DIY apps and Googling will never
replace a fine tour leader, writes Kate Humble.
You can buy a guidebook to almost any place in the world, from
Antarctica to Zambia, and find it full of ideas of places to go and people to
organise it for you. The internet will enable you to book everything from your
bus ticket to a tree house and help you find the best places to eat. Are we
travelling in an age in which a tour guide is surplus to requirements?
Well, no amount of Google searching or guidebook trawling beats a person
with local knowledge and know-how. But however knowledgeable that person, is he
or she someone with whom you really want to spend all or part of your eagerly
anticipated holiday? A good guide will undoubtedly make your trip a rich and
rewarding experience; a bad one could make you cut up your passport and never
leave home again. So what is it that makes a good guide?
It is a difficult question to answer, because every traveller has his or
her own idea of a guide's role. Some people seem to require more nannying than
guiding; others will be happy with a city tour on an open-top bus with someone
who can tell a few jokes.
I certainly don't want nannying. Nor do I want to listen to the bored
drone of someone leading his fourth group of the day.
For me, the perfect guide, whether with me for an hour or a fortnight,
gives me an insight and some understanding of where I am that I wouldn't get
from a guidebook or Wikipedia.
I was working recently in Ecuador. In a rare hour off I went with our
guide, Paul, for a walk in the rainforest where we were filming. Tropical
rainforests have among the greatest biodiversity of species of any habitat on
the planet but they can seem curiously devoid of life, especially if you're
unfamiliar with them.
Paul spotted and caught several species of frog, so tiny and camouflaged
that I would have missed them. He identified birds and insects hidden in the
canopy from their calls and was able to describe what they looked like and
explain why they lived on particular trees and how they fitted into the
amazingly complex jigsaw that is the rainforest.
I had endless queries about why the trees were so shallow-rooted, why
the soil was considered poor when it was bursting with life, why there was a
need for such diversity among plants and animals when, with year-round sun and
rain, there seemed little need for a species to adapt to survive. All these he
answered as enthusiastically as if he had never been asked before. He brought
the forest to life and taught me more in that hour than a month of reading.
You might think a crucial attribute would be a guide's ability to speak
your language. But probably the greatest guide I have ever had was a man who
spoke not a single word of English.
Amin Beg is an Afghan from the Wakhan Corridor, a spectacular,
mountainous finger of land in the far north-east of Afghanistan. In 2009 I went
there with a group undertaking a two-week trek in an area rarely visited.
The walking was tough, much of it at about 3000 metres, and the ability
and fitness of the group wildly mixed. Amin Beg, despite never having worked
with tourists before and having no linguistic or cultural references in common
with us, appeared from the outset to read everyone's mind. He knew exactly who
was tired and would carry that person's pack. He would spot nerves at a river
crossing and help, or even carry, the nervous one across. He would bounce ahead
in his plastic shoes and jaunty turban, removing rocks from the path so no one
would trip. When he and I were first to reach the highest point of our trek, we
celebrated with a snowball fight at 4800 metres. Rarely have I met anyone with
such a capacity for kindness and consideration, and such an infectious grin.
But perhaps what makes a good guide is also what makes a good friend:
someone whose company you enjoy, who can surprise and delight you, whose advice
and comfort you can seek but who also knows when to leave you in peace.
Kate Humble was one of the judges in
the World Guide Awards 2011.
- Telegraph, London
