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10 great ways to experience Lisbon
Tour leader, linguist and art history specialist Dr Jeni Ryde takes you through one of her favourite destinations – Portugal’s coastal capital city of Lisbon. Situated on seven hills at the wide mouth of the river Tagus (Tejo), where it meets the Atlantic Ocean, Lisbon enchants travellers with its white bleached limestone buildings, intimate alleyways, and brightly coloured yellow trams.
What is the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair?
Darwin hosts two very important cultural events in the same week: the largest and most important annual event for Indigenous Australian art, the Darwin Aboriginal Art Fair (DAAF); and Couture to Country, the leading space to highlight the rise of Indigenous fashion and textile design. It is a unique opportunity for over 1,500 artists from more than 70 Indigenous owned Art Centres to showcase
Insider’s Venice
The crowds in Venice are almost as famous as the gondolas. At the cruise port, in the height on the summer season, as many as five large ships can arrive in a day, bringing with them up to 20,000 fun-seeking day-trippers. An equal number can arrive by coach, arriving at the island car-park of Tronchetto and winding their way up the Grand Canal to St Mark’s. The itinerary of these day-trippers is
Ikara Flinders Ranges
The Flinders Ranges, as they are today, are the mere stubs of once majestic mountains, which hundreds of millions of years ago would have rivalled the Andes or the Himalayas. The original sediments were laid down over half a billion years ago before uplift, folding and faulting formed a massive mountainous range, followed by the weathering that has left us with the current landform
Abruzzo
In an era of mass tourism with Italy amongst the world’s most popular destinations, it can come as a surprise to find that there are still entire regions in the country which are virtually unknown to the international traveller. But such is the case with the region of Abruzzo, nestling in the centre of the peninsular to the east of Rome. I first came to Italy in 1980 with the usual expectations of a place
Tresco Abbey Gardens
This 19th-century garden is immersed in history and yet has a botanic twist, holding more than 20,000 plants from over 80 countries. Tresco, one of the Scilly Isles, lies 28 miles off the Cornish coast of England. A subtropical island, blessed with white sand and turquoise sea, it is home to just 150 people. Thanks to the Gulf Stream, the climate is unique in the UK and makes it possible to grow rare and exotic species
Unveiling the Enigma
Nestled in the heart of Italy, the Etruscans created Italy’s most fascinating and enigmatic culture prior to the emergence of Rome. Flourishing from the 9th down to the 3rd century BCE, they played a pivotal role in mediating the arrival of Greek and Eastern Mediterranean influence in the Italian peninsular and it was, above all, to them that the Romans looked in the early stages of their emergence as a
Sisters of India
All Academy Travel tours are special. Yet the ‘Fabric of India’ tour in December 2022 has a postscript that makes it even more special… Led by Judy Tenzing, just under one year ago, we took a group of textile-mad women, and one very patient gentleman, to the far reaches of Bengal and Gujarat in the north-east and north-west of India respectively. There were workshops in indigo dyeing, block-printing
The Alhambra of Granada
Granada is southern Spain’s precious jewel, and for much of the Middle Ages it dangled – like the glowing pomegranate for which it is named – temptingly before the eyes of the Christian conquistadors, who hoped to recapture it from the Muslim dynasties that ruled the city from 711. While the Almohads, who reigned until 1228, were known for their orthodoxy and sometimes repressive regime, the Nasrids
Highlights of Chianti
Stretching between Florence and Siena, nestled in the heart of Tuscany, is the romantic Chianti region – well known for its rolling green hills dotted with vineyards, terra-cotta-roofed towns and wine-soaked dinners. And while the copious amounts of red wine are well worth the visit, there is plenty more on offer for the cultural traveller amid Chianti’s winding roads and rolling hills.
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