Archive for the ‘Products’ Category
Products
Eco-Tuscany: Fresh milk from the cow to your table
Environment, Products
Got Milk? / Flickr photo by cwalker71
Up to the late ’80s, the village had a milk shop. A lady would sell you fresh milk delivered to the shop that very morning by local producers. You had to bring your own bottle. Over time, the milk shops closed, fresh milk was sold in milk cartons, and long-life milk became more and more popular. I always use it, but it’s nothing like the milk I used to drink when I was a kid.
The good news is that the “latteria“ is coming back…
Continue reading this article @ At Home in Tuscany
February 28, 2010
Post Office Travel Money Cards. Any good?
Opinions, Products
Post Office Travel Money Card
It’s not everyday you get asked to test out a product so the opportunity to explore this new offering from the Post Office was quite a pleasant surprise.
The Post Office is often the place i’ll go to change money before a trip away, because it’s convenient and because there’s no commission taken from the exchange. Trying out their new Travel Money Card is something that I would probably have got around to eventually but being incentivised to write about the experience here by the Post Office certainly sped up my interest in it.
The idea is that you preload the card with currency and use it whilst you’re abroad instead of your bank account. It’s good for ATM withdrawals, in-store payment, all the tasks that a regular VISA Electron card can manage. I picked mine up from the Post Office, loaded it up with some US dollars, activated the card over the phone the next day and I was ready to go. The card does deduct a fee for withdrawing money from ATMs but using the card in-store to pay for items is free, this is how I decided to use it. It was on my recent trip to Miami that I gave the card a try and it worked perfectly. It was only declined once in a supermarket, the rest of the time it was fine. I brought my card home with some dollars still on it but they will sit on there happily until my next sojourn. If you do run out whilst you’re away it is possible to top-up over the phone.
On my last big period of travel I carried a Nationwide Debit card which allowed me to withdraw money from ATMs around the world with no charge. This has since changed slightly and there is now a small fee involved, a fee that Nationwide previously absorbed but decided they could no longer afford. This makes the Travel Money Card a great option for carrying money abroad from my experience, I’ll be using it again.
October 7, 2009
The Wine Barrel Making Process – From Forest To Finished Product
Adventures, Environment, Products
At the Cooperage / Photo by Dan Petroski
I could easily write to you about the barrel making process, “once upon a time, in a forest far, far away…” however, that would be boring. I have created a photo slideshow that takes you through the barrel making process. This is a snapshot of the forest, the selection of wood, work in the saw mill and cooperage from forest to finished product.
The making of a wine barrel can take up to 180 years. The trees of the French forests Nevers, Allier, Troncais, Vosges, Bertranges etc. although 70% privately owned, are all under the watchful eye of a government agency to protect and preserve the natural habitat and safeguard the industry. Oak trees which the Agency deems suitable by age and quality are harvested once a year, after October auctions. The age of the trees can be no less than 50 years and at their peak 180 years old. The Agency releases an auction catalog broken down into parcels from each particular forest. The good coopers send their top arborists out to inspect the quality of the wood and estimate their bidding prices. Each parcel of forest comes to market every ten years or so and once the auction is completed, winning bidders have until March to harvest the selected trees. Unlike grape farms with diverse soils and micro-climates, the quality and character of these forests remain pretty stable throughout.
When the trees are harvested, the wood is processed almost immediately. However, the preliminary staves will be seasoned in natural elements (air, wind, rain, snow) for 24 to 36 months. The photos that you will see are not one tree going from harvest to barrel room. The seasoning process along with the geography tends to be the determining factor to great barrel production. What you learn from tasting barrel samples in French caves (part-two of my trip) is that it is not the level of toast that the barrel has to offer, but the wood itself. Just like winemaking, great forests will produce great barrels. Enjoy the photos and let me know if you have any questions.
Note: these photos were taken with my camera phone; so, please don’t take offense to the quality.
Dan Petroski is Assistant Winemaker at Larkmead Vineyards in Napa Valley. Dan has an MBA from New York University and worked as an Ad Exec in New York for several years, before switching it up and trading his suit for a move out west.
March 25, 2009
Book Review: Three Cups Of Tea
Books, Products
Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson
For those of you who, like me, somehow missed this book when it first came out, here’s the scoop.
After a failed attempt to climb K2, Mortenson descends from the mountain ill and disoriented. He washes up in the village of Korphe in northern Pakistan, where villagers help him get better. He is grateful but isn’t sure how to thank them properly, until he sees village children holding their lessons outdoors because they have no school. He promises to come back and build one.
Continue reading this article @ Facing the Street
March 16, 2009
Interview: Hilary Bradt MBE, Creator Of Bradt Travel Guides
Books, Products
Hilary Bradt MBE
She’s written or co-written thirteen travel books, and is off to Cambodia next week, so we managed to catch her for a few minutes in between polishing her new MBE and packing for her next trip.
GTC: You’re famous for creating the Bradt range of travel guides. What first inspired you to travel, and then actually sit down and write about it?
It was probably an advantage that I didn’t go abroad until I was 16, and did my first overseas trip without my parents when I was 18. By that time I was mature enough to indulge my interests – art and natural history – and relish the adventure. So I wrote long letters home. The desire to share my experiences in this way led naturally to the first guidebook and numerous articles.
GTC: What do you think makes your style of guide so different from the mass market of other guides available (not mentioning any names!).
There are various factors: an emphasis on history, culture and wildlife, as well as the unusual destinations that we specialise in. Most of all, though, it is the freedom we give our authors to induldge their enthusiasms. Our books are not formulaic, which we believe leads to better writing and so a more enjoyable read (check them out at Bradt Guides).
Continue reading this interview @ Girls Travel Club
February 24, 2009
Does Google Latitude Take Local Knowledge Too Far?
Products, Social, Technology, networks
Google Latitude screenshot
The other day I was having a bar-room chat about coincidental run-ins. I mean those times when you randomly bump into someone on the other side of the world, or someone you haven’t seen for many years. I’ve had a fair few of these and they never fail to blow my mind.
“And for all the people that you do run into,” I said to my drinking buddy, “imagine all those you just miss. If you’d been five minutes earlier, you would have walked straight into an old colleague. Or we could be sitting here in this bar and one of our long-lost university friends could be having a drink three doors down.”
Continue reading this article @ Going Local
February 11, 2009
Moleskine City Notebooks
Products
Photo: We use Moleskine Notebooks everyday
Next time you take a city break make sure you get hold of the appropriate Moleskine City Notebook and start to build your own personal handwritten guide and scrapbook. On subsequent visits your family or friends will be able to return to the places you enjoyed, make new entries in your notebook and continue to build a very unique view of the city. The personal value of your Moleskine will undoubtedly increase over time.
Each hardback City Notebook (9 x 14cm) is complete with 36 pages of relevant urban maps and contains adhesive sheets of tracing paper so that you can annotate and draw on routes taken and places visited. There’s a street directory, 76 blank pages, 96 tabbed pages for keeping details of places to stay/eat, shops and attractions.
January 13, 2009
World Nomads: Insurance Doesn’t Need To Be Boring
Products, Projects, World Nomads
Shopping around for travel insurance has always been one of the more boring elements of organising a trip away, and with so many companies offering similar policies it can be a real nightmare deciding what you need. The Guardian wrote a helpful article in 2006 – Consumer test: travel insurance. Their best buy then was Preferential’s Worldtrekker policy. Earlier this year I looked at Endsleigh’s Backpacker Plus policy and World Nomads policy for my six month trip, both of which provided good cover including the occasional adventure activity. In the end I went with World Nomads, and although I didn’t need to make a claim I consider their service probably the best in its field. From the instant you arrive on their website it’s clear that World Nomads know a lot about travel. The policies are straight forward, easy to read, common questions are clearly answered, and more importantly the coverage is designed for adventurous travellers. You can buy online, make a claim online and extend your policy online. World Nomads know their customers and have pitched their product in a very accessible way that really makes it stand out.
World Nomads’ social responsibility program
When you take out a policy with World Nomads there is the option to contribute a couple of dollars to their social responsibility program ‘Footprints’. Micro donations collected in this way have now raised $500,000 from more than 180,000 transactions and funded 34 projects in 18 countries. Footprints does not run projects directly but raises funds on behalf of other organisations, charities and NGOs.
“The contributions, while often small, are growing and today we have a 90% ’strike rate’ from World Nomads customers,”
- Christy McCarthy, World Nomads Community Relations Manager
The Footrints program has been so successful in raising funds that World Nomads have now created the Footprints network and released an API to allow other e-commerce companies to collect micro-donations.
Be inspired
A series of Positive Footprint documentaries follow groups of travellers who have chosen to go and work on some of these community development projects. What makes someone want to do that on their holiday? What effect does it have on someone who chooses to make a difference when they travel? Is it over-rated and does the community they visit want them there, or care they’ve travelled across the world to help? These are some of the questions that Chris Noble, General manager of World Nomads had and he decided to shoot a documentary following these people and seeing what community project travel or ‘voluntourism’ is all about.
“We shot a pilot ‘Positive Footprints – Nepal’ and managed to get it onto over 15 International Airlines such as Qantas, American , Virgin, Thai. We then had the good fortune of meeting a distributor who’d seen the documentary and wanted to pitch it. So like a scene from a Guy Ritchie film, plane takes off, lands in Cannes, quick handshake, back to Australia…. and Nat Geo Adventure want a series !”
- Chris Noble, World Nomads General Manager
Futher Information:
December 2, 2008
6 Books That Teach Some Of Life’s Lessons
Books, Featured, Personal, Products
Enlightenment / Photo by Stephen Chapman
One of the reasons I favour independent travel over travelling with a group, or as part of a pre-arranged tour is that personal and spiritual growth both have room to occur without conciously being sought. Having unstructured time on your hands affords you the freedom to move on a whim, to spare a thought for happiness and to philosophise about your life. Untying ourselves from the restraints of conventional routine that hold us prisoner to ourselves in our daily lives requires us to dig deep within ourselves for confidence and wisdom. Independent travel is an opportunity for growth and by its very nature feeds the soul with new experiences, new thoughts, and new attitudes that eat away at the tight grip we once thought we had on the world, expanding our understanding of existence.
This list may once have seemed like a bunch of new-age books of no practical use, substance or interest to you, but may in fact contain the inspiration necessary to awaken your soul and get you out into the world in a way you’ve been dreaming about for far too long. Allow these six books to connect with your inner self and add their messages to your curriculum of life’s lessons.
- Jonathan Livingstone Seagul by Richard Bach – A story for people who follow their dreams and make their own rules. Through the metaphor of flight, Jonathan’s story shows us that if we follow our dreams we too can soar.
- The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield – A story of adventure and discovery that draws on the ancient wisdom found in a Peruvian manuscript.
- The Art of Travel by Alain de Botton – Stop asking where should we go? What should we see? and start asking yourself why do we travel and how can we become more fulfilled by doing so? These questions are addressed here with the help of a selection of writers, artists and thinkers.
- Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho – An odyssey of self-discovery for a young Brazilian girl who ends up working as a prostitute in Geneva. The book is a sensitive exploration of the sacred nature of sex and love and invites us to confront our own prejudices and demons.
- Zen and The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenence by Robert M. Pirsig – Based on actual occurrences and celebrated internationally for its enlightening effect on the mind. The author embarks on a 17-day motorcycle adventure across the U.S.A. with his son Chris exploring various elements of philosophy along the way.
- Watching The Tree by Adeline Yen Mah – A personal interpretation of Chinese wisdom and beliefs that shows us how those in the west can benefit from the teachings of the east.
November 5, 2008
Beer On The Hogs Back
Products
Photo: The Shop / Photo Hog's Back Brewery
For centuries the area around Farnham, Surrey led the brewing of British beer and produced the finest hops in all the land. By the 1700s hop growing together with the malting of barley had become a major local industry that greatly increased the prosperity of the town.
Evidence of this once great industry can be seen today in the remnants of old kilns, and malthouses dotted around the area. The Kiln in Badshot Lea, Hewett’s Kilns in Runfold is now The Packhouse Antiques centre. The Farnham Maltings are now an arts and community centre where the annual Farnham Beer festival is held in late April.
In 1992 the opening of a small independent, The Hog’s Back Brewery in Tongham near Farnham brought beer brewing back to the region, and with award winning products like Traditional English Ale (T.E.A.) it has definately made a name for itself declaring itself here to stay.
“The brewery is now producing in excess of 140 barrels per week of beer with all sorts of names, somehow the names reflect the enthusiasm of the proprietors. Among the many there are Santa’s Wobble, Still Wobbling, Wobble in a Bottle, Rip Snorter.”
The brewery was established in some 16th century farm buildings located in the village of Tongham, Surrey – between Farnham & Guildford just off the A31 ‘Hogs Back’ road – and is open to the public for Brewery Tours on Wednesday, Thursday, & Friday Evenings, and during the day on Saturdays and Sundays. Tours include generous sampling & a souvenir glass but must be booked and paid for in advance due to their popularity.
Do you have a similarly fantastic product produced nearby?
Read about how Make Travel Fair Writer Nick Weston made his own homebrew for £30 »
October 30, 2008
