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ISSUE 45//$8.95 GST INCLUDED
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50 Secrets of
SOUTH-EAST ASIA
+ WIN A TRIP TO DISCOVER YOUR OWN
Rajasthan ride India by camel
Afloat in Fiji
Whitewater rafting epic
LA’s night moves The upside of Downtown
Caribbean dream
ISSN 1449-3543
Kicking back in the Corn Islands
AUSTRALIA | BAHAMAS | COLOMBIA | ENGLAND | MONGOLIA | SCOTLAND | SWITZERLAND
special SECTIO
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106 Chill out in an overwater bungalow in Indonesia, trek through the world’s largest cave in Malaysia, hang with the sea gypsies in Myanmar and feast on the best of local Filipino delicacies. Here is our epic shortlist of 50 of very best little-known gems South-East Asia has to offer.
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ColoMbIA
Corn Islands, the Caribbean paradise you’ve never heard of but have long dreamed about.
Explore Rajasthan’s golden dunes on the back of a camel.
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FIjI Ride the rapids on a wilderness adventure far from the big resorts. 8 get lost ISSUE 45
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MoNgolIA living like a nomad in a land of gers, vodka and never-ending plains.
Discover the colourful streets of Cartagena and their equally colourful past.
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AUStRAlIA lord Howe Island, our home-grown galapagos, and you won’t even need a passport.
get in the know No city in the New World has been as besieged, sacked and plundered by pirates as Cartagena, Colombia.
contents
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et books, 21 Lonely Plan itcase, 23 Paklite su trip, 48 South Africans, 135 Tamron le
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137 86
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Festival UK’s great balls oF Fire
liKe a local glasgow’s west end
18 oN tHE RADAR get all the goss and win!
outdoor cinemas
28 Hot 5
132 FooD
140 top bARS
23 HAppy SNApS
32 yoU WISH
134 pHotogRApHy
142 REvIEWS
Win with your travel pics
24 plACES to StAy the weird and wonderful
26 top tRIpS
Adventure wrapped up
Surreal sculpture swim
34 gEt pACKINg
Eight nights in Switzerland
36 AFtER DARK
Downtown lA ups the ante
get in the know In 2012 North Korean archaeologists claimed to have discovered the lair of the unicorn.
good fare up in the air Snapping architecture
137 MUSIC
Metal meets Moscow
this issue’s top tipples All the gear you’ll need
144 CoNFESSIoNS
on the slopes in North Korea
138 tRAvEl job
on the road with the Rugby Sevens ISSUE 45 get lost 9
Winner
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or me, Scandinavia waS the trip oF a liFetime. the aurora borealiS (northern lightS) waS Something i'd wanted to See in person for nearly a decade. this night, i was north of the arctic circle near a town called tromsø in norway. it was freezing, about –15°c. we waited for three hours but there was only an occasional glimmer of green in the sky. then, just as we were about to pack up and leave, the green glow reappeared, slowly intensifying until the aurora band was quite strong. i pulled out my camera, set up my tripod and put together this panorama before the shimmering light disappeared. • Canon 60D • Tokina 11–16mm f/2.8 at 11mm • ISO 800, f/2.8, 30 sec Photograph by ray wang. Congratulations to Ray who submitted this image in our Tamron competition. As this issue’s winner he’ll receive a Tamron 16–300 mm f/3.5-6.5 Di II VC PZD Macro Lens. See page 135 for entry details. tamron.com.au
Roaming Downtown Los Angeles at night, Nikola Sarbinowski finds a neighbourhood flourishing in the shadows of the city’s ritzier surrounds. Photography by Lachie McKenzie and Nikola Sarbinowski
Angel City Brewery gets busy as the night ripens. 36 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know The Broadway corridor has 12 historic theatres within nine city blocks.
get in the know In 2008 a US$40 million initiative dubbed Bringing Back Broadway was implemented to preserve Downtown’s theatres.
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Remember, remember the fifth of November‌ in the English town of Ottery St Mary, locals celebrate bonfire night in a unique way. 42 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know Lewes, in East Sussex, is the bonfire capital of the world, with up to 80,000 spectators watching things go up in flames on 5 November.
ENGLAND
Proud mother-country tradition or porno for pyros? Pat Kinsella joins revellers defrosting at a fiery festival in the wintry heart of England to find out. Photography by Pat Kinsella
get in the know Cheese rolling takes place at Cooper’s Hill in Gloucestershire every May.
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hump In a remote corner of Rajasthan, Shaun Busuttil explores the Thar Desert from high atop a camel. Photography by Philip Charlie Malmqvist
Crossing the dunes on an epic adventure through the Thar Desert. 62 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know The Thar Desert, also called Marusthali (Land of the Dead), forms a natural border between India and Pakistan.
INDIA
get in the know Rawal Jaisal built Jaisalmer Fort in 1156 after a local mystic told him Lord Krishna had praised the site.
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get in the know Palenque, a village near Cartagena, is the only remaining city in Colombia founded by escaped slaves and still inhabited by their direct descendants.
colombia
Colombia’s Caribbean coastline is home to a city that has seen the worst of history. Thankfully, as Cam Cope discovers, it now seems destined for a far more creative future. Photography by Cam Cope
School children stride by a homage to the Palenquera (fruit vendors) of Cartagena. get in the know Cartagena’s population exploded in the sixteenth century as Spanish graverobbers came in search of gold buried in the tombs of Indigenous Sinú people.
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C h a s ing Turning his back on Fiji’s famed beaches, Justin Jamieson embarks on a mind-blowing journey through the holiday hotspot’s own river of Eden. Photography by Justin Jamieson, Aaron March and Pita Nailobu
The mighty Upper Navua gorge. 78 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know The Upper Navua is Fiji’s third-largest freshwater river.
Fiji
get in the know Kava powder is made from the ground roots of the Piper methysticum plant.
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They are clearly proud and very welcoming, but perhaps a little overly generous with the kava. The trip back to camp is somewhat unsteady. Caption
The dense jungle spills into the river. Caption 80 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know Of Fiji’s thousands of islands, only 322 are big enough to be inhabited by humans.
Fiji
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t feels counterintuitive to be watching the turquoise blue of the South Pacific disappear in the distance as our rickety old minibus bounces and lurches deeper into the heart of Fiji’s largest island, Viti Levu. The red-clay road is potholed and winds steadily upwards into the verdant highlands. We’ve left behind a beach bar with buckets of beer and a perfect palm-fringed, fine-sand beach where I’d made myself all too comfortable the previous day. But it isn’t Fiji’s beaches that have lured me here, rather a chance meeting a few months earlier with an American whitewater rafting pioneer named George, who told me, wide-eyed with excitement, of a tropical ‘Grand Canyon’ slicing its way through the country’s lush interior.
“It will blow your mind!” George had exclaimed. “Ya just gotta do it! It’s the real Fiji!” It is a phrase I will hear often as we raft down the Upper Navua River. “Bula!” screams the genial Moses, our head guide, as the minibus grinds to a halt. We’re four hours deep into the jungle. It’s hot and the only sound is a low rumbling roar. “The river!” declares Joe, another guide with a smile almost as wide as Moses’. His energy, like all the guides, is infectious. It was obvious when we first met at the Rivers Fiji head office in Pacific Harbour that they were just as excited as we were about the two-day journey ahead. “This river is the highway of our ancestors,” Joe later explains as we cool our feet. “We are honoured to be allowed on it.” With a flick of his oar, he splashes me with refreshing cold water, laughs and tells me to pay attention as he takes us through a quick safety briefing. The rapids of the Upper Navua at this time of year are moderate at best (class II to III) and apparently never reach the magnitude of the much more famous runs on the Colorado or Nile rivers. It’s my first-ever whitewater rafting trip, however, and I’m content with a gentle initiation. But within a minute of pushing off, we drop nose-deep into the first rapid. Adrenaline kicks in as the cool water drenches us, increasing tenfold as we paddle around the first bend.
They are clearly proud and very welcoming, but perhaps a little overly generous with the kava. The trip back to camp is somewhat unsteady. We are in a gorge about four metres wide with 50-metre-high black volcanic rock towering on either side. It could easily be the start of a Disneyland thrill ride themed on a cross between The Lord of the Rings and Deliverance. Waterfalls shower sporadically from the jungle above as the sun shines through the spray and mist. I stare up in awe. It is surreal get in the know In Fiji, it is tradition that only village chiefs are allowed to wear hats and sunglasses.
Joe controls the action.
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Nomads Land guesthouse on the Cambodian island of Koh Totang. 106 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know According to a psychologist’s study, Singaporeans have the fastest average walking speed in the world, at 6.15 kilometres an hour.
Image: Amey Kandalgaonkar
get in the know The Istana Nurul Iman palace in Brunei has 1788 rooms and more than 250 bathrooms.
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do
JellyfiSH Jaunt > kakaBan lake, indonesia Slip into warm water and feel the bizarre sensation of blooms of stingless jellyfish gliding over your body. Located in the tropical Indonesian paradise of the Derawan Archipelago, the coral atoll of Kakaban Island offers refuge to thousands of these delicate creatures in a lake that covers two-thirds of the island. While you’ve probably heard of Palau in Micronesia where two types of jellyfish inhabit worldfamous waters, few beyond Indonesia know of Kakaban Lake, which is home to four species of these tentacled creatures. Once you’re done with the jellies hike back through the thick mangrove forest to Barracuda Point where you can swim with leopard sharks, manta rays and tuna, or if you’re an experienced diver search for the entrance of Blue Light Cave, a 100-metre cavern accessible through a crack in the rock wall beneath the ocean’s surface. TRAVASS runs four-day tours to the Derawan Archipelago for AU$820 per person.
facebook.com/travasslife
Sea gypSy Sailing > Mergui archipelago, MyanMar Sail the kind of untouched paradise travellers crow about off the shores of southern Myanmar. With 800 islands, sea gypsies and coral reefs, the Mergui Archipelago, which was sealed off from foreigners until 20 years ago, has just started to lure a trickle of discerning adventurers. Meet the Moken people who traditionally reside in kebang – small hand-built wooden boats – and dive to phenomenal depths for fish. They shelter in temporary stilt houses during the monsoon, but as commercial overfishing and government pressure threaten their nomadic lifestyle, the Moken's time in these settlements is becoming increasingly permanent. Explore the sea on a private charter with Wild Frontiers, kayak to uninhabited isles, swim with schools of fish and nurse sharks and meet the elusive gypsies in seaside villages. Only one eco-lodge has set up shop in the archipelago but others are set to follow so get there before the masses arrive or the Moken abandon their boats. Wild Frontiers’ 10-day The Sea Gypsies of Burma tour departs 25 October and costs AU$6305. wildfrontierstravel.com 108 get lost ISSUE 45
get in the know Thanaka, an off-white paste made from ground bark, has been used as a cosmetic in Myanmar for centuries. It also protects skin from sunburn.
marine relicS
Healing HandS
> Wreck diving, Brunei
> red cross spa, laos
It may not be your typical diving destination, but Brunei is a bubble-head’s
It’s true – in one part of the building you can give blood and in the other you can get pummelled into
paradise. Home to stunning reefs, rich marine life and more than 400 species
submission during a traditional Laos massage. Granted, the surrounds at the Red Cross Spa in Luang
of coral, Brunei’s waters have been compared to the Great Barrier Reef. Here,
Prabang aren’t all rich silks and wafting incense like you might find at one of the ritzier hotels in the
you’ll also find more than 20 shipwrecks, three of which are considered among
city, but the rooms – each with several beds separated by curtains for privacy – did undergo a reno
the world’s top dive sites. The ships' graveyard features four World War II relics,
last year and are bright and clean. The quality of the massage is completely dependent on the person
including the American Wreck – a US Navy minesweeper that sunk in 1945 after
who’s assigned to dig their elbows into your sore spots, but at about AU$8 for an hour-long treatment
hitting a Japanese mine in Brunei Bay.
(admission to the sauna costs less than AU$2) there’s not a lot to complain about. All proceeds go back to Red Cross projects in some of the poorest parts of Laos, so you’re doing good while feeling great.
Swinging good timeS
Heavenly Hike
> Tree Top explorer, laos
> MounT Murud, Malaysia
Make like a funky gibbon (or perhaps your speed is more slow loris) and head
Every adventure-seeker who comes to Malaysia wants to conquer Mount Kinabalu – one of the highest
to Tree Top Explorer, outside of Pakse in a pocket of the Dong Hua Sao National
mountains in South-East Asia. But Mount Murud, in the state of Sarawak, is an equally challenging trek
Park. Two- or three-day tours into the lush jungle will see you on a purpose-built
– minus the crowds and with a reputation that is heaven-sent. Known as the sacred mountain, Mount
walkway in the canopy – and at eye level with macaques and hornbills – zip-lining
Murud (2423 metres) in the Kelabit Highlands is the site of many supposed miracles. In the late 1980s
past thundering waterfalls and hiking to nearby villages. At night stay in simple tree
a church was built on a plateau not far from the summit and every second year Christian pilgrims from
houses wedged in the branches 20 metres above the ground, with nothing between
all over the world come together to climb the mountain as part of the International Revival Meeting.
you and nature but a thatched roof and mozzie net.
Strap on your boots and pray for clear weather when you get to the top.
A two-day adventure, including transfers from Pakse and all meals, gear and
Planet Borneo Tours and Travel Services operates five-day treks to Mount Murud from Limbang for
guides, costs from AU$290.
AU$780.
treetoplaos.com
planetborneotours.com
urban tHrillS > skyexperience, The philippines Zip-lines aren’t particularly novel in South-East Asia, but there’s one a little different from all the rest. SkyExperience Adventure in Cebu City links two buildings – the one you jump off is 150 metres above the ground – via a 75-metre highwire. It takes just eight seconds to fly through the air to your destination, but then you also need to be winched back to the starting point. For extra thrills, take the plunge at night or hanging by your feet. skyexperienceadventure.com
get in the know Phou Bia is the highest point in Laos, however it’s off limits to tourists because it is filled with unexploded ordnance.
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