Neil Taylor studied Chinese for two years at university and then Soviet and East European history for a further two years. Since then he has worked in the travel business, having been to China as a student in 1971. He led his first group to China in 1976 and since then has returned there nearly every year. His interest in Germany goes back to 1961, when his first visit took place just before the Berlin Wall was built. He has returned annually since then. He became interested in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as soon as they regained independence in 1991 and now divides his time between Tallinn and London.

He lectures on river cruises on the Elbe, and the Danube, along the China coast, in the Baltic Sea and along the French/Spanish/Portuguese Atlantic coast.

He has written the Footprints Guide to Berlin, two books on Estonia, the Bradt Guide and Estonia A Modern History, and contributed to the Blue Guide to China.

China Under Mao
The Cultural Revolution in China
Taiwan - The Unsolved Chinese Problem
Beijing and Shanghai - The Constant Rivals
The West and China in the 19th Century
China and Japan - Continuing Hostility
Korea North and South,always enemies?

Sweden v Russia - Centuries of Hostility
Sweden Since World War Two - how neutral was it and is it?
Sweden and Finland Enemies or Friends?
How Denmark's Jews Were Saved
Heligoland - an Island Outpost
The Kiel Canal, a gift to the German navy

East Germany - Do We Remember It?
Berlin - A Sudden Capital
Weimar - Germany's Literary Centre
Potsdam - The Rival to Berlin under all regimes

The Baltics under Soviet Occupation
Estonia Since 1991
Memel becomes Klaipeda, after 500 years
Riga - the new Baltic Capital or equal to the other two?
Finland and its Escape from Russia

St Petersburg, Leningrad, St Petersburg again
The Eastern Front 1941 - 1945
St Petersburg v Moscow - never a dull moment

The Austro-Hungarian Empire and its Sudden Fall
Budapest from 1956
Slovakia, not Slovenia
Romania under Ceausescu

The following recent Cruise History has been recorded for this candidate.