Oceania

Travel through Oceania by country:

Australia, Indonesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, New Zealand, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu

Travel through Oceania by popular city:

Auckland, Canberra, Melbourne, Perth, Sydney, Wellington

Travel through Oceania by popular things to do:

Cook Islands, Sydney Opera House

Travel through Oceania with our writers:

In the Corner of the World, Work and Play in Queensland

Worldmapper

by Erik Olsen on

A very cool use of technology, geography and demographics can be found over at the site Worldmapper. They have developed a really amazing algorithm that allows you to see the world and the various sizes of the country therein, through various statistics. Countries look skinny or fat according to their share of wealth or trade or population or education or whatever gets plugged in, but they maintain their familiar boundaries and shapes. Some of the results make the countries look silly (i.e. a Chile-shaped USA), but they are scientifically precise.

For example, the map here shows the break down for tourism. Now this is fascinating, right? It seems that Western Europe is the most popular destination for international tourists, receiving 46% of world tourist trips, while on the other end 0.1% of world tourist trips are made to Central African territories. Hmmm, I guess that’s not too surprising, though. More interesting perhaps is the map here that shows countries that receive more international tourist visits than international visits are made by their residents. Anyway, that’s just a sampling. There are a lot more fascinating maps to see at the site.

Worldmapper was created by geographers from the University of Sheffield’s Social and Spatial Inequalities Research Group (There’s an innovative college major!) and by Mark Newman, a physicist at the University of Michigan. Really neat.

The Most Romantic Places on Earth

by Willy Volk on

Of course, Valentine’s Day is largely about romance. In my opinion, the most romantic place I’ve ever been was on top of Table Mountain. After riding the aerial cableway car to the top, my wife and I found a secluded spot, whipped out a bottle of South African wine, and watched the sun set. It was beautiful. However, many people might not think of a mountaintop as particularly romantic. To that end, here are some other places that might be more “classically” romantic:

  1. The Samode Palace in amber-soaked Rajasthan, India.
  2. Chaa Creek’s Treetop Suites high above Belize.
  3. Mfuwe Lodge’s chalets, overlooking animal-packed South Luangwa Park.
  4. Bavaria’s Schloss Neuschwanstein, nestled among so many mountains.
  5. Chile’s Hacienda Los Lingues is for the horse lovers.
  6. California’s Muir Woods, which conservationist John Muir claimed was “best tree-lovers monument that could possibly be found in all the forests of the world.”
  7. The Daintree Cape Tribulation coast is where the Great Barrier Reef and the Daintree rainforest meet, and the only place on earth where two World Heritage areas exist side by side.
  8. Zanzibar’s gently-sloping Paradise Beaches.
  9. The Sheraton Moorea is guaranteed to make you melt.

What should we list as #10?

Valentine’s Idea: Chocolate Tours

by Willy Volk on

What better way to celebrate this sweet occasion than by stuffing your face with the sweetest sweet on earth — chocolate!

  • Every Saturday, Boston’s Chocolate Tour takes guests on a trolley ride through Boston’s finest culinary landmarks. Of course, guests enjoy a sumptuous array of decadent chocolate desserts from the city’s best chefs, and are treated to the history, myths, trivia, and legends surrounding chocolate.
  • Chocoholic Tours has a variety of options for sampling Melbourne, Australia’s rich history and stunning chocolate. Bonus: since the tours are walking tours, you can burn off calories as you consume them!
  • Join culinary guide/pastry chef David Lebovitz, author of The Great Book of Chocolate, for a chocolate-y exploration in Paris. An expert on the chocolate shops and bakeries of the City of Lights, David treats guests to a memorable tour featuring the best of what France has to offer. Private tours are also available.
  • Chicago Chocolate Tours provides guided walking and tasting tours of some of Chicago’s finest chocolatiers. What’s more, they even have a special Valentine’s Package.
  • London’s Chocolate Ecstasy Tours offers 4-hour long tours (guided by a Chocolate Ecstasy Chocoholic Guide), through London’s side streets and alleys. Participants sample chocolates, enjoy chocoholic chats, take a lavish hot chocolate break, enjoy special prices on the ultimate chocolate luxuries, and receive a goody bag!
  • One day isn’t enough for your chocolate-loving mouth? InTrend offers 7-day Escorted Tours for real chocolate lovers! Spend a week in Brussels participating in chocolate-making demonstrations at chocolate factories, and sample chocolate desserts after sumptuous meals.
  • Looking for a more affordable option? San Fransisco’s Sharffen Berger requires a reservation but offers free walking tours through its factory.

Chocolate tours sound like my kind of holiday celebration. Yum!

Word for the Travel Wise (02/03/07)

by Adrienne Wilson on

When temperatures start to climb too high and the ocean breeze off the island isn’t cutting it try asking for one of these to cool you down…

Today’s word is a Tahitian (Maohi) word used in Tahiti:

pia – beer

Tahitian is one of the two official languages of French Polynesia with the other being French. There are approximately 120,000 speakers through the Polynesian Islands. Head to Wikipedia for the background details as always. After you’ve gotten your history fix go to the tourism site for a small useful list of words to help get you by on the islands. Tahiti Explorer looks like it has the small list of words with a few more added on and a nifty pronunciation guide. The same thing goes for the list of words on the Tahiti Traveler without the pronunciation guide, so it’s really up to you to take your pick. Lonely Planet has a guide which probably has the same amount of words in the back of the glossary. Still – better to know a few than none at all.

Past Tahitian words: tamaaraa, pape, niuniu paraparau

Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateapokaiwhenuakitanatahu

by Justin Glow on

No, I didn’t smash my face against the keyboard — the title of this post is actually the shortened name of a hill in New Zealand, and what the Guinness Book of World Records calls the longest place name in the world, clocking in at a full 92 letters. For the sake of formatting, I’m going to refer to it as Frank from now on, OK? Frank the hill. Great.

According to Wikipedia, Frank translates to, “The brow [or summit] of the hill [or place], where Tamatea, the man with the big knees, who slid [down], climbed [up] and swallowed mountains, [to travel the land], [who is] known as the land eater, played [on] his [nose] flute to his loved one.” Just check out how long the caterpillar-like sign is:

If you’d like to visit Frank, you’ll have to travel to the southern coast of the North Island of New Zealand. Don’t get your hopes up, though. “There is nothing [there], just a sign to mark the place,” notes one traveler. Sounds like fun.