Results matching “galapagos” from Intelligent Travel Blog

Our friends down the hall at National Geographic Expeditions are offering a free webinar next week on the Galápagos Islands, and are inviting Intelligent Travel readers to join them online on October 20, 2009, from 8-9 p.m. EDT. Full details from the Expeditions crew follow below.

The Galápagos Islands are home to a fascinating array of unique wildlife. Frigate birds puff out their scarlet pouches, 100-year-old giant tortoises lumber through the grasses, and brilliant Sally light-foot crabs scamper across dramatic rocks covered with sunning marine iguanas. Incredibly, these fantastic creatures have no instinctive fear of humans.

National Geographic Expeditions and Lindblad Expeditions have been exploring the Galápagos together for years. Now we invite you to join National Geographic marine biologist Mike Heithaus and veteran expedition leader Carlos Romero on a virtual trip to this magical place. During our upcoming webinar, you'll get a taste of the islands and their wonders--and what makes our expeditions there so special. You'll take a stroll through our ships, meet our naturalists, and learn why our Galápagos trip is a truly spectacular adventure.

When you sign up for the webinar (it's free), you'll be able to email questions  to the Expeditions staff in advance, and any questions that they don't have time to answer during the webinar, they will call you up and answer on the spot. If you'd like to read about this 10-day voyage about the National Geographic Endeavor or Islander, (that's right, we have our own navy), check the Expeditions website here.

Photo: National Geographic Expeditions

Plant a tree in the rainforest. Provide clean water for a river community. Deliver school supplies to an Amazonian school. By traveling with International Expeditions, not only will you experience the rich cultural and biological diversity of the world, but your trip will also help ensure that future generations can experience it, too.

IE, a world leader in nature travel and Amazon conservation programming, offers trips to awe-inspiring locales including the Amazon, the Galapagos, Antarctica, Belize, India, Kenya and South Africa.

The efforts by IE and its travelers take the term "voluntourism" to a new level, demonstrating just what it means to see the world and save it, too. Led by local naturalists and historians, their goal is to cultivate a greater appreciation and understanding of the earth's natural wonders as well as the welfare of the local people and communities within them.

To learn more, I caught up with Maggie Hart, President of International Expeditions, to discuss the program, its conservation efforts and ways that travelers can get involved. See full interview after the jump.

Talk about a cause to celebrate! It's been 200 years since naturalist Charles Darwin's birth and 150 years since his pioneering publication On the Origin of Species first rocked the scientific world.  In honor of the milestone occasion, the University of Cambridge, where Darwin was a student, is hosting a festival this week through July 10 as part of a yearlong series of events marking the university's 800th anniversary.

Over 100 scientists, writers, artists and performers will commemorate Darwin's work at more than 40 events around Cambridge. Speakers and performers include Sir David Attenborough, Ian McEwan, Professor Richard Dawkins, Sir Terry Pratchett, Richard Leaky, and Harold Varmus among many others.

If you're not a scientist or your level of evolutionary expertise consists of that one high school biology course you took eons ago, don't fear. The wide range of events caters to all interests, from scientific debates to art exhibitions to stand-up comedy. Street-side performances include interpretations of the evolution of juggling, music, and voice, while the evening Fringe Festival features plays, comedy shows, and film screenings.

"Nowhere else this year will you find such breadth of expertise gathered in one place, at one time, to discuss and celebrate Darwin's work," Darwin Festival director Mirand Gomperts said. "The Festival is a key event in the University of Cambridge's 800th anniversary year. We hope that as many people as possible will enjoy this unique opportunity and discover how Darwin's ideas can help us tackle the challenges we will face in the future."

• Kangaroos in London? Australia's Kangaroo Island was promoting a free trip to the "Galapagos of Australia" by placing 20 kangaroo statues around London. Check out the photo gallery of all of the kangaroos here. Also, be sure to check out the site's RooTube, where you can watch kangaroos in their natural habitat.
  
  
• German scientists have discovered what they believe to be the world's oldest musical instruments. Three flutes--dating back some 35,000 years--were found in Germany's Hohle Fels cavern.
  
  
• Taking a leap of faith? Look no further than Brave New Traveler's photo essay on the 12 Most Spectacular Houses of Worship.

Photo: Roocatcher

• North Cascades National Park is adding four vintage buses to its fleet. The buses are replicas of the ones that toured the Stehekin Valley in the early 20th century.
  
  
• What ever happened to that architectural wonder? Infrastructurist has a cool photo essay of 11 train stations that were torn down and replaced.
  
  
• Geographic Expeditions is offering special discounted fares (like saving $1,700 on a trip in Rajasthan) on its trips to Bhutan, Kilimanjaro, the Galapagos, India, Laos, Vietnam, China, and Turkey. Check them out here.
  
  
• Patagonia and Texas Tourism have teamed up to give away two trips to the Rio Grande Valley and Big Bend National Park. Check the Patagonia website for details about the sweepstakes.
  

Photo: North Cascades National Park

Traveler and Photo District News are currently hosting our annual World in Focus Photo Contest, and this year we're letting readers preview the submissions and vote on their favorites. Each week, we'll feature ten entries on the Traveler website. Here's one of of the featured shots from this week:

We kind of wish were were standing in the sun, taking a photo of an iguana sunbathing in the Galapagos right now. But this picture is by Louise Marie Holst, and she's got a chance to win great trips, cameras, and other gear in our contest. Enter now for your own shot at getting the goods.

"Timis County shares its name with a tributary of the Danube and is located in the western part of which European country?"

Answer: Romania.

That's the question 13-year-old Eric Yang had to answer to win the 21st Annual National Geographic Bee, which took place today. The Texan took home a $25,000 scholarship, a trip to the Galapagos with Alex Trebek, and a lifetime membership to the National Geographic Society.

Think you're smarter than this 7th grader? Test your geography knowledge with Geo Bee questions, and brush up on other travel facts with National Geographic Traveler's WorldWise quizzes.

Congratulations, Eric!

Photo: Laura Panduru via the Intelligent Travel Flickr pool

• Orbitz has joined the fight to get the U.S. government to overturn travel restrictions to Cuba. The online travel site launched a web campaign where people can sign a petition to end the 50-year travel ban.
  
  
• Air New Zealand's got a new ad campaign. The playful commercial--which features staffers wearing nothing but body paint--focuses on the fact that the airline's "fares have nothing to hide." Check out Jaunted for a behind-the-scenes look at the filming of the commercial, and see the actual commercial here. (Don't worry. It's rated PG.)
  
  
• Destination: America. Check out DiscoverAmerica.com, the "official tourism site for the U.S.," for travel information, interactive maps, activity finders, and travel booking to all 50 states. The new site, targeted at "U.S. leisure travelers who have not pinpointed 'where to go' or 'when to travel' or 'what to do'."
  
  
• Tweet your way to free tickets. In honor of National Travel and Tourism Week (through May 17), budget carrier Southwest Airlines is sponsoring a Twitter photo hunt. Folks who tweet themed photos to Southwest have the chance to win two round-trip tickets and two nights at an MGM property in Vegas.
  
  
• In order to preserve the fragile ecosystem of the Galapagos, Ecuador aims to eliminate the use of fossil fuels by 2015.

Photo: Patrick Barry Barr via the Intelligent Travel Flickr pool

Senior editor Norie Quintos, who edits the annual Tours of a Lifetime special issue currently out on newsstands, talks to Jim Sano, president of San Francisco-based Geographic Expeditions, one of the oldest and most trusted guided tour operators in the country (NOTE: not associated with National Geographic Expeditions), about where the industry is headed and the role travel plays in making the world a better place.

How are current economic conditions changing guided travel?

I don't have a crystal ball, but I can say we have weathered many storms. This one may be more significant than 9/11, SARS, and the Gulf War because it is so global and pervasive up and down the economic ladder, affecting the highest end travelers as well as value travelers.

Are you making changes in your programs?

Yes. We're moving towards shorter and shorter holidays. This has actually been a trend over last few years, but for many people in the current climate, the degree of comfort to which they feel they can be away from home, as well as finding the time, has been foreshortened.

Where are people traveling?

We've seen our South American offerings, including the Galapagos, go up from last year.

I know you are planning programs several years out. What are the new destinations of the future?

Cuba is one of the countries on our radar screen. We have done educational trips to Cuba in the past, but there is a pent-up demand and we're doing legwork on that now and will be ready when conditions change. We're also looking at the west coast of Africa as an area yet to be explored; it is very rich culturally.

Your company's roots are in long adventure treks in Asia. But I've noticed your catalog has diversified and is offering fewer hard-core treks.

Whereas before 80 percent of what we offered in the '70s and '80s was trekking, now it's just under 20 percent. That's true for many other companies that started at the same time. The degree to which people want to do the harder treks has lessened dramatically. The people who used to trek now want to do something softer. They may want to hike during the day, but then they want a hot shower and glass of wine. We've adapted by offering both. There's an upcoming trip we're doing with Peter Hillary (son of Everest climber Edmund Hillary), going to South Georgia Island to retrace Shackleton's trek across the island. Part of group will be crossing with Peter; it's difficult glacier travel. But a majority of the group will stay on the vessel. Of the 80 to 100 passengers, we may get 20 who want to do the crossing. But the others still want the opportunity to rub shoulders and learn from Peter Hillary and top-notch mountaineers.

Giovanna Palatucci gets the scoop on National Geographic's study abroad opportunities for high school students.

Students "On Assignment" with National Geographic Student Expeditions

Ford Cochran first ventured to Iceland while on assignment for National Geographic Television; he filmed the ice cliffs and caves created by a 1996 volcanic eruption that had melted hundreds of feet through the ice. Today, Ford is heading back to Iceland, this time to share his experiences with high school students as part of National Geographic Student Expeditions program.

National Geographic Student Expeditions is an educational adventure program providing high school students the opportunity to explore various communities around the globe and across the US under the guidance of experts like Ford and other NG writers, photographers, and scientists.

"Students, particularly young ones, are open to learning new things and seeing the world in new ways. There's little that excites me more than visiting an extraordinary place for the first time--and being able to share that experience with others is thrilling. For teens today, there's also genuine urgency to caring for this amazing planet we share," said Ford.

• I'll take Galapagos for $200, Alex. Twenty-five Jeopardy! fans have the chance to win a ten-day trip to the Galapagos Islands with host Alex Trebek.
  
  
• Happy Birthday to You! This week the National Zoo celebrated the birth of two clouded leopards, an endangered species that is usually killed by its mother upon giving birth.
  
  
• In Estonia, please remember to feed your children to the crocodiles.
  
  
• The one-and-a-half-mile canal linking Liverpool's South Docks to the Leeds & Liverpool Canal was officially opened Wednesday. The canal (which connects the city to the U.K.'s 2,200-mile canal system) is expected to bring an additional 200,000 visitors to the docks each year.
  
  
• Beginning July 22, Icelandair will fly from Seattle to Reykjavik. This is the airline's first U.S. West Coast route. Prices will start at $822.

Photo: Jeopardy!

IT Contributor Andrew Evans offers an all-inclusive guide to all things penguin.

Penguins are never passé. Be they marching or tapping their happy feet toward another sequel, the little black and white birds are still very much in everybody's minds and hearts. I also imagine that kids who play with plastic penguins in their Happy Meals grow up to be bigger kids who want to see the birds in real life, in the wild.

Admittedly, live penguins are so astonishingly cool--the way they tilt their heads from side to side to get a good look at you, the strange braying chorus they sing, and that distinctive penguin smell that's part fishy dishwasher detergent and part dusty, old attic. Travelers often bemoan the fact that penguin Grand Central is in almost-inaccessible Antarctica, a destination better suited for scientists, explorers, and millionaires. Still, that doesn't mean you have to cross wild penguins off your wish list. The southern hemisphere is filled with alternatives for seeing wild penguins in their natural habitats.

The following locations offer options for safe and sustainable human interaction with wild penguins:

1.    Isla Magdalena, Chile: This lone clump of rocks in the Strait of Magellan is home to over 50,000 breeding pairs of adorable Magellanic penguins. After a one-hour ferry ride from the city of Punta Arenas, the boat drops you off for a good 90-minute visit with the birds. A marked path guides you safely through the penguin nests and up to the island's lighthouse for a remarkable view. (Insider's tip: in case you're tempted to use your hands to climb up those giant mountains of yellow 'dirt' for a better view, don't. That isn't dirt.)

2.    Galápagos Islands, Ecuador: The Galápagos penguin is the world's northernmost penguin species. They live right on the equator, but look and act a lot like the penguins from colder climes. The best viewing spots are on Isabela island (the largest in the archipelago) and the west coast of Fernandina island.

3.    Boulders Beach, Simon's Town, South Africa: Gigantic granite boulders and tropical-looking turquoise inlets are the exotic home for the African or jackass penguin. A system of raised wooden walkways leads you right into the heart of penguin territory, including the penguins' own sandy beach. Afterwards, enjoy a swim at the people's beach next door.

Today at lunch, we got a sneak peek of "Darwin's Secret Notebooks," a new program airing next week on the National Geographic Channel. Upon arriving back at my desk, I emailed the TV crew for a clip, so here's a snippet to whet your appetite for all things evolutionary.

The show is part of the celebration of the bicentennial of Charles Darwin's birth (fun fact: did you know that he and Abraham Lincoln were born on the very same day?) and traces the path of the Beagle and how his theory of evolution developed through his travels. Contrary to popular belief, it was not actually the finches on the Galapagos that got Darwin excited, but a handful of mockingbirds that intrigued him (the finches came later).  And did you know that of the five years that the ship sailed, the crew only spent a total of five weeks on the islands?

This segment of the program features the Patagonian region of South America where the crew of the Beagle spent the majority of their time, and where Darwin first began to arrive at his theories.

You can catch the entire show on Tuesday, February 10 at 9P et/pt.

Read more: National Geographic magazine has two articles on Darwin in the February issue, as well as this tricky Darwin trivia quiz.

Video: The National Geographic Channel

Poor Australia. Our family had just spent the most magnificent month in New Zealand, and none of us wanted to leave. I had anticipated this might be the case after hearing nothing but rave reviews from people who had been there. But our around-the-world ticket dictated that we had to board a plane for a short 3 1/2 hour flight from Christchurch to Brisbane. So we set off knowing that Australia would have its work cut out to match the experience we had just had.

Upon arrival, we found ourselves in anything but a Christmas atmosphere with just a little over two weeks to go before the big day. Having relatives in southern Florida, we've spent late December in warm weather before, but this was different. Instead of houses draped in flashing lights and lawns adorned with holiday displays, the kids stared bewildered at caricatures of Santa riding a surfboard and signs in store windows offering "Beginning of Summer Sales." This just didn't compute properly to a nine- and eleven-year-old, but the 85-degree temperatures and sunny weather quickly helped make sense of the situation and got us all excited to start exploring Australia wholeheartedly.

The itinerary for our time Down Under had been pretty well mapped out before we arrived, in large part from the recommendations of the national and local tourist boards. Our plans included quite a few stops to view native wildlife and take in the country's fabulous scenery. New Zealand had set the bar pretty high in this category and anyone who's traveled extensively knows it's easy to get caught up in comparing experiences and rating different places for things like food, hotels, and in this case, natural beauty. You find this on the cover of travel magazines all the time ("Top 50 Places Rated"). So when we arrived at O'Reilly's Rainforest Retreat in the heart of Queensland's World Heritage Lamington National Park, I didn't expect to find anything different or overwhelming that could top what we'd seen in New Zealand.  To my pleasant surprise, it wasn't just what we saw that impressed us (the sunset over the Green Mountains was an all-time classic), it's what we heard.

Gear up your summer travel plans with Traveler's newest issue, now on newsstands. In the cover feature, "Real Rome," Mimi Murphy sums up the city in her opening paragraph. "If all the world is a stage," she writes, "Romans are the players who strut their stuff with uncommon elegance, breezy sophistication, and impeccable style. After all, there is an art to driving a Vespa in stiletto heels." Explore the city with Rome resident Murphy and her local experts, finding the best in nightlife, dining, hotels, attractions, and shopping. And you can get a glimpse of some of the highlights from the city from our Rome Photo Gallery.

Are the Falklands the next Galapagos? The 778 Islands 300 miles off the coast of Argentina are host to a multitude of fauna, and Rolf Potts visits with many of them. In "My Own Private Falklands," he discovers the difference between sheep that are "woolies" and "clippies," (hint: it has to do with whether they've been shorn) and hangs out with rockhoppers, the "hipster punk rockers of the penguin world."

And contributing editor Andrew Nelson takes to the streets of Santa Barbara to explore the city's "Funk Zone," an eclectic mix of artisanal bakeries, contemporary furniture, koi ponds, and skate parks. Check out our Santa Barbara Photo Gallery for a glimpse of the city. 

Subscribe to this blog's feed

 

Rainer, Carol, Tyler (in the blue shirt) and Stefan (in the green shirt).

In one month, National Geographic Kids Vice President and Publisher Rainer Jenss will embark on the trip of a lifetime. He's selling his house and setting off for a year-long, round-the-world journey with his wife and two sons, and he'll be blogging about his trip for Traveler the entire time. We asked him to offer up a bit in the way of an introduction, and to explain his reasons for leaving his current life in New York to travel the world.

It’s four weeks away from the day my wife Carol and I have been planning and fantasizing about for the last four years. The day we officially act on the most wonderful, life-changing, crazy, outrageous, and most of all, natural idea we’ve ever had: to travel around the world with our two boys, Tyler (11), and Stefan (8).

Over the next year and 50,000+ mile journey, we will all be contributing bi-weekly postings to Intelligent Travel. As such, I set out to address two of the more common questions that people like Keith Bellows, Traveler's editor-in-chief, ask us all the time: Why we are doing this and what do we hope to gain from it? I was immediately struck by a word I came across in Global Traveler magazine just the other day, a term which they've trademarked:

Globility /glo bility/ n: The quality of being open to a world of cultures and experiences.

I wonder if this is even a real word?  It doesn’t matter. Its definition alone makes it something I wanted to adopt for this trip, and in a word, provides the core of an answer that is this complex and multi-dimensional. To understand this further, we need to go back a few years.

Climb to the top of an ancient fort in Rajasthan. Snorkel with sea lions in the Galapagos. Spend the night with a family who lives next to the Great Wall of China. Ride a zip line through the rain forest in Costa Rica. Sail to fishing villages in Mali. Learn to drum in Belize. Trek to bubbling mud pots in Iceland. Hone your photography skills with a National Geographic photographer in Granada. 

Sound tempting?  If you’re in high school (that's the catch), one of these adventures could be yours. National Geographic Expeditions, which is the travel outfitter for the National Geographic Society, has a long history of leading adventurous travelers to some of the world’s most fascinating destinations, and just this year they’ve teamed up with Putney Student Travel to offer trips for high-school students through National Geographic Student Expeditions. Only students completing grades 9 through 12 this year are eligible, and spaces are filling fast, due to a recent front-page article in the Washington Post travel section.

Each three-week expedition will have specific assignments (writing, photography, culture & arts, etc.) under the guidance of a National Geo expert, and takes advantage of our worldwide network of experts. "In Peru, for example, visit the lab of National Geographic grantee and archaeologist Guillermo Cock and hear an account of his ground-breaking discovery of thousands of Inca mummies. Get to know a Maasai elder in Tanzania, and climb a glacier with a local scientist in Iceland. In Beijing, meet with editors of the recently launched Chinese-language edition of National Geographic magazine.

Kangaroo Island, off the South Australia coast near Adelaide, is most famous for its fuzzy inhabitants (from kangaroos to seals to wallabies to koalas). But the island, with 1/3 of the land national or conservation park and roughly seven times the size of Singapore, is also known for being one of the last unspoiled refuges (often called "Australia's Galapagos"), with little commercial development and no large-scale hotels. But last week, that changed.

The Southern Ocean Lodge is the island's first luxury resort. The resort features 21 "eco-chic" suites and a spa with Australia-made Li'Tya products and Aboriginal-inspired treatments.

I'm relieved to know that the the Lodge is blending local culture and the natural landscape with its "luxury" tag, but for $900 (about US $825) per night per person, I'd rather stay at one of Kangaroo Island's local bed-and-breakfasts for a more authentic experience.

Is the Southern Ocean Lodge just the beginning in the over-development of Kangaroo Island? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Photo: Australian sea lion on Kangaroo Island; Stuart Reynolds via Flickr

Subscribe to this blog's feed

Friend of IT Roger Hamilton isn't afraid to dribble fruit juice down his chin in the name of research...

OK, it’s not one of tourism’s top ten. Still, Honduras’ Bay of Tela looked great in the aerial shot, a crescent-shaped tropical paradise anchored at both ends by national parks. But on the ground, I quickly tired of seeing dead and diseased coconut palms and hearing the roar of bulldozers carving out a sprawling golf and condo community. Land prices were soaring and squatters were laying claim to beach frontage even as the native Garinagu were happily selling their quaint communities out from under their feet.

So I turned my back on the beach, and a short taxi ride later, joined four workers and scientists eating dusky red passion fruit and spitting the seeds in a plastic pot.

Seed collecting not your taste? There’s more to the Lancetilla Botanical Garden than wiping passion-fruit juice off your chin. It’s the second largest collection of tropical plants in the world, with some 1,200 species. A botanist with the United Fruit Company started it in the 1920s with a collection of banana plants. From that humble start, the garden grew and grew, along with United's success in creating banana republics. Governments rose and fell, banana workers struck and rioted, but through all the commotion, the garden kept on photosynthesizing.

Check out the winner of National Geographic Traveler's first ever Mobile World photo contest!

While photographing the Ruby Mountains from her deck in Spring Creek, Nevada, Jodi Esplin snapped this photo of her dog Tango as he watched wistfully from behind a window. A self-described "serious amateur" photographer, Esplin has dabbled in photography for two years, taking a class from the local college and three online courses, as well as working as a part-time chemical engineer and the full-time mother of two boys. "I often shoot outside with the dog," said Esplin, explaining his watchfulness. "We have a couple of acres where he can wander, and we live in such a pretty area that I end up taking a lot of outdoor scenic and wildlife pictures."

This shot was taken with a Motorola RAZR cell phone, and Jodi won a ten day cruise through the Galapagos with National Geographic Expeditions for her pic. Check out the second and third place finishers here, and be sure to sign up for our current contest: The Great Outdoors, for a chance to win a trip to Hawaii. The extended deadline ends on March 30.

Photo: Jodi Esplin

We never like to hear about animal cruelty, but we were very distressed to hear about the mysterious death of 53 sea lions in the Galapagos Islands, as the BBC reported last Tuesday. The dead animals: 13 pups, 25 young sea lions, nine males, and six females, were all found with signs that they'd received a blow to the head, yet their bodies otherwise remained intact, leading the park officials to believe that poaching was not the motive. The BBC reported:

The animals were found in a state of decomposition on Pinta island, part of the archipelago which lies about 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) off the coast of Ecuador in the Pacific Ocean. The Galapagos sea lions have no natural predators on land and generally do not fear humans.

Sea lions are a vital part of the island's ecosystem, park official Victor Carrion told the Agence France-Presse news agency. At this time, no other dead animals have been found, and park officials have increased their patrols of the areas.

This news comes as another example of the islands' vulnerability, along with last year's announcement by the UN Environment, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) that the region was "in danger."

Senior editor Norie Quintos—currently hard at work on the annual  Tours of a Lifetime issue (May/June 2008)—is looking for deals.

You won’t find a lot of discounting in the boutique tour industry. (Mega cruise ships and large resorts have spoiled us into thinking you should never pay rack rate.) Outfitters are typically small and operate on extremely tight margins.  Nevertheless, one company recently found a win-win way to sell some distressed inventory. Vermont-based Boundless Journeys occasionally offers up spaces on upcoming tours to the highest bidder. Explains regional manager Karen Cleary,

Last year, we found ourselves in the position of having a cabin on a small Galapagos cruise suddenly come available due to a last-minute cancellation. We decided to send out a call for bids to our relatively small e-mail distribution list. We received several bids and the couple who got it ended up saving 25 percent off the regular price. In this industry that’s a pretty screaming deal.

Want to try it? Boundless has a few spots open right now on a 12-day trip to Bhutan departing April 15. The retail price is $3,995 per person. All offers must be submitted to info@boundlessjourneys.com by January 25. To get on the list for future “Make Us an Offer” trips, sign up for the company’s e-newsletter.

Perhaps you've been enjoying our new Global Eye feature on IT, but aren't ambitious enough to submit a photo. Well now we have a great incentive, and it's even easier to snap a shot. If you have an amazing cell phone photo, you could win a trip to the Galapagos by entering the National Geographic Traveler Mobile World Contest! You can register for the contest and learn how to upload your images easily online, plus see a gallery of entries already submitted.

The first due date was today, but we've extended deadline until November 30th! Vanna, tell them what they can win!

• Grand Prize: 10-night Galpágos tour for two aboard the luxurious yacht La Pinta. Sponsored by Geographic Expeditions.

• First Prize: 4-night San Francisco weekend for two at the Hotel Carlton, dinner at the Saha Restaurant, and two City Passes. Sponsored by Hotel Carlton, a Joie de Vivre Hotel, Saha Restaurant, and City Pass.

• 2nd Prize: 7-day Photography Workshop for one in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Sponsored by Santa Fe Workshops.

Visit the Traveler website or www.mobileworldcontest.com for more details and to enter!

Photo: Nevada Wier/Getty Images

Returning to the Wanderlust in 1980 on a dhoni 'manned' by boys. 

We were very pleased to see that last week, the editors over at the New York Times added another great blog to their mix: Dot Earth, which will focus on sustainability and climate change and is written by science reporter Andrew C. Revkin. In his introductory slide show, Revkin describes how much of his reporting has been informed by his varied travels, so we decided to ask him to delve a bit deeper about the place where travel and sustainability collide.

Before you became a reporter, you sailed around the world. Can you tell us a bit about that experience and how it led you to do what you're doing now?

As a senior about to graduate Brown University with a biology bachelor's degree (I had visions of being a marine biologist, thanks to Jacques Cousteau), I won a fellowship allowing me to pursue a proposal to study "man's relationship to the sea" in some isolated villages on islands—Fetuna, Raiatea, and a couple of places in the Tuamotus, in French Polynesia.

After a few months, I headed to New Zealand for a big international science conference and while in Auckland saw a sign that said simply: "Crew Wanted, Yacht Wanderlust, headed to Mediterranean. Inquire Marsden Wharf." I'd grown up in Rhode Island sailing, but not bluewater cruising. Nevertheless, that was hard to pass up. I sent a letter back to the fellowship committee at my school and said I was going to study man's relationship to the sea in a more intimate way. . .

I was on the boat for 17 months, 15,000 miles, and about 15 countries as we sailed around Australia, through Indonesia, across the Indian Ocean, up the Red Sea, and around the Mediterranean. I saw the splendor of untouched reefs, the troubles created by poverty and pollution, we almost sank twice, and all of that prompted me to take a lot of photographs and return planning to be a writer, not a scientist.