Celeste Brash

Living on a remote coral atoll for five years with no phone, plumbing and limited solar electricity prevented Celeste from getting an early start in her writing career - although it sounds idyllic, washing laundry by hand, digging your own well and sustenance fishing takes a big chunk out of one's day. Since moving back to 'civilization,' which is a small village in the southeast of Tahiti, Celeste has juggled a career in black pearl marketing and raising two children, with writing. Nowadays, her kids are bigger (in the mud slinging, bike riding phase) and she devotes her work time entirely to writing.

Before plunging into French Polynesian life, Celeste traveled extensively and continues to do so, exploring nearly 30 countries. She grew up in Brighton, England and the San Francisco Bay Area and somehow managed to squeeze in a degree in Anthropology at UC Santa Cruz. Although being an author for Lonely Planet is the only job that's ever held her interest long-term, she once flitted around as in English teacher to Singapore, England, California and Indonesia and held other random jobs such as observing disturbed gorillas at the San Francisco Zoo and cocktailing for weekend warriors at a landmark California restaurant. She nearly started working for Lonely Planet three times (always being halted by little mishaps like 9/11) before she was essentially recruited by a managing editor she met in a remote corner of Mexico.

Celeste's writing has appeared in the Travelers' Tales books Thirty Days in the South Pacific and The World as a Kitchen, her travel articles have appeared in Islands and Voyageur magazines and she is a regular contributor to the syndicated newspaper column Travels with Lonely Planet. In Tahiti she translates Air Tahiti Magazine from French to English. Beside French she speaks rusty textbook Thai (thanks to stint at Chiang Mai University in Thailand), survival Spanish, Tahitian and Indonesian. She has contributed to nine Lonely Planet titles (a figure that's apt to change) but her first love will always be Tahiti and French Polynesia.

Favorite Places: I've had my most amazing experiences in Guyana and Nepal.

Travel Tip: Taking a single melatonin on your first night of arrival eradicates jetlag. If you wake up too early, take a run through town (if it's appropriate) to get your bearings for later.

Books Authored

• South America on a Shoestring Travel Guide
• Nova Scotia, New Brunswick & Prince Edward Island Travel Guide
• Southeast Asia on a Shoestring
• Canada Travel Guide
• Kuala Lumpur, Melaka & Penang Travel Guide
• Thailand's Islands & Beaches Travel Guide
• Tahiti & French Polynesia Travel Guide
• South Pacific Travel Guide