Wanderlust travel secrets

Wanderlust magazine is marking its 15th birthday by bringing together industry experts and revealing 100 of travel's best kept secrets

Wanderlust magazine, the bible for independently-minded travellers, is marking its 15th birthday by bringing together industry experts and revealing 100 of travel's best kept secrets. The December issue is on sale now priced £3.80

Ride the rails for less in South Africa

According to Mark Smith, The Man in Seat 61, Shosholoza Meyl's long-distance passenger trains are a great and safe way to travel between Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban and Port Elizabeth.

Cape Town to Jo'burg is a bargain R280-50 (£19-37) with sleeper. Or take the weekly Cape Town to Durban train across the arid desert of the Karoo, past the De Beers Diamond mine in Kimberley, and through the Orange Free State and into Natal.

You'll also see the spot where Winston Churchill's train was derailed by the Boers and where Mahatma Ghandi was thrown off a train - a comfortable bed, an amazing journey and a slice of history for just R415 (£31).
Spot jaguars in the Pantanal, Brazil

Jonathan Morris of Reef and Rainforest Tours reveals the best place to spot Jaguars in Brazil.

The Meeting-of-the-Waters State Park in the northern Pantanal is one of the largest and most pristine areas of Brazil's 200,000 sq km wetland.

The wildest part is an abandoned 280 sq km cattle ranch, which includes most of the forests and savannah along the Three Brothers River.

Numerous jaguars roam the area and are free to hunt their favourite dry-season prey - huge caimans and plump capybaras - making these usually elusive wild cats much easier to spot.
Find beauty on a back route in Petra, Jordan

According to David Symes of the Jordan Tourism Board, there is a little-known back route down from the High Place of Sacrifice that is one of the most beautiful walks in Petra.

Begin your descent on the western side of the cliff, passing through the Wadi Farasa (Butterfly Valley). To the left of the Bedouin Cafe you'll find two stone obelisks.

From here, continue straight on (not left) for about 100m, then right through a passage in the rock and down some steps. You then get to take in the Lion Fountain, Triclinium and Roman Soldier Tomb, too.

Photo: ©Paul Morrison
Take an Emperor Penguin Safari in Snow Hill Island, Antarctica

Rated by Paul Goldstein, wildlife guide and photographer as his top-ranking travel experience of all time - an Exodus Emperor Penguin Safari, to see the most northern colony of these extraordinary black, white and yellow creatures in Antarctica, a 10,000-strong waddle on Snow Hill Island.

Today, tourism in the Antarctic is on the increase, but still only one vessel is able to cut through the November ice of the Weddell Sea: the Kapitan Khlebnikov.

Reinforced and robust, this leviathan ship generates huge cracks all the way to the horizon, a truly groundbreaking sight for lucky passengers.

A quick helicopter ride to the rookery, discovered by the Kapitan Khlebnikov as recently as 2004, gives you several days to watch thousands of emperors feed, toboggan and cuddle their chicks, tiny bundles of grey next to adults who can reach impressive weights of 35-40kg.
Picnic with the locals in l'Oum-er-Rbia, Morocco

Chris Stewart, ex-shepherd, ex-member of Genesis and author of Driving Over Lemons was introduced to the picnic spot of l'Oum-er-Rbia when he got to know a Berber family while collecting seeds in the Atlas mountains.

Way, way out in the mountains, l'Oum-er-Rbia is a wonderful spring surrounded by little tea gardens made from eucalyptus branches, string, old fertiliser bags - whatever was to hand.

You can hire one of these tea rooms for the afternoon, take your charcoal burner and cook your lunch. Utterly uncommercial, just Moroccan families enjoying themselves to the sound of the gurgling river.

Photo: ©Paul Morrison
Find the world's end at Luskentyre, Scotland

Simon Calder, travel editor of the Independent, rates Luskentyre beach as the most beautiful on the planet.

As you edge along the Hebridean shore of the Isle of Harris, carved by the Atlantic at its most savage, you conclude that the end of the world is probably nigh.

To the south, the sea batters incessantly against the ragged coast of ancient rock. Glance north, and a barricade of mountains sulks beneath an angry sky.

This is the earth stripped of embellishment, reduced to its most elemental. But then you see Luskentyre beach. Tenacious grasses bind together a backdrop of dunes.

Below them, ice-white sand, sculpted into unworldly shapes by the wind, is washed by turquoise water.

When a blade of sunlight slices through the cloud, the light dances on the surf, while the soundtrack rumbles with the weary roar of an ocean at the end of a 4,500km journey.
Gaze at the best view in Torres Del Paine Chile

Sarah Beard from Journey Latin America recommends the view from Mirador Ferrier on the western side of Chile's most famous national park.

To get there, head to the iceberg-filled Lago Grey and take the winding path through native beech tree forest before a steep ascent.

At the top is a sensational panoramic vista of the southern ice-cap, the entire granite massif and the windswept slopes of Patagonia.

Photo: ©Paul Morrison
Sleep by the sea at Terres Blanches, Madgascar

Hilary Brandt MBE, founder of Brandt Travel Guides, reveals a truly secret fly-in lodge on an extraordinary piece of Madagascar's north-west coast: long stretches of white sand, horse shoe bays tucked into green forest and an eroded sandstone cirque that would make Mars look dull.

Built by the former owner of Anjajavy Hotel, Lodge Terres Blanches is the ultimate escape.

You can be dropped off in an isolated cove for the day, or beachcomb the kilometre long sands below your cabin.

There's no electricity, set (delicious) meals are eaten communally and most visitors are French. The English-speaking manager told of only eight British guests in the past year!
Join the South America Explorers Club

If you're travelling independently in Latin lands, join the South America Explorers Club.

This not-for-profit organisation will be your new best friend on the continent, offering advice on everything from tango lessons to volunteering placements, as well as free internet, bag storage, networking opportunities and use of its clubhouses in Lima, Cuzco, Quito and Buenos Aires.

There's nothing it doesn't know about South America - sign up for the free newsletter to get a taster of what's on offer (including apartments to rent, quiz nights and excursions) or become a full member: one year membership costs US$60; couples US$90.
Beat the crowds to 'the new Prague' Lviv, Ukraine

New flights make Ukraine's cultural hotspot - UNESCO-loved but tourist-free - the hottest city break for 2009.

Lovely Lviv, the cultural heart of Ukraine, is touted as the 'New Prague'. Remarkably unscathed by Soviet central planning, there's hardly a concrete block in sight.

Instead, the city is layered with Armenian, Polish, Austro-Hungarian and Jewish influences. Architecturally, it's neoclassical Baroque, Rococo, Renaissance and Gothic, with a generous helping of Art Nouveau.

Right now, its cobbled streets and home-from-home cafes are relatively tourist-free, even in the mild climes of midsummer.

Yet as Wizzair announces a London-Lviv route (starting in January), that could be about to change - head east now ahead of the crowds.