I’m choose ,I’m like

“If a kangaroo accidentally gets hit by the train, you don’t really feel it,” conductor Scott Fels informs me as the scrublands and giant termite mounds of the Australian Outback whisk by. “But if the train drivers see a camel on the tracks, believe me, they get away from the windows.”

Camels in the Outback? Yes indeed. There are estimated to be over a million of these ungulates roaming at will through the desert, descendants of the original camel caravans led by Afghan drivers in the 1860s and 1870s. It was these migrant cameleers who helped opened up the continent’s arid interior to travelers. The country’s most famous train, the Ghan, www.gsr.com.au, is named in their honor.

Those unfamiliar with the challenges of building infrastructure in harsh environmental conditions might have assumed that an advanced nation like Australia would have had a north-south transcontinental railway for some time. But the funny fact is that while the Ghan’s tracks were first laid in the 1880s, the entire line wasn’t fully completed (on an upgraded track) until 2004, and at a cost of nearly $1 billion. Now, luxury trains up to one kilometer long, sometimes numbering 52 carriages, crawl through the forbidding primordial stretches of Outback twice a week, like giant high-speed caterpillars. It’s a seemingly endless landscape of Martian redness, and to be able to enjoy it all from a private Platinum cabin — while taking high tea served to you by a personal butler — is a curious lesson in the persistence and ingenuity of humankind.

Making the three-day, 1,900-mile (3,000 km) journey from Darwin in the north to Adelaide in the south in this kind of comfort comes at a cost, of course — $2,100 a head in the case of the new deluxe Platinum cabins. There are Gold cabins for about $1,600, and Red Service twin share bunks — the cheapest option — for $500. The majority of the Ghan’s passengers are Australians undertaking an almost ritualistic pilgrimage through their colossal backyard, and the local accent predominates in the elegant dining car, where kangaroo steaks and fine Australian wines are served. But it’s not all sitting, drinking and gazing through a window: the Ghan stops twice for half-day tours like exploring sacred Aboriginal sites around Alice Springs or floating down the deep, rocky Katherine Gorge. Keep an eye out for any passing camel herds.

 Hot summers when the city is crammed with tourists; cooler winters when the rain can swell the Arno: Florence is an all-year-round destination. Here are some of the city’s seasonal highlights.

A Verdi player finds a gap in the Azzurri team’s defence during the 2003 Calcio Storico

Vintage clothes
For a long time, image-conscious Italians wouldn’t be seen dead in second-hand clothes. But recently they have started to catch up with the rest of the world when it comes to coveting the nearly new and Florence is host to the biggest used clothes fair in Italy. It’s held twice yearly in February and July (Stazione Leopolda; +39 055 246 6198).

Christmas in Florence
Not only is the city wonderfully deserted at this time of year, but the lights that adorn every shop window give the place an almost magical feeling. You can buy everything from amber to reindeer skins at the Christmas market (Mercato di natale) in the Piazza Santa Croce from the beginning of December. Go ice-skating in the Piazza della Liberta or make for the Piazza della Republicca, home to Florence’s enormous Christmas tree sparkling with 16,000 lights. On Christmas day, High Mass at the Duomo is an unforgettable experience.

Scoppio del Carro, Easter Sunday
Exploding the cart, or “scoppio del carro,” at Easter is one of the oldest and most important Florentine traditions. Decorated white oxen drag an elaborate cart stuffed full of fireworks from the Porta al Prato to the Piazza del Duomo. A dove-shaped rocket in the Duomo is lit and shoots along a wire to the cart where it ignites the rest of the fireworks: impressive pyrotechnics ensue. Tradition has it that if the first rocket flies straight, it will be a lucky year for Florentines.

Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, April to June
The May Music Festival is a series of classical music concerts, recitals, and operas and ballet held in venues across the city. It is internationally acclaimed and tickets are hot property, so check the Web site for scheduling and book in advance (www.maggiofiorentino.com )

Calcio Storico Fiorentino, June 24-28
This traditional game is a testosterone-fueled mix of football and fighting played by young men from the four Florentine quarters: San Giovanni, Santa Maria Novella, Santo Spirito and Santa Croce. They may look amusing in their medieval-style pantaloons but there is nothing funny about the level of competition in this fierce sport — players often seem more preoccupied with fighting each other than getting the ball in the net, which runs the length of the pitch. An amazing spectacle, especially because it is held in the shadow of the beautiful Santa Croce church in the piazza below.

Festa del Grillo (Cricket Festival), Ascension Day
If you are feeling low on luck, the cricket festival, which heralds the start of spring, could boost your fortunes. Singing crickets are thought to bring good luck and in days gone by children would fashion cages and hunt for crickets to take to the Parco delle Cascine. Nowadays, the crickets are likely to be fake, but you can buy them housed in endearing pastel-painted confections with windows and roofs — and they are still considered lucky.

What sights have you enjoyed in Florence? Send us your tips and suggestions in the “Sound Off” box below and we’ll print the best.

 For whoever has seen the 2002 movie “City of God” — based on real stories set in the eponymous slum in Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro — a favela can be a scary place, plagued by violent crime.

The Pousada Favelinha, perched atop the Pereira da Silva favela, offers spectacular views of Rio de Janeiro.

The unpretentious Pousada Favelinha, a modest guest house and hostel located at the top of Rio de Janeiro’s favela Pereira da Silva, is one notable exception to the city’s criminal reputation.

Originally inaugurated in January 2005 by a Brazilian woman and her German husband, it is now run solely by its “carioca” (Rio-native) owner, Andreia da Silva Martins, whose family is both at home and on friendly terms with everyone in the neighborhood — as well as the police.

The little “Pereirão,” a favela that a modest few thousand call home, was just as dangerous as any other until one fine spring day in 1999, when the local police cracked down on the whole favela and killed all its drug dealers, the Pousada Favelinha claims on its Web site.

Since then, the “morro” (hill) has cleaned up the crime, with a police post permanently located at the top entrance of the favela in Santa Teresa, while the bottom entrance leads out to a gentrified neighborhood in Rio’s Zona Sud.

During the five days and nights that I stayed at the Favelinha, safety in and around the favela was never an issue. I saw no automatic rifles, and residents greeted me as I passed them in the narrow alleys, while dogs and cats lounged on cement platforms and rooftops.

One girl even walked me to the door of the hostel upon my first arrival, and showed me where she lived in case I needed any help later.

“They’re proud to live in a favela that hosts visitors from all over the world,” says Carlos, who welcomed me inside. Indeed, it’s in everybody’s interest to keep the neighborhood safe and friendly.

Meanwhile, I was constantly admiring the extraordinary view of the city from atop the hill, as were the other guests — predominantly round-the-world twentysomething backpackers from Western Europe and Australia — during those hot summer days of Carnaval 2009.

And as our leisurely breakfasts and evening brought together both the dorm-room dwellers and the private-room couples around balcony chats, we quickly developed a natural complicity — not only of those who dared to bunk in a favela, but of those who climbed the steep uphill trek at least once a day.

In recent years, “slum tourism” — seeking out the shantytowns of developing nations for a more authentic holiday experience — in Brazil has gained in popularity, and a handful of other establishments open to foreign patronage (if not community volunteers) have sprung up in peaceful favelas around the country.

Among the most prominent is The Maze, a more upscale bed & breakfast — which also hosts jazz gigs, original artwork for sale, and even the occasional film shoot — inaugurated in Rio de Janeiro’s Tavares Bastos favela in late 2005 by the Brit Bob Nadkarni and his Brazilian wife.

While middle-class Brazilians tend to shun the shantytowns as being filthy and violent, foreigners who are fascinated by them and locals who are familiar with them are making the effort to break down the barriers and open up shop.

Thanks to the interest of adventurous tourists, such initiatives are proving both economically profitable and culturally enriching.

Sunshine-seeking travelers whose vacations are spoilt by wet weather will be able to claim compensation under a new scheme introduced by Germany airline Lufthansa in a bid to head off the gray clouds settling over the aviation industry.

Travelers choosing Lufthansa could pick up compensation for bad weather at their vacation destination.

Under the “sunshine insurance” scheme, passengers who book flights to any of 36 destinations on offer will be entitled to €20 ($28.8) per day up to a maximum of €200 ($288) for every day of rain.

To take advantage of the offer, passengers must book before August 18 to travel in either September or October. They will be entitled to claim for every day in which at least 5mm of rain falls at their destination according to the German weather Web site wetteronline.de.

While many of the destinations on the list are sun-drenched locations on the Mediterranean or in the Middle East, more discerning travelers looking to claim a discount on their trip may choose Bilbao, on Spain’s wet and windy northern coast, or U.S. cities including Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington DC.

Lufthansa’s offer comes less than a week after the airline said it expected to endure a difficult time for the rest of 2009 after reporting an 88 percent drop in second quarter profits to €40 million ($56 million), amid volatile fuel prices and a slump in passenger numbers.

The airline is not the first to offer “sunshine insurance.” Last month two French travel agencies, Pierre et Vacances and FranceLoc, offered vacationers a partial refund if they suffered four days of rain in any one week