The world,
taken slowly.

A room above Alfama with the river below. The old quarters on foot with a local historian, and an afternoon by tram to Belém for custard tarts still warm from the oven.

Up into the cool, wooded hills to palaces half lost in the mist, then down to Cabo da Roca to watch the sun set over the Atlantic.

A short flight out to Ponta Delgada. Twin crater lakes at Sete Cidades, tea gardens on the green hillsides, and a stew slow-cooked in the volcanic ground at Furnas.

Yachts and sailors’ paintings on the harbour wall at Horta, and a small boat out at first light to watch sperm whales surface.

Walk among vines walled in black lava, and climb Portugal’s highest mountain if the weather is kind. Home by way of Lisbon.

A riad with an orange tree in its courtyard. The souks with a guide who knows the craftsmen by name, and supper on the roof as the evening call to prayer drifts over the city.

Walk between Berber villages under Toubkal, the highest peak in North Africa, and sleep in a mountain lodge with mint tea by the fire.

Over the Tizi n’Tichka pass to a fortified village of red earth, at its best in the late afternoon light.

Out into the dunes of Erg Chebbi at dusk, a quiet camp, and more stars than you have ever seen.

A medieval medina still lived and worked in: dye pits, tiled schools and the best pastilla in the country.

Cafés, bookshops and a late dinner in Palermo to set your clock to Argentine time.

Walkways face the Perito Moreno glacier, close enough to hear the ice crack and fall into the lake.

Trails to the foot of Fitz Roy with a mountain guide, back each evening to a small lodge on the edge of the village.

Across the border into Chile for the granite towers, milky blue lakes and guanacos on the open steppe.

A slow boat up the fjord to the glaciers of the Southern Ice Field, then a last night by the water.

Arrive and recover in a quiet inn, with an early morning at the fish market and an evening in the old lanes of Yanaka.

A wooden townhouse in Higashiyama. Temples at first light, a morning with a tea master, and dinner by the river in Pontochō.

Deer in the park, the great bronze Buddha, and a quiet afternoon in a garden of moss.

A night at a temple on the mountain: dawn prayers with the monks, and the cemetery of Okunoin under cedars at dusk.

Three days on foot along the pilgrim trail, with inns that serve dinner in your room and baths fed by hot springs. Home from Osaka.

Pools, bakeries and the old harbour, then out to the rift valley at Þingvellir and the geysers of the Golden Circle.

Black sand beaches, sea stacks and waterfalls you can walk behind, with a farmhouse stay beneath the glacier.

Icebergs drifting out to sea from the glacier lagoon, a walk on the ice with a guide, and the beach of ice at dawn.

Steaming ground, lava castles and a warm lake to bathe in while the northern lights move overhead.

A peninsula with its own glacier volcano, black churches and fishing villages, and a last evening of lights over the sea.