Star Clipper is a 115m Tall Ship, carrying just 170 guests in pampered comfort. She cruises out of Phuket during the southern summer, relocating to the Med in March to cruise the Med during the northern summer.

Onboard for an Indian Ocean crossing, Fiona Harper will join Star Clipper in March 2010 on her repositioning cruise. Contact Fiona (fiona@fionaharper.com.au) to confirm in principle support in commissioning an article based on this voyage.

Images will be available from Fiona Harper and Star Clipper.

I’d come to see for myself why the Swiss Riviera, and other European Rivieras in fact, dotted throughout the Mediterranean, have long been a stamping ground, not just for the well heeled, but writers, celebrities, artists, composers, musicians and nosy parkers like me.

Not only do they come but surprisingly often, as was the case with Charlie Chaplin and Audrey Hepburn, they set up permanent digs at their favourite seaside or lakeside towns. Brigette Bardot, Tina Turner, Elton John and Bono to name just a few, have holiday homes in the French Riviera while Antonia Bendaras and Melanie Griffiths prefer the Spanish Rivieria. Either way you look at it it’s a glamorous way to avoid winter altogether.

While the Swiss Riviera was the celebrity hot spot in the early to mid 1900s, smart money invested in the French Riviera in the 1950s and 1960s. In the seventies it was the Italian Riviera while Spain came into its own in the 1980s and 1990s. Today the spectacular coastline of new hotspots Croatia and Montenegro are  where the likes of Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Kerry Packer and Apple supremo Steve Jobs like to hang out.