Travel

Cafes of the World by David Burton & Grant Sheehan. ISBN 0473046105. Recommended retail price $17.95.

"Coffee is the only beverage that sharpens rather than stupefies the mind, and cafes are meeting places of the mind, an expression of a culture…"

David Burton, food critic and writer introduced "Café's of the World", a book for café and coffee aficionados. Forty-two evocative photographs by Grant Sheehan reveal the ambience, the architecture and the people of many of the world's most interesting cafes.

This unique book takes the reader on an illuminating journey, visiting the highly individualistic cafes of Australia and New Zealand, the grunge cafes and classic diners of the United States and the grand cafes of Europe. From the eccentric to the elegant, sumptuous to small, this insightful view of international café society shows its many forms and explains its enduring popularity.

Grant Sheehan is a freelance photographer, who lives and works in Wellington, New Zealand. His most recent books include "Leading Lights: Lighthouses of New Zealand" (1991), "Character Cafes of New Zealand" with text by David Burton (1994), and "Landmarks; Heritage Buildings of New Zealand" with text by David McGill (1997).

David Burton grew up with good coffee in Burton's Coffee House, run by his caterer father during the 1950's and early 1960's in Nelson, New Zealand.

For the past twenty years he has been a food writer and restaurant critic, and is the author of seven books, including the award winning "200 Years of New Zealand Food & Cookery" and "The Raj At Table". His last book, Savouring the East, was shortlisted for two British book awards in 1997 - the Andre Simon Memorial Award and the British Guild of Food Writers Book of the Year. Soft cover, 96 pages. Published in 1997.

Healthy Travel: Australia, New Zealand & the Pacific by Isabelle Young. Recommended retail price $5.95.

Many folk from sheltered cultures are totally at sea when set loose overseas. Sometimes such ignorance can just be embarrassing, such as when a visitor says or does something inappropriate. At other times it can be very much worse and can even lead to loss of life. This book will help you avoid being an “Ugly American” (or Asian or European etc.). Soft cover, 432 pages.

Landfalls of Paradise: Cruising Guide to the Pacific Islands by Earl R. Hinz. A Latitude 20 Book (distributed by University of Hawaii Press)
ISBN 0-8248-2115-7. Recomended retail price $44.95.

"The only complete cruising guide to the Islands of the Pacific... a must." --Islands

Landfalls of Paradise has remained the definitive guide for cruising in the Pacific for more than a decade. This new edition contains the most current information available on customs and immigration procedures, together with revised harbor charts and updated descriptions of more than seventy-five ports of entry and many lesser harbors and anchorages. (Midway, Bikini, Suvarov, and Henderson Atolls have been added to this edition.) The extensive treatment of island countries found in previous editions remains, with pertinent political, economic, social, and geological information updated. Expanded weather coverage, including discussions of the South Pacific Convergence Zone, the impact of El Nino, tropical cyclone havens, and preferred weather windows for sailing, will help guide cruisers to a safe harbor. Among the appendixes are a trilingual dictionary useful for port entry, a glossary of cruising terms, and a new section offering sound advice on the prevention and, in some cases, treatment, of critical medical conditions such as ciguatera and scromboid fish poisoning, dengue fever, and malaria.

Earl Hinz has sailed Pacific Ocean waters since 1958. He is the author of numerous cruising, maritime history, and technical boating books. Soft cover, 384 pages. Published in 1998.

More Curious than Cautious by Peter Fraser. ISBN: 9781598587708. Published by Dog Ear Publishing.

Armchair travelers, get comfortable. “A Survivor of Paradise” is a memoir of this Author’s solo adventure visiting several Idyllic Islands of the South Pacific. It is the middle of the twentieth Century. Come with me for a view of a small part of this fabulous tropical world which is gradually disappearing. Together we join the crew of the schooner “Te Vega” for a two week cruise to Tahiti. We arrive in time to enjoy some distinct traditional cultures of the islands. This is your chance to “go native” and dress in pareau and sail an outrigger canoe. You travel on copra trading vessels to The Society Islands, the Atolls, and the Marquesas. We meet a descendant of Fletcher Christian, leader of “Mutiny on the Bounty,” and go dancing in riotous “Quinn’s Hut.” Is this really “Paradise?” Maybe! Next we visit Samoa which is far less influenced by modern Western Culture. Stop to watch them build a “fale,” their thatched home, and work on a dugout canoe. Watch a young man get his body tattoo, a unique experience. Learn to cook in an umu, an underground oven. Come to Fiji. If lagoon snorkeling is your thing, this is the place. You might even catch a “vasua.” Or you might choose to try an Indian fire walk with bare feet. We meet village chiefs, Island Royalty, ex-cannibals, and drink a toast to them in kava. You stay with families in their thatched “bure” (home) villages, and share their meals while sitting on floor mats. We can bathe in delightful rivers. Now, if you have the heart, you can sail to New Zealand, but the weather is not predictable. Meet some Maoris and help make a tukutuku. We attend weddings and funerals and sit through a traditional Silent Kava Ceremony with a week-long celebration. It’s all in here.

Published in 2010. Soft cover, 372 pages.

Plumber’s Progress, A : Pilgrimage to the Heart of Tibet by W. J. O’Connell. ISBN 1877135895. Published by Longacre Press. Recommended retail price $21.95.

Why is a Kiwi plumber, pushing 50 and with a bad lung, hell-bent on wandering off to the lid of the world where there are lots of Chinese soldiers and not much air?

After decades of hard yakker, harder addictions, then six years of living in an American ashram, Kiwi adventurer W. J. O’Connell loses his right to stay on in the U.S.  He’s hitting middle age, has no home, no job, no wife, no bach at the beach, no life insurance.  What should he do?

Logical really.  He’ll take a hike.

This is the story of a personal journey to find the ‘something more to life’ that so many seek at important crossroads.  O’Connell’s route takes him from Delhi to war-torn Kashmir, then from Ladakh to sacred Mount Kailas in a remote region of Western Tibet.  It subjects him to experiences both bizarre and terrifying; travel scams, nightmarish bus rides, rescue by stray dogs, and encounters with all kinds of offbeat travelers.

Disarmingly honest and with a refreshing sense of comedy, O’Connell is unashamedly on a spiritual quest: a spiritual quest through ‘swamps of his own cynicism and doubt’.

Think Eric Newby meets The Snow Leopard; think philosophy confronts the ordinary bloke.

Soft cover, 222 pages. Published in 2003.

Not content with enjoying the fruits of their efforts, and determined to provide their family with inspiring and positive surroundings, Martin and Jenifer buy a small island in the Caribbean Sea, off the coast of Nicaragua. The island seems idyllic, home only to a rare species of turtle. But as their new dream takes shape they find themselves facing unexpected opponents, and there are times when the task seems too difficult even for them. As the story ends Nature has taken a hand in events.

This is an inspiring and entertaining book about turning dreams into reality.

Soft cover, 228 pages. Published in 2004.

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Last modified on Monday, 26 December, 2010