You might think that a place called Hellville would have a dark past. But this lively town on the Madagascan island of Nosy Be takes its name not from any Satanic connections but from Anne Chrétien Louis de Hell, a French admiral who was governor of Réunion Island from 1838 to 1841.
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The Hurtigruten line is first and foremost a postal service and ferry, although it caters well to tourists too with a cruise-like offering of quality food, excursions and on-board lectures. Many of the stops the ships make are brief, typically twenty minutes. Supplies for these small coastal towns and villages are off-loaded, post and parcels collected. A few passengers embark or disembark. Most are locals, visiting family or returning home after time away. Only a handful will be tourists, hikers perhaps.
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You may be tired by now of me saying that Colombia is colourful, but hopefully not of seeing the evidence. Many of its small towns are as imbued with colour as the cities; indeed maybe more so as they don’t spill out into more drab commercial and industrial areas. Passing through even the smallest village I would spot murals on local bars, bright doors and windows on the houses.
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Colombia’s Villa de Leyva is one of those places where time seems to have stopped still. Or at least, it would seem that way were it not for the large number of visitors, both Colombian and international, who descend on the town to see its perfectly preserved colonial architecture and huge main square. This is a town that is as much museum as place to live.
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Villa de Leyva was founded in 1572 by the Spaniards, and is considered one of the most beautiful colonial villages in Colombia.
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Strung out along a ridge in the Himalayan foothills lies the ancient town of Bandipur. It has only been fully accessible by road since 1998. The ridge is just 200 metres long and barely wide enough to accommodate the main street and the buildings that line it. Behind the houses the mountainside falls away steeply. The small market gardens farmed by the inhabitants are accessible only by steps cut into the hillside.
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Paved streets gently wind uphill, lined with brick houses three or more stories high. Every door, every window is surrounded by exquisitely carved wood. Locals sit chatting, their day’s work over, or watch from an upper window.
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I couldn’t go to the Faro area and not meet up with blogging friend Restless Jo, could I? Or perhaps I could! We planned to meet, naturally, but on the day fate intervened and our coffee date had to be … not cancelled, I hope, but certainly indefinitely postponed.
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No, not THAT one! Did you know that there’s another Las Vegas, in New Mexico? But unlike its more famous glitzy namesake this one is an appealing mix of slightly down-at-heel with trying-hard-to-revive itself.
