Travel

A globe-trotting food writer recaps standout meals from 15 countries and roughly 1,091 restaurant visits in 2011, handing out quirky awards spanning best pizza in South Australia’s Barossa Valley, best tandoori at New Delhi’s Bukhara, best champagne at The Open Championship, and best ramen at a Hokkaido golf club.

A frequent traveler recounts seven recent international flights spanning three countries, sampling regional snacks like Lay’s “Naughty Tomatoes” chips, enjoying Thai cuisine, and catching a lunar eclipse from Ko Pha Ngan before wrapping up a long year of travel in tropical Thailand.

A golfer recounts an eventful November across India, visiting sixteen golf courses but playing only one round—a winning match at the historic Delhi Golf Club—while also navigating wildlife encounters and travels through Tamil Nadu and the Palni Hills.

A golf course greenkeeper education programme across India — covering Kolkata and New Delhi — is described, including classroom and field training sessions aimed at improving playing conditions on golf courses throughout the subcontinent, with an evening at the historic Tollygunge Club providing an unexpectedly literal close encounter with the club’s exotic birdlife.

A turfgrass researcher recounts a busy month of international travel across five countries involving eight flights, two evacuations from flood-stricken Bangkok, and an aerial view of submerged golf course facilities in Ayutthaya, Thailand, while sampling local cuisine at each destination.

A recap of an eventful month of golf featuring two highlight videos that capture nine birdies and the celebratory dances that followed each one.

A lighthearted account of navigating the ANA Lounge at Narita International Airport’s Terminal 1, weighing the competing temptations of the full-service noodle bar, the self-service sake bar, and the shortbread on offer in between.

Behind-the-scenes outtakes from a visit to Wuhan reveal the lighter moments of a turf research trip, including banner-positioning struggles, a red carpet inexplicably ending in a grass field, baijiu-fueled dinners with spicy duck feet, and a sentimental “stay off the grass” sign posted on a thriving patch of Zoysia matrella.

A golf turf agronomist recounts a lively trip to Wuhan, China, mixing professional seminar appearances with rakish adventures including a baijiu dinner, a winning wager on a par 3, a lunch featuring snake meat, and an unauthorized ride on the exterior of a speeding boat across Liangzi Lake.

A golfer recounts his August matches across courses in Japan and beyond, going 4-1 for the month after a final-round defeat that he half-blames on a lavish mid-round meal of wagyu beef and Asahi beer, with big tournaments still ahead in September and October.