The Travel Wire: best travel reads #36

The Travel Wire is a weekly newsletter of the best travel reads from around the web, edited by James Clark from Nomadic Notes.

Travel reads

• Staying on a coffee plantation offers a fresh perspective on the beloved brew [Roadbook]

"Curious about coffee cultivation? From Costa Rica and Panama to Vietnam, a stay on a working plantation provides an immersive coffee farm experience – where hands-on tours are met by morning birdsong, home-cooking and heartfelt service."

I stayed at a coffee farm in Thailand, and I would highly recommend such a tour.

• Japan's smaller cities lure digital nomads with surfing and sushi (archive) [Nikkei Asia]

"Co-living programs and tours aim to catch eye of mobile high earners."

• The Hobo Handbook [The Paris Review]

"The Guide is either the train hopper’s Bible or an outdated relic, a must-have or a crutch, depending on whom you ask."

• How a drug smuggler and his mysterious death put Siargao surfing on the map (archive) [South China Morning Post]

"American drug smuggler John Michael Boyum was one of the first to surf Siargao’s Cloud 9 in the late 1980s. His story helped put the Philippine island on the map."

• The library of fake travel photos in Asia [Pics of Asia]

• ‘Time slows down in Lastovo’: I may just have found Croatia’s most unspoilt archipelago [The Guardian]

• One Moroccan road trip, two women, three dogs, and a new highway through the Sahara [Adventure]

• Exploring the Famagusta ghost town of Varosha - Northern Cyprus [Nomadic Backpacker]

• Lonely Planet co-founder reveals the four destinations he’ll never visit again [Independent]

• ‘Paris Here I Come!’ (archive) [The New York Times]

"In 1953, Ollie Stewart, a correspondent for The Afro-American newspaper, wrote a guidebook to the French capital aimed at Black travelers. Nearly 75 years later, his grandniece follows in his footsteps."

• The airplane ‘barf bag’ is a genius invention most people never think about, and using one blew my mind [The Autoplan]

• A cartoon by Twonks

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James Clark (@nomadicnotes)