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A Green Travel Guides crew has just been out to Jamaica to film the latest developments from the marine sanctuary project I reported on in January. Assisted by The Travel Foundation and Virgin Holidays, local fishermen have created Jamaica’s largest marine reserve, to allow depleted fish stocks to recover.

The Bluefields Bay reserve is now a year old, and it seems that fish stocks have gone from strength to strength since my visit at the start of the year. The wardens… Continue reading

Blogs from my recent trip to the New Forest are now live on Greentraveller.co.uk, as part of an in-depth guide to sustainable tourism in the New Forest district:

A Q&A with Anthony Climpson OBE, tourism manager of the New Forest

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Canoeing in the New Forest

Strawberry mountain

I loved Chelsea Flower Show last year so was keen to go along when the Bermuda Department of Tourism invited me. Last year, most of my favourite gardens were big show gardens outdoors, but this year I made more time for the exhibitors inside the floral marquee, and found lots of interesting smaller gardens. Here’s the 10 I liked best overall this year (in no particular order):

1. The tunnel of clematis of all different shades of purple and… Continue reading

My interview with Anthony Climpson OBE (tourism destination manager for New Forest District Council) is now live on Greentraveller.co.uk - which has this week launched a sustainable tourism guide to the New Forest. Read it here

My feature in TTG, based on travel agent Karen Simmonds’ journey to running her business more responsibly

White-fronted Bee-eater

Leading on from my first blog on South Africa, here are the birding highlights of my recent trip with Eco Training. The Mukaleke concession has some of the best bird life in the whole Kruger National Park, and I was lucky enough to see and learn about all of the following (click each image for a larger pic):

Blacksmith Lapwing - which makes a noise like the… Continue reading

I’ve just got back from an incredible trip to South Africa, where I spent a week at a safari guide-training facility in the northern-most tip of the Kruger National Park. Eco Training is South Africa’s leading training provider for safari guides, and has trained more than 3,000 guides in southern Africa and beyond.

It has three camps in South Africa, but what makes the camp I visited at Makuleke special is that it’s within a unique part… Continue reading

I was in Jamaica last week for a tourism conference and spent a fascinating day down on the south west coast, learning about a marine sanctuary project at Bluefields Bay.

More destructive fishing methods and growing unemployment have led to greater and greater pressure upon Jamaica’s fish stocks, and it is now the most over-fished country in the entire Caribbean. In 2009, the Jamaican government agreed to create nine marine sanctuaries around… Continue reading | 5 Comments

My feature on dive holiday suggestions for 2011 is out in the January issue of Diver magazine….including some great new volunteering opportunities – Biosphere Expeditions in Maldives,Blue Ventures in Belize, and Montserrat Reef Ball project in the Caribbean… Continue reading | 4 Comments

My feature on Australasia’s best eco-lodges is out in the January issue of Australia & New Zealand magazine… including Bay of Fires Lodge Tasmania, Sal Salis Ningaloo Reef and Shearwater Lodge Kaikoura… Continue reading