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Harpa + other Iceland highlights

We made it to Iceland and back! The trip my husband, Ted, and I took was a 5-day package called “Hot Springs & Northern Lights,” which we booked with Icelandair (www.icelandair.us) for Nov. 13-17, 2016. It was a spur-of-the-moment inspiration after reading Randy Keck’s series on Iceland in the October through December 2016 issues.

For the two of us, the price, including three hotel nights and a nighttime tour, was $1,931 round trip out of New York. Round-trip airport/hotel transport cost another $78.

“OUT OF THE NORTHWEST PASSAGE”

 17-day, 16-night expedition cruise aboard 198-passenger Ocean Endeavour, Sept. 7-23, 2017. Highlights: Sail from Kugluktuk to Coronation Gulf/visit wreck site of HMS Erebus/polar bear territory at Peel Sound/Sirmilik National Park, home to whales, walruses/Mittimatalik, home to narwhals/Baffin Island fjords/Auyuittuq National Park. $8,995-$22,795 ppdo. Limited single berths with no single supp.; otherwise, 1.5x cost of berth.

Drive-thru Caribbean volcano

Visitors to Kyoto, Japan, can rent bicycles at five Machikado Minapoto (Community Cycle) locations. At the automated kiosk at each rental station, with instructions in English, renters insert a credit card or prepaid Pitapa IC card, input the stall number of the chosen bike and, using the number on the printed receipt, unlock the bike. 

Drive-thru Caribbean volcano

In the Caribbean island nation of Saint Lucia, visitors can drive right through the collapsed caldera of the Soufrière volcano and take a tour of Sulphur Springs geothermal park to see boiling springs and bubbling mud pots. 

The tour, lasting around 30 minutes, takes visitors safely across a wooden walkway just feet away from the boiling waters. Just outside the park are two bathing pools, one filled with hot black, mineral-rich water and the other, warm water.

New Zealand volcano tour

Off the north coast of New Zealand’s North Island, visitors can take a walking tour of the active White Island Volcano with White Island Tours (15 The Strand East, Whakatane, New Zealand; phone +64 7 308 9588, www.whiteisland.co.nz). 

The 6-hour tour, departing Rotorua daily (weather permitting), takes visitors across the volcano’s caldera, where they will see hot springs, bubbling mud pots and fumaroles. A tour costs NZD199 (near $145), adult, or NZD130, child (minimum age, 8); book in advance.

“NEW ZEALAND TOUR”

15 days, 14 nights, Feb. 23-March 9 & Nov. 9-23, 2017. Highlights: In Auckland (North Island), Parnell Rose Gardens/Waitomo Caves glowworms/in Rotorua, geothermal reserve/Tongariro National Park/ferry from Wellington across Cook Strait to South Island/from Christchurch, TranzAlpine train through alps/Franz Josef Glacier/2-day cruise on Fiordland Navigator/Dunedin/Mt. Cook National Park. $5,830 ppdo. Single supp., $700-$1,400.

Kabalebo rainforest resort 

The Kabalebo Nature Resort (Paramaribo office, phone +597 426 532, http://kabalebo.com), located in the Amazon rainforest and accessible only by air, is where I spent three days and two nights as a member of the tour “Guyana, Suriname & Trinidad” in March 2015. For the 13-day tour, sponsored by Adventures Abroad (Blaine, WA; 800/665-3998, www.adventures-abroad.com), I paid $4,290.

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