of God congregation crowded into the wheelhouse with him, belting out “Uncloudy Day.” We left the first of the Exuma Cays to starboard at sunset as men sprawled on coils of rope sat sipping Kaliks and two little Nassau girls—Lakeisha and Yeronnicker—taught me schoolyard games on the upper deck. We all slept where we lay, the girls and I spooned with our heads on my pack, safe under the stars and the satellites overhead.

At 4 a.m. on Cat Island, the bonefish were still sleeping, the clear waters of Smith Bay still opaque. A crowd had gathered, waiting for packages and family and news and sun. In the growing light Cat Island looked rough and beautiful, unapologetically unscrubbed, an older, more blessedly real Bahamas than the one we’d left behind.

Like everything else on Cat, the dock at Smith Bay clings to the lee side of the island, its gossip-linked small settlements strung 48 miles up and down Exuma Sound. I was picked up like a parcel and taken the mile south to Fernandez Bay Village resort, a collection of limestone cottages where, beware, days blur from beachside coffee to beachside cocktails with, if you’re determined to rally, bonefishing or snorkeling in between. On the second morning (or was it the third?), a little 19-foot Abaco motored in, piloted by marine biologist Stevie Connett, dropping in to see resort owners Tony and Pam Armbrister and to check on Cat Island’s sea turtles. The only way to count a turtle is to catch him, and so at high tide Stevie and I ran the Abaco south ten miles into Joe’s Sound, me standing lookout, the skiff’s deck blinding against the turquoise creek. The water moved and the clouds moved over it, tortoiseshelling the pocked sand bottom in shadows that resolved themselves into grass and algae and back into shadows again. Suddenly Stevie shouted and I cannonballed in, chasing a green sea turtle through the sun-filtered water. He was small, and I managed to grab a flipper, and then his shell; on deck we turned him over and he lay there panting, his turtle breast heaving. We tagged him with a leather punch, #BP9815, took his mug shot, released him. Track me, he said, see if I care.

In some elemental way, Cat Island is like that turtle. It just goes on doing its thing with or without you. Tourism is of the low-key, thatch-roofed variety— diving, a little bonefishing, catch a marlin, sure. 国产吃瓜黑料s, when they happen, happen on island time. The typical tourist is a naked German lady stuck in a cave at high tide, waiting for the police. The typical expat washed up on a sailboat and never left. Cat is the kind of place where on Sunday mornings in the village of Old Bight, the regulars at the Pass Me Not Bar lock the front door out of respect for the Baptist church across the street and play dominoes under the tamarind tree out back as the Baptist ladies holler scripture through megaphones. Where children roam under the midnight moon, catching hubcap-size palm crabs, and where you best not ask about obeah, or black magic, but where anyone will tell you that 21-Gun Salute, a bush-medicine Viagra, is “guaranteed to raise the dead.” Cat is the kind of place that doesn’t need you, but it likes you just fine.

There are unseen powers on Cat Island, demons that throw dishes, hands that reach down in the night. Cat has 2,000 caves and plenty of blue holes, but you won’t catch a Cat Islander in any of them: “Take us to one of the blue holes,” says island historian Eris Moncur, “and there’s something that happens to our skin.” Moncur is a sober man: white shirt, shiny shoes. As we sat under the thatched roof at Fernandez Bay, he told me about the island’s namesake, the pirate Arthur Catt, its past life as San Salvador, Columbus’s first landfall, and its first son, Sidney Poitier. Then he told me about spirits, and about the legendary nyankoo, a three-foot-tall gremlin with a human face. “You’re laughing,” Moncur rebuked me. “What we can’t control,” he intoned, “is safest for our sanity to deny.”

Late one afternoon, as the sun slanted into Exuma Sound, I threw a mask and fins into a kayak and headed up Fernandez Bay’s Bonefish Creek toward the Boiling Hole, a bluewater cavern that, through some alchemy of ocean, current, and creek, churns like a pot at high tide. I paddled for an hour, keeping the markers, tied to the mangrove branches, on my left. I passed the last one; no hole. I kept going. I got a feeling in my stomach that the water was sliding downhill, that I was being sucked into a drain. Spooked, I started to follow my wake back out, but the water had begun to percolate. Beneath the kayak the silt bottom opened into a limestone cavern, its recesses reaching farther than I could see. The idea had been to hop out and go snorkeling. You’d see great fish down there—snapper, grouper, barracuda.

But floating above the darkness, I suddenly understood. Cat Islanders have got it right; there are things you don’t fool with, powers bigger than tourism, or recreation, or paradise. God only knew what monsters swam in that hole. “Maybe live, surely die,” one islander had shrugged brightly to me at a midnight wake for his brother, who’d sat down on his front porch and never stood back up. You got to enjoy the time you got, drink your bush medicine, take the bright gifts the ocean offers. But don’t mess with the invisible. Ain’t no way, I thought, as I hung above that black water—ain’t no way I’m going in that hole.

Access & Resources: Cat Island

Don’t come down here thinking you’re going to “do” Cat Island. Oh, it’s all here to do—paddling, fishing, snorkeling, scuba diving—but you’ll be too deep into your blissed-out island reverie for anything too ambitious. And rightly so.

GETTING THERE: Visit during the Rake ‘n’ Scrape Festival, a feast of traditional music the first weekend in June, or for the Cat Island Regatta, a rowdy homecoming the first Saturday in August. Forty dollars will buy you 12 hours of chop on the Sea Hauler— or dish out $70 for the 45-minute plane hop from Nassau on Bahamasair (800-222-4262; ). In New Bight, you’ll pay dearly to rent a rusted-out Chevy Caprice at Gilbert’s Car Rentals ($65 a day; 242-342-3011).

WHERE TO STAY: Fernandez Bay Village is all outdoor showers, crisp linens, and a thatch-roofed bar (cottages, $160颅$305; 800-940-1905; ). The beachfront Hotel Greenwood, with its 20 motel-style rooms, is a mix of hippie Berliners and dolphin therapists from Miami ($79颅$105; 800-343-0373). Sport fishermen stick to Hawk’s Nest Resort and Marina ($124; 800-688-4752; ).

WILD CAT: Hotel Green-wood runs the only dive operation (two-tank dives, $75; 877-228-7475). Both scuba divers and fishermen will appreciate Cat’s Tartar Bank, an abrupt plunge from 60 to 6,000 feet. Hawk’s Nest’s fishing charters cost $400 half-day, $675 full-day; Mark Keasler is the island’s wiliest bonefish stalker ($195 half-day, $280 full-day; 242-342-3043). On your own, snorkel wherever the spirit moves you—any road off the Queen’s Highway leads to another deserted Atlantic beach. Just don’t leave Cat without a sunset picnic at the hermitage on 206-foot Mount Alvernia, the highest point in the Bahamas.

ISLAND EATS: Tear yourself away from that tenth plate of pigeon peas and rice at the Blue Bird Restaurant in New Bight and head for Hazel’s Seaside Bar in Smith Bay, where sassy octogenarian Hazel Brown offers up Kaliks, sip-sip (gossip), and dominoes. Soon you’ll be ready to lose your shirt down at the Pass Me Not in Old Bight, where the pros play. Dominoes under the tamarind tree and Percy Sledge on the jukebox—the perfect Cat Island combination.

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Grenada

Caribbean Islands Catch the fever dream, and let Boney take you on a wild ride past rocky cliffs, soursop trees, and the molasses devil that cavorts through town

In the drink: an offshore view of Grenada

Access & Resources

ON GRENADA, YOU DRIVE in the left lane and shift with your left hand, but it’s trickier than just that. Grenadan roads contain no straight lines. The narrow pavement follows the island’s volcanic contours with blind curves linking together for miles and sudden fearful inclines that match any in San Francisco. Roads are occasionally flanked by hundred-foot drop-offs with no guardrails. And around most every turn, something darts into your path: a bush dog, a Rastafarian, a coconut, a hobbling old-timer with a cane, an armadillo. Maps are of little use; street signs rarely exist. Taxis aim at oncoming traffic as if engaged in a good-natured game of chicken.

In time, my wife and I came to love driving on Grenada, but on the last afternoon of Carnival, we were sternly warned against it. There would be roadblocks, people said, and mobs of revelers. You’ll never make it around the island on your own. Hire a driver. Give Boney a call. And so we did.

He grew up near La Sagesse, a lovely bay on Grenada’s southern shore. His mother named him Stephen Morain, but 33 years ago, when he was 19, an Englishwoman rechristened the skinny kid Boney, and it stuck. A father of seven, he’s been a Rasta man, a policeman, a driver for the prime minister. He was taught by his grandmother, who lived to be 105 and passed on wisdom about plants that few remember anymore.

On a steep hill overlooking St. George’s, the capital, and the Carenage, the city’s artfully distressed harbor of anchored sloops and pastel warehouses, our education begins. Grenada’s roadsides are both pantry and pharmacy for those who can decipher the tangle of greenery. “This is dasheen,” Boney tells us, easing his maroon van to the shoulder and pointing to a spinachlike plant that’s the key ingredient in callaloo, the island’s signature soup. Next to it is a soursop tree, with huge, bumpy green fruits. There are breadfruits, mangoes, pawpaws, sugar apples. He fingers a weedy-looking vine—coriley, he calls it. “I take it once a month. Very bitter. For my kidneys. It help you a lot. A lot, my friend. Two or t’ree mout’ful a dis once or twice a month.”

He threads past a hilltop graveyard and down a twisting, plummeting backstreet, narrating all the while. There’s Fort George, on a brow of hill over the Carenage, where in 1983 a rival faction executed Prime Minister Maurice Bishop days before U.S. troops landed. Over there was an ice factory in the days before refrigeration, when the delivery man would announce his arrival in towns by blowing into a conch shell. On Grenada, most exchanges still begin with “Good morning” or “Good afternoon,” and even Boney’s irritation with other drivers seems tempered. To a passing minibus driver, as calmly as a schoolteacher: “Drive betta dan dot.”

We work our way clockwise along the western coast, past yawning valleys of coconut palms, enormous drooping banana plants, stately nutmeg trees. Here’s Molini猫re Reef, a few snorkelers undulating with the swells among the parrot fish and sergeant majors. We pass small vintage billboards for Ovaltine and Vita Malt, and an ominous sign: “Caution—Drive Slowly—Broken Road Ahead.”

At four o’clock, we enter Gouyave, a fishing village, just in time to witness a fever dream. Grenada’s Carnival takes place in August in part because it has roots in a harvest festival that started in the 1800s as Cannes Brul茅es (“burnt cane”), which gradually merged with the celebration of the 1834 emancipation of Grenada’s West African slaves, from whom most islanders are descended. There’s great commotion ahead on the main thoroughfare, so Boney diverts his van a block or so, darting down alleys, the houses close enough to touch. It works: We pull into a gas station at the town’s center, and the hallucination begins.

A flatbed truck leads the parade procession loaded with coffin-size speakers thumping out calypso at a deafening throb. Men on the truck bed are covered with glitter, some with red and blue body paint, some with huge blue horns flaring out from their skulls. Several dozen follow on foot, carrying a banner: “Splendid Pirates,” old and young alike wearing wigs and garish balloon pants of brown, red, green, yellow, white, and purple, stepping in unison to the beat as if in a trance. Then comes a marching pirate ship, a mock funeral, a brigade of men in identical Arab costumes. A fight erupts among four snarling dogs; a painted man beats them with his floppy straw hat. Here comes Death in his skeleton garb, and Jab-Jab, the molasses devil. Men and women walk in formation clutching tall cans of Heineken with straws poking out. Now comes a round-rumped gentleman wearing nothing but a lacy transparent curtain. Boney roars with laughter, though we can barely hear him above the din.

On to St. Patrick parish, on the island’s north side. Loaded vans and minibuses whiz past, slogans on their windshields: Humble Thy Self, Thug Life, Jah Rules. We enter Sauteurs, where Boney weaves through another mob, fragrant of ganja, and then throttles up a tightrope back alley lined by concrete troughs deep enough to swallow a jeep. He does this fast, uphill—and backward. He turns off the engine atop a cliff overlooking a rocky shoreline. From this spot in 1654, a small band of Carib Indians, trapped by French soldiers and fearing a life of enslavement, leaped to their deaths.

The sun sinks, and we arrive at an old airstrip, defunct since the new airport opened in the 1980s. Here sits an old Cuban turboprop, forlorn and abandoned in the grass. Boney has a dream about this plane: He wants to tow it closer to the sea and convert it into a restaurant. He’s talked to government ministers, but so far his plan has gone nowhere.

The notion still enthralls him, though. “If I had that airplane…,” he muses. He’s grinning broadly, gazing slightly heavenward. “I’d have some sparkling ladies there; old people in the kitchen; grilled foods, not fried; some guava ice cream, mango ice cream, soursop ice cream, chocolate, coconut…”

We vanish into the black night. Boney slaloms his van through unlit switchbacks, narrowly missing dreadlocked ramblers, dreaming aloud about empty fuselages and mango ice cream and a sweet-smelling entourage he’s sure will soon arrive. It’s a dazzling vision, on a day when no vision seems impossible.

Access & Resources: Grenada

Rumors of Grenada’s Club Med颅ification have been exaggerated. Yup, there’s a new shopping mall near Grande Anse, the two-mile crescent of white sand where the island’s plushest resorts sit. But there’s also this sign just down the street: No Tethering of Animals Allowed.

GETTING THERE: Fly American (800-433-7300), British West Indies Airlines (800-538-2942), or Air Jamaica (800-523-5585). Rent a car from Avis in St. George’s (about $50 per day; 473-440-3936). Boney, aka Stephen Morain, charges $20 an hour to be your driver and guide (473-441-8967).

WHERE TO STAY: The 66-room Spice Island Beach Resort on Grande Anse is inches from the Caribbean ($214-$173; $359; 473-444-4423; ). A more economical choice is the nearby Blue Horizons Cottage Hotel, with a cool veranda restaurant called La Belle Creole ($170-$173;$190; 473-444-4316; ). La Sagesse Nature Center is a nine-room onetime English manor house on a gorgeous, palm-shaded cove ($70-$173; $125; 473-444-6458; ).

WILD GRENADA: Summit the 2,300-foot, delightfully named Mount Qua Qua in Grand 脡tang Forest Reserve or hike to the Seven Sisters, a misnamed series of five waterfalls. It’s worth it to hire a guide, and probably the island’s best is Telfor Bedeau, a 62-year-old Grenadan who’s hiked the island’s highest peak, Mount St. Catherine, more than 100 times ($25-$173; $30 for one person, $15-$173; $25 per person for groups; 473-442-6200). To see the island from the water, sign on with First Impressions for a jaunt up the west coast aboard the Starwind III, a 42-foot catamaran ($45 half-day, $60 full day; 473-440-3678). Divers mingle with barracuda around the wreck of the Bianca C, an Italian luxury liner that sank off St. George’s in 1961. Reputable dive operators include Dive Grenada (473-444-1092; ) and Sanvics Scuba (473-444-4753; ).

ISLAND EATS: Cuisine centers around fresh-plucked fruit and the daily catch, with a local twist: More nutmeg grows on this 21-by-12-mile island than anywhere else except Indonesia. A fine perch from which to sample local grub is The Nutmeg, on St. George’s harbor. Above Grand Anse is Calypso’s Terrace, which serves up nighttime views of St. George’s and a fine rum-and-coconut-cream blend called a Painkiller.

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Best Islands for Sea Kayaking

Round up: paddlers prepare to shove-off in Belize

Exuma Cays, Bahamas
This 90-mile-long mosaic of more than 365 sandy cays is blessed with calm seas and dozens of flourishing reefs. The Exuma Cays Land and Sea Park, a 130-square-mile marine wilderness, has a strict “no take” rule (that means you, cockleshell klepto) that has allowed hundreds of species to thrive. For information on guided trips, contact Ecosummer Expeditions (800-465-8884; ).

Rock Islands, Palau
Paddling the air-clear water of the Rock Islands, a group of deeply undercut, plush green knobs, feels more like flying than floating. Swoop over barrel sponges and giant clams and buzz the open maws of dark sea caves before you touch down on an exquisite, deserted slice of sand—your camp for the night. Sam’s Planet Blue Sea Kayak Tours (011-680-488-1062; ) can help with gear and guides.


Isla Espiritu Santo, Mexico
Leave the cockfights and tequila worms behind and head for this desert island in the Gulf of California, where turquoise coves slice into volcanic cliffs, sea lions raise their pups, and black jackrabbits look for shade in the sun-baked canyons. For a guided trip, call Baja Expeditions (800-843-6967; ).

Glover’s Reef, Belize
Sapphire-blue seas, the world’s second-longest barrier reef, and six palm-studded cays crying out for the creak of a hammock…all in an 82-square-mile lagoon. Contact Slickrock 国产吃瓜黑料s (800-390-5715; ).

Best Islands for Communing with Nature

Dominica
Peaks shooting 4,000 feet from the surf, rare Sisserou parrots, 100-foot waterfalls, an undersea hot springs called Champagne—welcome to the Caribbean’s most primeval isle. Play “Me Tarzan, you Jane” at the orchid-filled Papillote Wilderness Retreat ($90; 767-448-2287; .

Kangaroo Island, Australia
Eucalyptus-stoned koala bears roam this 1,737-square-mile island off Adelaide. Hundreds of miles of hiking trails take you through 21 parks, where you’ll spot sea lions, kangaroos, and nocturnal penguins returning to their colony at Penneshaw (Alkirna Nocturnal Tours, ).

Madagascar
Nearly all 30 species of lemurs live on this 995-mile-long island off Africa—broad-nosed gentle, ring-tailed, red-bellied, fat-tailed, hairy-eared dwarf—and despite a host of other exotic animals, they steal the wildlife show. Contact Lemur Tours (800-735-3687; ).

Fernandina Island, Ecuador
Flightless cormorants, pelicans, marine iguanas, and sea lions congregate on Punta Espinosa in the Gal谩pagos Islands. Contact Galapagos 国产吃瓜黑料s (561-393-4752; ).

San Miguel Island, California
San Miguel is unique for its seal and sea lion colonies; Point Bennet is the only place in the world where six types of pinnipeds congregate. Click on .

Best Islands for Scuba Diving

Cocos Island, Costa Rica
To witness what lurks in the current just off this jungly island 300 miles west of Costa Rica, you’ll need to go long and deep. Live-aboard dive boats make the rough, 36-hour crossing; then it’s a 60- to 135-foot dive down to see hammerheads, white-tipped sharks, and manta rays. Book a trip on the Okeanos Aggressor (800-348-2628; ).

Little Cayman Island
Still home to some of the deepest walls and clearest water, and still scarcely inhabited, this Frisbee-flat isle 80 miles northeast of Grand Cayman belongs on every diver’s life list. Kick through tunnels, chimneys, and canyons; sail over 1,000-foot drop-offs; and come face-to-face with sea turtles. Book a diving package at quirky Pirates Point Resort (345-948-1010).


Wakatobi, Southeast Sulawesi, Indonesia
Waka-who-bi? Largely unexplored, the Wakatobi National Marine Park in the Sea of Banda teems with everything from pilot whales to pygmy sea horses. Stay at the Wakatobi Dive Resort on Tomia Island (011-62-361-284-227; ), which has lodging for 22 guests.

Roat谩n, Honduras
Visit 33-mile-long Roat谩n and you’ll be faced with tough decisions: Reef-, wall-, or wreck-diving? Full-service dive resort or primitive beachfront cabana? Elephant-ear sponges and black coral or black groupers and whale sharks? Roat谩n Charter (800-282-8932; ) offers tank dives or weeklong packages.

Gizo, Solomon Islands
Diving near Gizo, in the western Solomons, means exploring coral-encrusted World War II wrecks and 100-foot walls surrounded by slow-cruising manta rays, tuna, barracuda, and a parade of confetti-colored reef fish. Topside, Gizo is a lush fantasy island smothered in orchids and mangroves. Call Dive Gizo (011-677-60253; ).

Best Islands for Fishing

Cast away: afloat off the Florida Keys

Madeira, Portugal
Obsessive record-stalking anglers descend on this mountainous, vineyard-covered isle 320 miles north of the Canaries hoping to haul in a “grander”—a thousand-pound-plus blue marlin, one of two things Madeira is famous for. The other is a sweet wine that’s sure to ease your pain over the one that got away. Charter a boat and guide from Nautisantos (011-351-291-222667; ).

Midway Atoll
Once a World War II battle zone, this U.S. National Wildlife Refuge 1,500 miles northwest of Hawaii began allowing visitors five years ago. Since then, more than 20 world-record catches have been hauled in, including a 78-pound giant trevally. Stay in Midway’s only accommodations, the spruced-up (and surprisingly pleasant) former Army officers’ quarters.Contact Destination: Pacific (888-244-8582; ) to plan your trip.

Mauritius
This volcanic melting pot 450 miles east of Madagascar, with its Creole-speaking Franco-Anglo-African-Indian-Chinese population, offers superb fishing for black and blue marlin, sailfish, and sharks. Captains generally keep your catch and sell it; if you insist on catch-and-release, expect to pay about $75 for each fish you land in this not-so-green economy. Call Sportfisher (011-230-263-8358; ).

Marquesas Keys, Florida
Monster tarpon, permit, and bonefish loll in the turquoise shallows of this handful of uninhabited islands in the Key West National Wildlife Refuge. Work the Marquesas on daylong charters out of Key West.Call Key West Fishing Guides (800-497-5998; ).

Best Islands for a Multisport Vacation

Corsica, France
Scraggly peaks and 620 miles of rugged coast draw Euro-masochists for canyoneering, sea kayaking, diving, climbing, mountain biking, and sailing, plus paragliding off 8,877-foot Monte Cintu and rafting the Class IV Golo River. But the sportif notch to carve on your belt is trekking the grueling Fra I Monti, or GR20 Trail, a 104-mile grind along the island’s spine. Call France-based Corse Aventure (011-33-495-259119; ).

St. John, USVI
Virgin Islands National Park, which claims about three-fifths of this emerald isle, is crisscrossed with 20 miles of jungle trails for hiking and biking and blessed with pristine coral reefs for some of the best snorkeling and diving in the Caribbean. Arawak Expeditions gets you out in the park on weeklong trips (800-238-8687; ). But schedule a few extra days to enjoy lounging like a Rockefeller.


Kauai, Hawaii
Mount Waialeale, near the island’s center, which gets more than 480 inches of rain a year, is a verdant backdrop for horseback riders, mountain bikers, hikers, and windsurfers. Kauai’s trophy trek, the 11-mile Kalalau Trail, leads you from the cliffs of the Na Pali Coast, past 300-foot Hanakapiai Falls, deep into the spectacular Kalalau Valley. For camping permits, contact the Hawaii Division of State Parks, 808-274-3444.

Dominican Republic
Hike 10,417-foot Pico Duarte, raft Class III颅V Yaque del Norte, mountain bike in the Dominican Alps, windsurf off Cabarete, and surf the ten-foot waves near Sousa. Go green and stay at Rancho Baiguate, an eco-resort in the highlands (809-574-4940; ).

Best Islands for Boardsailing

El Yaque, Margarita Island, Venezuela
Fifteen- to 30-knot sideshore winds blow over water so shallow here that you can bail 400 yards out and still walk back to land. High-quality rental rigs, cheap Cuba libres, and pulsing merengue compensate for crowds. Call Club Margarita Windsurfing for details (011-44-1920-484121; ).

Flag Beach, Fuerteventura, Canary Islands
Wide beaches and sartorially challenged German sunbathers dominate this arid Spanish island 70 miles west of Morocco. At Flag Beach, low pressure from the Sahara pumps in sideshore winds and Atlantic storms kick up jumpable swells. Call Flag Beach Windsurf Centre in Correlejo (011-34928-866389; ).


Taranaki, North Island, New Zealand
Mast-dwarfing walls sculpted by 20-knot winds along the mountainous West Coast are ridden most days by only a handful of wild-eyed, whooping Kiwis. Get local wisdom and a bunk at Wave Haven lodge in Oakura (011-646-752-7800; or e-mail wave.haven@taranaki.ac.nz).

Fisherman’s Hut Beach, Aruba
Bankable trade winds and planeable flatwater lure windsurfers to this cactus-spiked isle. Goofy diversions—casinos, jet skis, rum-‘n’-strum cruises—keep fidgety nonsailors happy, too. Call Sailboard Vacations (800-252-1070; ) for rentals and lodging.

Hookipa, Maui, Hawaii
Kneel at the feet of the airborne masters of Hookipa’s North Shore and perfect your carve-jibe in the sideshore trades off Kanaha Beach Park. Call Hawaiian Island Surf & Sport (800-231-6958; ).

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