Been busily preparing a speech on consumer financial protection in the travel industry to give at the International Guild of Battlefield Guides AGM(yawn - I hear you!). But I spent most of the latter part of 2011 writing a dissertation of the matter and I wanted to pass on the fruits of my labours before they left my brain forever. Actually there are alot of 'battlefield tours' companies out there that don't offer the financial protection that the EU package directive and the UK package travel regulations require of them - naughty, naughty. And in the light of the recent Thomas Cook scare there is every reason to be careful when you buy travel services at the moment. Anyhow I won't bore you any further - you can read the content of a recent speech on consumer financial protection  that I gave last week on the website of The Cultural Experience (they offer high quality battlefield tours, don't you know!)

Setting up the 2012 battlefield tour programme

After what seems to have been months of hard work; historical research, creating itineraries, checking practicalities and availability, liaising with guides and tour managers, writing the copy, sourcing suitable images and helping with the overall design – I am pleased to announce that  I signed off the final proofs for the 2012 tour brochure. And I can tell you that my shoulders feel considerably lighter.

We have got plenty of new tours to whet your appetite as well as many familiar ones. And some new guides too. We have Mick Holtby taking us on a battlefield tour to India in search of Wellington but also to Plassey and Kohima. Gordon Corrigan will be traipsing over the battlefield of Salamanca on its 200th anniversary and following Sir John Moore to Corunna. I’ve got a couple of new Napoleonic trips lined up: the 1809 battles around Vienna and Napoleon’s 1812 campaign from Smolensk to Moscow. Fred Hawthorne will be leading a new Western Theater American Civil War battlefield tour and John Drewienkiewicz will be taking us around the 1866 Austro-Prussian Warbattlefields. Gary Sheffield has a new General Haig tour on the Western Front and I am pleased that Robert Kershaw has agreed to lend his expertise to our Great Patriotic War and Berlinb attlefield tours. Patrick Mercer has devised a really in-depth battlefield tour around Monte Cassino, whilst we welcome Chris Pugsley who has created his own Operation Mercury battlefield tourto Crete. And a final mention to Tony Smith who will be guiding our Falkland Islands battlefield tour.