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n o v e m b e r P R I M E t r a v e l l e r
Mark Garber
At the beginning of the 90s when
Russian business was just making
its first steps over the destroyed
iron curtain, the first stop was in
Vienna. When there was no united
Europe Austria was a neutral coun-
try with everything you needed
for business. Besides at the time
there still were anonimous bank ac-
counts, the law protected the busi-
ness from any illegal moves of the
authorities and created the right
environment. Now this sounds like
science fiction or myths of the past,
but it was really like that.
Vienna was the most Eastern out
of all Western capitals. Russia and
Austria-Hungary were connected
for many centuries by a special
relashionship. And although the
empires and their ambitions placed
the countries at the opposite bar-
ricades of the war, on the social
level the relashionship was always
good. We also began our expansion
to Europe fromVienna, our first
foreign office was there. And I have
to say that the Austrians treated us
in a more than friendly way.
— Continued on page 62
Andrei Dellos
Russian cuisine doesn’t exist. For
at least two centuries it was for
many a mysterious phantom. Or
a phantasy? ‘Where can I try the
real Russian cuisine?’ is the same
rhetoric question as ‘Who is to
blame?’ and ‘What’s to be done?’.
Of course in our Cafe Pushkin we
maintain the myth (especially for
foreigners) with constant scien-
tific and practical work – we just
don’t have the right to refuse our
guests the most sacred thing. It’s
not a deception. Someone clever
said: ‘Anyone who becomes a
tourist becomes stupid’. And
there is a certain charm in it! Just
as they deal with foreign foodies
in France – people don’t have
to know that the famous haute
cuisine also doesn’t exist. It’s just
a game. Likewise the notion ‘Rus-
sian cuisine’ changes depending
on the addressee: it’s absolutely
different for Soviet people or
Russian emigrants, for the French
or the Americans – the list can be
continued.
— Continued on page 66
Rankin
How often do you travel?
I travel every week for work, mainly
to LA, New York, Milan or Paris.
I tend to travel for holidays three
times a year. I like to stay in Britain
for at least one of those holidays,
so that I can take my dogs withme.
Last year I rented a house for 10
weeks at Saunton Sands in Devon
and went down at weekends. Saun-
ton Sands has one of the longest
beaches I have ever seen, which
weirdly doesn’t get too full. Earlier
this summer, I went to Bali for two
weeks – I quite like to just get away
and do nothing somewhere warm.
We stayed at the Samaya Hotel, in
Seminyak, and also visited Ubud.
Bali is fantastic.
Location you wouldmost like to
photograph?
I love photographing clouds, so to
photograph from a hot–air balloon
would be incredible... but it’s kind
of been done. I don’t really chase
locations or places. I’mmainly a
studio photographer, so just get-
ting out into the world is a bless-
ing for me. I would like to go and
photograph the northern lights,
though – that would be amazing.
Do you get to travel by private jet?
God, no. The only time I’ve rented
a plane was when I had to go to
D sseldorf in December 2010.
The weather was very bad – snow
meant that all normal flights were
grounded, so that was a necessity.
I tend to travel with one assistant.
Someone else travels with the pho-
tography equipment. You can rent
what you need frommost major
cities but you do tend to get the
worst equipment unless you are a
regular renter.
Is Scotland, where you were
born, a favourite travel destina-
tion?
I will always have Scotland inmy
heart. My family lived in Glasgow
until I was 10. We used to go to two
places for camping or caravanning
holidays: Bute, which is the little
island just off the west coast, and
Golspie, in Sutherland.
— Continued on page 64
Cabrales
A hidden corner of northern
Spain, Cabrales preserves its by-
gone way of life as it does its food.
Cabrales caves are creepy. the
floors are damp and slippery. Age-
old spiders’ webs trail from the
roofs. Scariest of all is the fierce
aroma of a thousand cheeses
slowly morphing from white to
blue. Cheesemakers come here
to wipe them, turn them, wash
them, brush them and sniff them
— latterday Gollums fondling
their Precious.
A lost corner of northern Spain,
Cabrales isn’t Middle-earth. Set
back from the atlantic ocean and
stretching deep into the Picos
de europa mountain range, it’s
a warren of switchback roads,
tracks, rivulets and streams
scored through limestone gorges.
Carrena’s pale cows straddle the
double white lines, daring drivers
to pass. the local headline com-
plaining ‘the presence of wolves
in Cabrales is stifling tourist
development’ says it all.
More than twice the size of
Barcelona, with a population of
less than 2,500, Cabrales is one
of the 78 districts that make up
the Principality of asturias. It has
a local dialect, a favourite tipple
(cider), one famous eponymous
cheese and another produced
nearby that’s a worthy rival. It’s
tempting to describe it as a hy-
brid landscape of alpine uplands,
backed by mountains rising to
over 2,600m, that unravels into
rolling plains as it drifts down
towards the coast. In summer, it’s
bucolic, a rambler’s paradise; in
winter, ferocious, a countryside
where survival can be tough.
Ana Rosa Bada makes her Cabrales
cheese in Poo, a village whose
name we won’t dwell on. originally,
the milk was curdled with rennet
from a kid’s stomach.
— Continued on page 84
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