We got off the Silver Ray in Lima on 4th January 2025 and were picked up by our Driver and Guide to tour Northern Peru
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| Our tuk tuk at Caral | The aqueducts at Cumbe Mayo | We braved many difficult roads | Kuelap is crumbling at the edges |
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| Sarcophagi high in the cliffs | Gocta Falls from our bedroom window | The Lord of Sipan may have looked like this | The Chaparri Bears were a great disappointment |
Back in Moraira for about a month
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| Burns Night at the Bridge Club | Guess who won that night | Yes, that is the pair | Sunset from Carol's |
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| Watching the Rugby | Quite exciting if you like that sort of thing | Sarah | Doling out the food |
Then off to India on our first Wild Frontiers trip for years and years. It was actually very well oganised and we stayed in some really nice hotels and saw a Tiger in the wild.
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When we finished in India we flew on to Vietnam where we had booked two river cruises with Pandaw - one on the Red River through Hanoi and Hanlon Bay. Then a flight to Siem Reap and another cruise, this time down the Mekong to Saigon.
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And the second Pandaw ship down the Mekong to Saigon
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I don't think we had all three of these bears when we arrived in Vietnam
We were were then back in Moraira for about 4 weeks
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| The building boom in Moraira gave us a new crane | We spotted workmen but my high hopes of a new bridge .. | .. were dashed, as it was only a new handrail | Joanna in Sheffield |
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| Lunch at Maxims with ... | ..Ted and Cilla | We had a Paella at Amante | And the boys lunched at the Dauphin |
There was then an "interesting" 4 night trip to the UK. Our first sally to the UK for about 5 years. We stayed with Fiona, and remarkably saw both Stephen & Joanna in Winchester.
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Before having a night with Tim& Daphne in Wiltshire
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Then we go to see the Gunns in France. With a night in Rioja on the way to them, 3 nights with them and 2 nights in Burgundy and 1 near Girona on the way back
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| A stop at Viura Hotel in Rioja | Uncle Victor entertains the boys | Oradour - a memorial to the villagers murdered in 1944 | Sainte Sabine - our hotel in Burgundy |
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| An ill fated attempt to buy Epoisses Cheese | And I bought some Aloxe Corton | A stop in Catalonia on the way back | At the village of Arcs |
Back to life in Moraira for a few weeks
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| Boys are back at the Dauphin | One of the new powered surf boards | ||
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| A walk into the hinterland | The car is no longer on the rock | An Easter Bunny for the boys | |
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| Paul O'Gorman's Birthday Party | Me and the Boys were there for the cake | And we get new balcony furniture | |
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| Lunch with Bill and Brenda at Ausias in Pedrigeur | The Boys meet the chef | ||
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| Chris tries out the new "bionic" glass and is trying to get her | brain trained to interpret the image that arrives in her eyes | And Media Luna gets new solar panels, which appear to .. | ..make more electricity than we consume |
So by mid-June we were ready to face Ireland and the Silver Wind to Iceland
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| A night in Dublin | ..then over to Mull in the Western Isles | St Kilda where we landed without difficulty | We get to Iceland with its waterfalls |
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| Islands with steep cliffs .. | ..but with a way up to the top | An abandoned fish factory | A whale Museum |
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| Natural hot springs | ..and a rainy day at Iona | ..but a warm day at the Giants Causeway | . and a trip to River Dance when we end at Dublin |
Two weeks later we were off to Rwanda and Rovos across Africa
The full story of Rwanda here.
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| The Genocide is still very raw in Rwanda | We had treks to see monkeys | ..chimps |
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| And the big fellows, the Gorillas. All the treks were quite hard ... | ... going through bushes steep hills and often boggy ground | .. with an aerial walkway thrown in |
Then a roundabout route from Kigali to Entebbe to Addis Ababa to Dar es Salaam. To join Rovos Rail across Africa from Dar to Angola. A one off and one of the last great journeys that one can do
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| We greet Rohan Voss | Along the way we meet lions in Tanzania | Walk through remote Zambian villages | The Chisimba Falls |
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| We have a remarkable leopard sighting | The crowds around the train in Congo were intimidating | The track in the Congo left a lot to be desired | Our luxury train rolled on across Africa |
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| We were followed by the secret police | We saw the fallout from a civil war | Not just graves, old tanks littered the countryside | And we had an armed police escort through Angola |
Back home for a bit of socialising
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| Peter and Helen Jackson for lunch - they come from Dublin | And the O'Gormans for Lunch | And the Russells |
And to Malta and Gozo for my birthday
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| We enjoyed my birthday in Gozo. Jeep tour was not good | Spectacular bangers in Malta | And the Naxxar Church was lit up | And as a bonus a total eclipse of the moon |
Then off to India in October. First up the Hoogly River
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| An unplanned night in Valencia | We join our Pandaw boat at Kolkata | The boys visit the Victoria Monument in Kolkata | ..and learn how to hot cast brass into pots |
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| There were numerous spectacular temples .. | .. and more of the same | The Hari Krishna are building a new world headquarters | And we got to dress up as the locals |
Then along the Ganges and old Hill Stations
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| God was Buddha in Bodhgaya | But this was a Hindu mausoleum at Sasaram | We stayed at a palace on the Ganges at Varanasi | For a Hindu, Varanasi was the place to die and be cremated |
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| We sampled street food in Lucknow | ..and saw the washing being hung up beside the Ganges | Afternoon tea and a chat with the Nawab of Lucknow | And the Beatles Ashram in Rishikesh |
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| The nightly blessing Mother Ganges ceremony | The "Toy Train" at Shimla was a disappointment | Vice Regal Lodge at Shimla | Only a photo, we never saw the great man in person |
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| The Himalayas occasionally appeared out of the pollution | The Golden Temple at Amritsar was magical at night | Bullet holes where a British General butchered hundreds | The Border show at the Wagah Gate was spectacular |
Chris had a few "internal" problems. And Sally & Margaret came for a week
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| Termites in the stairs was a saga. We had to find a | termite man, & a man to make a new wood insert | Dinner with Catherine in Javea | |
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| Chris was taken into Imed in Benidorm with a blockage | and stayed overnight | We had solar panels installed | A new ritual is looking at daily electricity production on an app |
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| Sally & Margaret came for 5 days in mid November and enjoyed | ..warm sunny weather | ..it got a lot colder the next week | There were even a few hardy souls on Moraira beach |
And to round off the year we took the Coral Geographer from Taiwan to Manila. . The full story is on this link
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| Welcome to Coral Geographer in Taiwan | But first a visit to a CT scan in Taipei. Happily no problems | So we carried on an visited to top of Taipei 101 | We picked tea in Taiwan |
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| We climbed an awful lot of steps | We were greeted to a lot of welcome dances | We had a lot to eat | and even a lot to drink |
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| Lectures from Stella | And desert islands to walk round | We met Tarsiers | And the boys enjoyed a daily change of outfit |
Then flew to Sri Lanka and toured round it over Christmas and New Year . Click for a fuller story of our stay in Sri Lanka
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| Galle is the fort as built originally by the Portuguese | We saw how cinnamon sticks were produced | A classic afternoon tea | And a visit from Father Christmas |
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| A church service on Christmas morning | A distant and quick view of the Sacred Buddha tooth in Kandy | Magnificent Buddha caves | We never actually climbed it |
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| An elephant safari with more jeeps than elephants | A Sri Lankan policeman delivering his form of justice | A very good stay at Uga Hotel | And a guided walk round central Colombo |
We then flew back from Colombo to Valencia on 1st Jan 2026
Valencia from the air as we arrive back