Dear Fellow Adventurers,
In truth I’ve been less nomadic this year than normal, and this is mainly due to my wife and I doing up a country cottage from semi-derelict neglect to now be included as one of the many AirBnB properties on our Westerlands Family Farm.
We’ve named the house ‘Narnia’ from the famous children’s books by C.S. Lewis – because to us the house is just a little bit magical.
A happy exception to this was a trip over the summer to the ‘Hautes-Alpes’ (High Alps) region spanning Italy & France to go hiking. I’ve been coming here for many years – even having my bachelor party ‘Ski Stag’ here in the winter of last year.
This is such a hidden gem of a location that we’ve just launched our first ski adventure in this most rustic of regions – especially for our American clients this is a fantastic and rewarding alternative given souring US lift pass prices – these are the valleys where the local French and Italians come to ski so the experience is much more rounded:
Watch this space for some summer Hautes-Alpes itineraries coming your way also! With the house now out of the way I will be making up for lost time with an upcoming trip to Sardinia this September to gather first-hand experience of their pasta I mean our new tour there: Ancient Sardinia.
We will shortly be launching a group photography tour here in Q1 2026 led by Award-Winning Wildlife Photographer and Adventurer Renato Granieri, who just happens to be Sardinian – please let us know if you can be interested in joining this.
I will also be heading out to Bhutan this autumn as this continues to be one of our most popular destinations – why don’t you join me?
Trekking the Trans Bhutan Trail & Black-necked Crane Festival
Wed, 5 Nov - Sat, 15 Nov 2025
In African news:
Malawi’s Mount Mulanje has been finally added to the prestigious UNESCO World Heritage List – some of you may recall this was the setting of Laurens van der Post’s first travel book. I very much wish to return there.
Our Kenya small group safari adventure is booking up next June if you’d like to join us:
Kenya Laikipia, Maasai Mara & Lamu safari adventure
Sat, 6 Jun - Tue, 16 Jun 2026
In Ethiopia we have already raised over 50% of the money needed to help our friend Berhanu start again after his shop was looted and destroyed in the recent war – read more about his story HERE. When I stay “start again” I literally mean the difference between the gruelling misery of extreme poverty for a disabled man in a predominantly agricultural and pastoral region, and having the means to look after himself and his family with dignity.
Please please help us to help him HERE.
I have recently been reading……
What Am I Doing Here? (1989) by Bruce Chatwin
Chatwin, best known for his peerless travel books In Patagonia (1977) & The Songlines (1987) has here compiled an extremely wide-ranging collection of travel stories, biographical observations and general razor-sharp penmanship. The man is a whip.
Speaking For Themselves: The Personal Letters of Winston and Clementine Churchill (1999) by Winston & Clementine Churchill
Like most Brits I am obsessed with Churchill and I found this book far more revealing about the man than the biographies I’ve read about him. Clementine I knew less about, but it turns out she was a more formidable traveller even than Winston; documenting may of her expeditions to her husband in these letters.
Books often lead to other books and I’m now reading Marlborough: His Life and Times the biography Churchill wrote of his illustrious ancestor, the first Duke of Marlborough, published in four volumes. What a mind.
Until next time,
Sam McManus, MD
