Oceanfront Dining Excellence at Sea Captain's House, Myrtle Beach

As a traveller there are some things that are terrifying – like two-dollar hotel rooms infested with  fleas, crazy waterborne diseases that you can’t pronounce like schistosomiasis, and the darkest, dingiest bathrooms void of light and filled with foulness. Then there are other things that call to you like the sensual sirens of Ulysses. Sometimes they summon you into the fiery furnaces of hell. I had heard of the Danakil Depression, seen it on ‘Planet Earth’, and had visions of it in my sleep

I forced my heavy legs to make the last few steps up to the fluttering prayer flags and stood on the small white summit, drinking down gulps of thin mountain air. The sun was rising through patchwork clouds and all around, and far below, a sea of brown shadowy mountains stretched out as far as I could see. I smiled, but my cheeks hung numbly on my face, masking the tumultuous emotions I felt inside. Otsal, my young Ladakhi guide, already had a bounce back in his step and he jumped around in

It was a meeting of pure chance and impeccable timing that lead to our next culinary experience. I was lying, practically immobilised, in the cheapest of Turkish hotel rooms – damp, dark and thoroughly pungent – nursing a painful cramping stomach, knees pulled to my chest and muttering sorry expletives. The copious amount of black tea and strong Turkish cigarettes the previous day had clearly caught up with me. Our morning’s cycle had turned into a laborious and fractured affair, eventually r