Mueller Hut, Mt Cook National Park: Is this NZ’s best overnight walk?
Perched 1800 metres above sea level in the Southern Alps, Mueller Hut is surely one of the best places in New Zealand to spend the night.
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Author: pdg
How to ride New Zealand’s Timber Trail without blowing your budget — or busting a gut
Ancient podocarp forest, soaring suspension bridges and oodles of history make the Timber Trail one of New Zealand’s best cycling experiences.
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‘We can hear ourselves think again’: Stillness descends on Mangamuka as highway closes for the second time in two years
Two years ago a massive slip wiped out a highway and turned Mangamuka into a ghost town. Now it’s happened again.
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“We were starving”: How my aunties saved their family from famine
In the Hunger Winter of 1944-45 Dutch families faced a terrible choice: Risk starving to death or walk hundreds of kilometres in sub-zero temperatures to find food.
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Jordan in pictures
Proud desert dwellers, extraordinary hospitality, and the ancient, rock-hewn city of Petra: Just three of the reasons you need to visit Jordan.
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Auckland’s island escape: Great Barrier’s Aotea Track
The island boasts spectacular beaches, hot springs, raucous birdlife and lush forest — and it’s just half an hour from Auckland by plane.
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Fiordland’s Hollyford Valley: A walk back in time
Where experiencing one of New Zealand’s wildest places doesn’t mean you have to go without fine food and lodgings.
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The Hunger Diary: My father and the Dutch famine
A chance discovery sheds light on the last famine in Western Europe: The Hunger Winter of 1944-45.
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Ukraine revisited: Invasion rekindles memories of long-ago trip
Towering monuments, vibrant cities, and a national identity which has somehow survived Soviet oppression and a turbulent history — those are a few of my memories from a trip to Ukraine long before the Russian invasion.
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The Bone Church of Kutná Hora: Final resting place of 40,000 people or macabre tourist attraction?
The monks of Sedlec Abbey, in what is now the Czech Republic, turned a problem into a morbid masterpiece.
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Egypt in pictures
Best known for its ancient wonders, Egypt also boasts biblical sites, superb snorkelling, stoner hangouts, trips down the Nile on traditional sailing boats, and — best of all — sleepy oases of date palms and mud brick homes deep in the desert.
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Portmeirion of the south: How the most remarkable village in Wales was almost built in New Zealand
Village’s creator had a “serious flirtation” with an island in Auckland’s Hauraki Gulf before choosing a bay near his home in Wales instead.
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Being Dutch: What my heritage means to me
What does it mean to be a New Zealander of Dutch descent? And what if the country of my ancestors decides I no longer belong?
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Cambodia in pictures
More than 900 years after it was built Angkor Wat is still the world’s biggest religious monument — but this resilient, vibrant country offers much more than temples.
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Albania in pictures
Destroyed factories, looted manhole covers, stunning scenery and staggering generosity: That was Albania in 1999.
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Czechostalgia: A photographic ramble through 1990s Bohemia
Snow-covered landscapes, peeling plasterwork and views from my window: A sentimental selection of photos from Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic in the early 1990s.
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Project Island Song: Return of the giants
An ambitious ecological restoration project aims to return a small corner of New Zealand to the way it was before humans arrived.
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Ani: City of Ghosts
One of the great cities of the medieval world, Ani is today a city of ghosts marooned between bitter enemies Turkey and Armenia.
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Braving New Zealand’s Old Ghost Road
One of New Zealand’s newest dual-use tramping and mountain bike trails, the 85km-long Old Ghost Road is also one of the most spectacular.
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Getting high in Northland: A peak-bagger’s guide to the North’s 10 highest mountains
How to climb Northland’s highest peaks — well, some of them anyway — and where to find them.
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