As much as we like to complain about it, Britain’s public transport system is amazing! We can probably get to 90% of the country any day we choose, more often than not at a choice of times throughout the day or night. For many years I have contentedly (or occasionally grudgingly) used this brilliant service [...]
“It’s a dangerous business, going out your door” Bilbo Baggins said. “You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no telling where you might be swept off.” I love that sentiment that where you end up has a lot to do with chance, and so I sometimes like to add [...]
I don’t know how many of you have come across prickly pears before. Certainly they’re not the kind of fruit you see growing by the side of the road in England. But in Australia they’re not particularly uncommon – they were introduced in the late 1800’s and caused widespread ecological damage and undoubtedly pissed off [...]
After a couple of weeks in the Blue Mountains; drinking, barbecuing, walking, swimming, and meeting plenty of new people – I had the urge to go and meet some familiar people again; Friends that had become the most significant aspect of my memories of my first year in Australia, but who I hadn’t seen in [...]
It was with an air of confidence and a strangely undeserved sense of belonging and homeliness that I stepped off the plane at Sydney airport after an uneventful flight from Bangkok. I was back! The familiarity of Sydney was comforting as I made my way through this city I had only briefly lived in. I had been [...]
Thailand has long been a country which has held a particular fascination for me. Over the years I have spoken to many people that have visited, lived or been brought up there and the descriptions I listened to only served to fan the flames of mystery the culture and country holds for me; and when [...]
When we decided that we would try and meet up with our Croatian friends Iva and Maja before we left the Northern hemisphere we got in touch with some preliminary dates, and found out that Maja was not going to be in Croatia for a couple of months. She was going to be studying in [...]
Continue reading about Quatro Stagioni – Four Cities in Italy
When I was planning my trip back to Australia, I had anticipated a few weeks or months in Asia to break up the journey. But after meeting our Croatian friends at Roskilde earlier in the year, it seemed like we might have another better option. I still wanted to break up the long flight from [...]
Before I left the shores of the United Kingdom for an undetermined time I wanted to see a little bit more of the place, and see as many people as I could. Sian was the same, and as much of her family was in Swansea we decided to go to Wales for a few days [...]
I moved to Edinburgh a few years ago for my first contracting position. I had become bored of the slow-paced public sector life and wanted a new challenge. I knew a lovely young lady up there and so Edinburgh seemed like a great choice, and leaving my home in Essex was extra impetus not to [...]
Roskilde seems different to other festivals I have been to. There’s no one reason why – it’s partly that the music is so truly eclectic – there are seven stages spread over the site and you can hear anything from death metal to opera on any one of them throughout the festival. It’s also got a lot to do with the people –
In 2008 just after I arrived back in the UK one of my closest friends, Michael, moved out to India. He must have got some dirt on one of his bosses – possibly some compromising photos that he may or may not have also been pictured in – and he had been promoted to oversee [...]
The Czech Republic has always been somewhere I have been drawn to. It would be easy to say it is because of the beer, or the culture, or the length of the Czech girls’ legs – but in reality it is because that is where my father was working when I was a boy, and [...]
2010 is now here: ‘The Year of the Future’, ‘The Year of Change’, ‘The Year of Progress’ (and apparently also ‘The Year of the Girl Guide’.) And for me personally it will also, at least in part, be the year for catching up on my blogs.
It was with much sadness that I left the wonders, warmth and whimsy of Australia behind me and returned, prematurely I felt, back to the UK. I had made so many friends, seen so many fantastic things, and been to so many exotic places that the previous year had swept past me with the speed and force of a tornado, leaving me a little dazed and dizzy in much the same way.
When it came to extending our stay at the hostel ‘Bungalow Bay’ we found out they had a seven night maximum stay policy, so we sadly accepted that we would have to get back on the road and leave behind the tropical paradise of Magnetic Island. We were returning to Townsville later that day anyway [...]
Townsville is one of the bigger cities in Queensland with a population of 120,000 who mostly serve in the armed forces or work in the mines in the outback and use Townsville as their base during their time off. The town itself is a sprawling mass of houses and bars, and the main attractions are [...]
It is just over 1300km from Brisbane to Townsville, and much of that stretch has been described as ‘famously uninteresting’ in at least one guide book we have with us. So we were lucky that we travelled in a shit-heap of a van which made our journey far more remarkable! The van had been ‘affectionately’ [...]
Our last morning in Byron Bay started slowly on account of the beers consumed the night before, but by midday we were on the road to Brisbane where we were meeting our friends Mike and Bex. We had originally met them in the Blue Mountains before Christmas, and seen them a few times since, but [...]