Why I write

I have already told you why i travel. And I've told you about my parents, who are a source of inspiration for a lot of the things I do. I will now continue this theme, and tell you what drives me to write about these things, to take the thoughts that swirl around in my head like blown shards of paper, and transcribe them here for the world to see.

Writing, for me, is a largely cathartic process. It is a means to order my thoughts and marshal some semblance of sense from them. I have written, in some form or another, for as long as I can remember. Sometimes in diaries, sometimes in e-mails, sometimes in the sort of poetry that you don’t actually share with anyone in case you get locked up for crimes against paper. When I walk, or listen to music, I find myself wandering the worlds of my imagination, and penning paragraphs in my mind. Sometimes I feel they are worth capturing, even if only for me.

Travelling is something that can cause one to go through a variety of experiences that have an impact. Some of these are big, some are small. Some are good, some are bad. All of them will have some kind of effect. By writing these things down, I can share what that may have been. Often I can understand them better myself. Maybe other people will relate to them. Some of the things I write, therefore, will come across as diary entries. Others, when I want to share the wonder of a place, will seem like tourist guidebook entries. Sometimes I just have some photos that I really liked, that I thought may brighten up a day. There is no grand plan here. Not yet anyway.

Of course, there are more selfish sides to it. Having a permanent (as far as one can these days) repository of my experiences serves as a sort of online memory backup. Even if no-one reads these things I write, in years to come I can look back and remember things that the sands of time have perhaps filled over in my mind. I can see the sort of person I was, and compare that to the person I have become.

It’s also narcissistic. The thought that other people may enjoy what I write, even go so far as to comment, or share my ideas, to find them interesting, amusing or somehow applicable to them, conveys a sense of acceptance, that the world is looking on and that people care. That I may be different in some of the choices I have made, but I am not alone.

There is the inkling that one could make money from it, although I believe that making a living from writing is something that is one of those dreams that is nice to have, but all of my hopes should perhaps not be pinned to that mast. The passion of writing may wane if it becomes something I have to do, rather than something I love to do. As it is, I currently like writing about what I am thinking about, or what I have experienced. If this strikes a chord with readers, then that is wonderful. It’s too early on for me to have decided how to expand on that, if at all. Yes, there are a few ads on this page. The odd Amazon recommendation. I have a variety of social media presences, that you can see on the top right of the page. None of these, as they are, are likely to fund my life going forward in any serious way though.

I also read a number of other blogs. I have started to share some of them here. My favourite kind of travel posts to read are those which are introspective, featuring folks who are sharing the things that they have found out about themselves through the medium of travel. Of course, this isn’t for everyone. Some people want to know about the destination, what to see, where to go. They want the value you get from the insights of someone who has been there, without the naval gazing. These exist too, and are probably the ones from which their authors can make a more reliable living.

So. A lot of words. In summary I find that for me, writing about travel from a personal perspective ends up being a balance between sharing the emotional impact of a place or experience, which will no doubt differ from person to person, and sharing the awe of the world and its physical spaces. I may look back at this in ten years and ponder over my youth and naivety, but, well, at least I will have something to look back at.

I hope you enjoy reading as much as I enjoy writing. And don’t forget, this is a two way street, the comments box is always there for you to share your thoughts if these posts make you feel something, whatever that may be.

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Photo theme – night skies

Night time photography, and in particular long exposures of starry nights, is an area of my photography I have been working on for a while. Below are some of my favourite shots of night skies, taken on my trip to Australia, where you can find some pretty stunning night sky views. For the curious, I use a Canon EOS 400D with an 18-80IS lens.

The classic, stars wheeling about a central point. Taken near Wave Rock, in the Western Australian outback.

It’s amazing how much light you get from a candle. Our camp and vehicle were candlit, in the background you can see other campers using more powerful lights. This shot was taken near Margaret River, in Australia’s Northern Territory.

Stars wheeling over our campfire, in the forests of south Western Australia.

Here a bush fire provides an eerie glow into which the stars appear to be falling. Taken near Margaret River, in the Northern Territory of Australia.

 It’s not all stars at night of course. This is the moon, happily parked over our campfire in Gregory National Park, Northern Territory, Australia.

Here the moon rises out of the sea. Shot taken from our beach campsite in Francois Perron National Park, Western Australia.

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Five great reads on New Zealand

I am pretty excited. In just over five weeks the next phase of my adventure will begin, as I depart the slowly darkening skies of Europe, and arrive at the slowly lightening skies of New Zealand.

With this in mind, I have been doing some research into my destination. Obviously, a Lonely Planet has been purchased. They aren’t referred to as travellers bibles for nothing. The internet has also been a wonderful source of inspiration and ideas. I thought that a summary of some of the better pieces I have read recently to whet my appetite may be in order, to give you an idea of what is to come.

Top 7 Natural Wonders of New Zealand’s South Island (Travels with a mate). From giant round boulders, to glaciers, to penguins. New Zealand’s South Island clearly has a lot going for it on the natural wonders front, and this article handily sums up a top seven not to miss out on.

Five best drives in New Zealand (backpackingmatt). I fully intend to be purchasing some sort of vehicle, so knowing where to drive to is kinda handy. Matt documents five drives he thinks are unmissable. With a year before me, I think I should be able to take them all in.

Five roads less travelled in New Zealand (A dangerous business). When I’m done with the five best drives, I expect I’ll still have a bit of time left over.  A year is a long time. I’ll want to get off the beaten path. Luckily, here is a post documenting five less travelled roads. I know, it’s as if these folk know I am going.

Great reasons to visit New Zealand (nomadicmatt). Matt does appear to be a popular name in travelling circles. Or at least in the travelling to New Zealand and writing about it circles which I am currently swimming around in. Nomenclature aside, Nomadic Matt has taken some time to put together his reasons to visit New Zealand, covering a variety of aspects beyond just the natural beauty of the place. I know, I hardly need more reasons, my ticket is already booked. Nothing wrong with more excitement though. Happily, Matt has catered to my possible needs already, with a list of New Zealand travel tips.

33 Reasons to visit New Zealand (tntdownunder). If all of the above hadn’t already excited me, then this list of thirty three reasons certainly does. Whilst some of the ideas are a tad out of my forecast price range (helicopter trips to glaciers?), the ones that aren’t (visiting Mordor!) sound excellent.

Well, hopefully this has been interesting for you. If you are aware of further content on New Zealand, or have written a piece yourself, feel free to bring my attention to it in the comments below! Also, if you enjoyed this post, don’t forget to check out my summary of summaries that I published last week, which rounds up the best of the weeks travelling content, as picked out by other travel bloggers.

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Photo theme – Sunsets

Sunsets are probably some of the most photographed natural phenomenon on earth. Every sunset is completely unique, and I love watching them. Here are five of my favourite sunset photos, taken from my travels.

Sunset over Lagoon Beach, East Coast, Tasmania.

Sunset over the Devils Marbles, outback Australia

Sunset through the blowholes near Geraldton, Western Australia

Rippling water at sunset, Lake Clifton, Western Australia

Watching the sunset on La Digue island, Seychelles.

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Mr. Bean & Cultural Stereotyping

Now. Before I start this post, you should be warned, it could come across a little bit ranty. It is, if this is of any consolation, a Friday. Which means almost nothing when you are travelling, other than the fact that all the pubs are likely to be busier if you go out.

I wish to raise the issue of cultural stereotyping, and wonder if it is just me who finds the worldwide phenomenon that is Mr. Bean just a little bit odd. And if you are wondering what I am wittering about, here is a standard conversation that I may have whilst on the road, and someone realises I am from the UK:

Me: Oh hi, who are you, where are you from?

Other person: Ohmigod you are from the UK! I love Mr. Bean!

Me: Er, yes. Right. <sidle away gently>

This, I should point out, is not a problem unique to being English. My girlfriend, who happens to be German, ends up dealing with the belief that all Germans are obsessed with David Hasselhoff, and in particular, his singing. The conversation is a little bit similar to the one above, only instead of the “I love Mr. Bean” it is replaced with “Germany! You must love David Hasselhoff!”. This is, to be fair, probably worse.

Still, I find it rather tragic that the sole cultural export that appears to be instantly recognisable, and in fact, loved, worldwide, when someone discovers I am English, is a rather silent, and somewhat moronic TV character, played, in case you didn’t know, by Rowan Atkinson. It’s not like the UK doesn’t have other exports. Football hooligans for example. Or the belief that everything tastes better with ketchup. Hmm wait. Maybe Mr. Bean isn’t so bad after all.

I guess it makes some sort of sense. A knowledge of English isn’t really necessary, as there is never really any talking. The humour is slapstick and therefore easy to get. It’s not Monty Python, but I guess, it is as least British.

I wonder if other nationalities find themselves to be instantly categorised by some aspect of their culture that to them seems, well, plain weird. Do let me know in the comments. In the meantime I’m going to wrap a union jack around my waist and raise a glass of sherry to the queen, whilst humming rule Britannia. Which, of course, is how I always pass my Friday afternoons. Cheers!

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Offroad in Oz: The Lost Cities of Limmen

To continue the offroad section of posts on the site, which I started with my piece on Gregory National Park, here are some thoughts on another less well known and somewhat out of the way park in Australia’s Northern Territory – Limmen National Park.

Where and what is Limmen National Park?

Limmen is a 10,000 square kilometre National Park in the east of the Australia’s Northern Territory. It is managed by the Parks and Wildlife Commission of the Northern Territory, and has it’s own ranger station, as well as a number of basic campgrounds, which are either free or very inexpensive to stay at.

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A travel bloggers travel bloggers list

See what I did there? I created a confusing and inappropriately apostrophe free headline for this article. Brilliant. So what is it all about then? Well, it turns out, much to my surprise, and probably not to yours, that I am not the only person travelling and writing about it. I know.

Apparently there is this whole world out there of people writing, and travelling, and travelling, and writing. Some folk do these things at the same time! A complex feat I imagine, much like rubbing your stomach and gently ruffling your hair in synchronisation. Anyway, I felt I couldn’t let this mind blowing fact just float off into the breeze. No. I felt I should share it. But which travel writers do I tell you about?

Well. I found out that not only do other travellers blog, some of them even take the time to blog about other travel writers. I thought I could cunningly jump onto this trend, and blog about other travel writers who blog about other travel writers. Folk out there have done all the really hard work of trawling through a multitude of travel themed posts, and picking the particular highlights. So all I have to do is provide a list of the lists. A meta-list as it will. Hopefully this will start to make some sort of sense at any moment. To the list (of lists) we go!

Adventurous Kate – Kate has been putting together a list of her favourite travel blogs on a weekly basis for a long while now. This week she has found posts on Vodka and the Olympics. Last week it was Zorbing and travelling blogging basics. Other weeks have been just as good. An excellent read of reads.

Travelling Savage – Keith searches the web every month for the travel writing that he finds, in his words, “inspiring, informative and provocative”. His summaries, which he titles “Bloody Good Travel Writing”, are exactly that. I have linked to his July ‘10 post, but I suspect an August update will be coming soon.

Travelling Canucks – The travelling canucks, also known as Nicole and Cameron, have done a weekly update on their favourite travel blogs for the last couple of weeks, and I figure that if folk keep reading it, they’ll keep writing it! Worth a read.

yTravelBlog – Each week Caz and Craig feature a list of their favourite blogs from the past week, focusing on particular travel themed topics, ranging from travel tips, to photography, to inspiring ideas. You can also draw your attention to your favourite posts for consideration, if you so wish.

Top 100 Independent Travel sites – If the above aren’t enough, here’s one to pass a few days of your life. Brendan spends what I can only imagine is an inordinate amount of time compiling a list of his top 100 Independent travel sites, based on Alexa rankings combined with his personal secret formula. Which he details in more er, detail, on his site. Enjoy that one, it’ll keep you going for a while.

Hopefully this has helped you discover some new sources for travel themed writing. Humour aside for a brief moment, it’s always a pleasure (and often an inspiration) going out and seeing what other people are doing and writing about. It’s a big old world (and web) out there. If you feel I’ve missed another brilliant list from the above, do let me know!

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Offroad in Oz: Gregory National Park

Gregory National Park is not on most visitors to-do lists when visiting Australia’s Northern Territory. It doesn’t have the dramatic natural wonders of Kakadu or the myriad water holes and easy accessibility of Litchfield. It doesn’t have the gorges of Katherine National Park, or the incredibly well known majesty of Uluru.

What it does have, on the other hand, are miles and miles of out of the way superb off road track. Which was why, when travelling through the Northern Territory, we decided to spend nine days exploring it.

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Kids, cars and chores

Yesterday was a day of new experiences. The first of these was doing housework. Ok, so I’ve done housework before. But a year living out of a tent really reduces the amount of housework you get used to doing, as all you need to do is turn the thing upside down from time to time and you are pretty much done. This approach is less applicable to a brick and mortar based dwelling.

The house I am currently living in (more on that here) has a rota based cleaning system, whereby every week one of the seven housemates cleans all the publicly used areas. Yesterday was my turn, as my better half had decided I could fill in for her while she was out earning some money.

There are a variety of options to take when housecleaning. The “surface tidy”, where you clean everything visible and hope no-one moves anything for a while. The “shuffle”, where you move everything around so it looks like a lot of effort has gone into it. As it was I went, rather surprisingly to me most of all, for the “nuke the site from orbit” approach, and spent six hours cleaning the place. I think the housemates now believe I have serious OCD about cleanliness, and I admit, perhaps cleaning and then lining up every single spice bottle on the spice shelf with the label front and centre may have been a step too far. Still the house, which wasn’t really dirty to being with, is certainly clean now. Even if the party planned for tonight will probably ruin all that.

Another new experience I had yesterday was driving a manual car on the wrong side of the  road. I have previously driven on the wrong side of the road whilst travelling in America, in one of those hilariously large tank like creations they call SUV’s, but that was an automatic, so was a little less scary. Admittedly, that was my first time driving an automatic, and I’m pretty sure that I terrified the hire car man by demanding of him how it worked, before pulling out into the San Francisco rush hour traffic, but at least I didn’t waste too much time trying to change gear by opening the door.

Instead of a hire car man, Vera was my victim, sitting patiently in the passenger seat as I attempted to convey us from point A to point B safely. It was weirdly like learning to drive all over again, the amount of concentration required to keep the car on the right bit of road, and changing gear with the wrong hand, not to mention all these cars coming at me on the wrong side of the road, was fairly taxing. Still, we got to our destination fairly safely. The whole purpose of the driving mission was to prepare me for a solo mission, as I was supposed to be picking up another car, but as the current tenant of said car had recently filled it’s usually petrol based tank with diesel, it wasn’t in a hurry to go anywhere, so the practice was in vain.

The final part of yesterdays new experiences involved Sri Lankan food and eating etiquette. But wait, you cry out. I promised kids in the title. I did. They were there too, although I can hardly claim kids to be a new experience for me. The culmination of the driving was the cottage owned by Vera’s grandparents, lovingly stuck in a sixties time warp. Staying here for a couple of weeks had been Vera’s godmother, and by some complex familial relationship, a Sri Lankan lady and her three children, ages 3, 7 and 9.

Regular followers will know that I am not generally brilliant with kids. I am not against the whole idea, but we usually don’t get on so well. There are exceptions to this rule. When travelling in Oz for example, I met some kids of a friend who were actually a joy to be around. One of them spent some time explaining his toy tank to me. He pointed out that it was the only tank in the world that could go underwater. I was hugely impressed by this youngsters knowledge of tanks, and asked him how it achieved this feat. He looked at me rather seriously, and explained that it was because it was a toy.

This is usually how it goes, and yesterday was no exception. My problems of not being able to speak German, (nor Tamil) meant that the girls clearly assumed I was fairly simple. I was carefully fed tic tacs. A three year old spent some time trying to learn my name, repeatedly asking in German what my name was. After a while of me sitting and staring in wild incomprehension, she said very slowly and clearly in German, that her name was Judy, and then pointed at me. Comprehension dawned. I managed to say my own name. Melon was presented to me as a reward for overcoming this clearly  challenging task.

Luckily, not being able to converse in German was not a huge barrier to acceptance. I was solemnly told to be quiet when a butterfly landed nearby, not, I hasten to add, so that we could revere it’s beauty, but rather so that a fly swat could be retrieved in order to squish it. I can report that a gentle cough prompted the butterfly on it’s way before death could be rained down. I was presented with a book of fairy tales to read aloud, which clearly caused issues, what with it being all in German. Pity was once again taken on me, the book was taken from my hands, and the story explained to me using the pictures. What I did learn from this experience is that if you want to rapidly progress in German, pitying seven year olds and a fairy tale book are a pretty good way to go about it. Assuming your future linguistic requirements involve ginger bread houses and witches.

Finally, after all this excitement, it was time for dinner, which was a traditional Sri Lankan affair. As well as the food being excellent, it turned out that eating with your hands was the way to go. As a result, Sri Lanka has now been firmly propelled into my list of places I must visit. Because making decisions about future trips based on a lack of eating utensils is how i like to roll. Yes. That is all for today. Tonight the annual house party is being held, which will no doubt involve beer, frolics and fun, of a Germanic nature. I expect I will report on that soon…

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Gamescom

Given that my better half is working this week, I decided that I should entertain myself. So I took the decision to pop into Cologne, navigate the tram system, and visit the worlds largest games event, the Cologne Gamescom.

The trip into Cologne, my first major foray out into the wilds of Germany on my own, did not start entirely as planned. I had travelled roughly two hundred metres from the property when I was stopped by the police. It is, I learnt, illegal in Germany to walk across a pedestrian crossing when the light is red. I explained in the UK that it wasn’t illegal, at which the officer looked perplexed, and said that it must be. I wasn’t sure that debating the finer points of the differences in judicial systems was going to win me any prizes at this juncture, plus I was clearly in the wrong, and gave in gracefully, wondering what my fate was likely to be. After checking my driving license against a list, presumably of international drug smugglers and the like, the officer emerged from his car, returned my driving license, explained again that it was illegal in the UK to cross the road as I had, and drove off. I guess I was lucky to get away without a fine.

Run in with the police aside, it was on to Cologne and Gamescom. Now if you are a regular reader, you will know that I was once a keen gamer, back in the time when I had a house and possessions and gaming consoles and the like. I am still interested in the medium, and as it was a jolly day with nothing else to occupy me, wandering around a giant series of exhibition halls looking at what the latest in interactive entertainment had to offer seemed like a great idea.

Now then. If I was a proper journalist, I would have been intelligent and taken lots of photos to describe the experience of the three giant halls, the pumping speaker systems, the lights, the people, the games, the costumes, and so on. As it was, I forgot my camera. So you will have to put up with me trying to imagine the scenario, and some stock imagery that I will borrow from the internet.

Gamescom, I learnt quickly, is massive. There are three main exhibitor halls, playing  host to over 400 exhibitors. Pretty much every major gaming company, and a few other random hardware and software companies, turn up and put on shows designed to lure you in to their product. Most of these, obviously, were in German, so failed on me. What, therefore, were my highlights?

A few things are clearly big news in gaming at the moment. 3D is one of these things. I had a go on a few demos that used 3D vision, in a bid to enhance the gaming experience. I have to admit, I was entirely underwhelmed by the experience. First off, you have to wear 3D glasses for the effect to work - anyone without glasses will just see a messy blur on the screen. Then when you do wear the glasses, it has the side effect of darkening the whole experience. And the experience, other than the gimmick of it being in 3D, doesn’t seem to actually add anything useful to the games. Sadly Nintendo didn’t seem to be demoing the 3DS, their upcoming glasses free 3D portable device, so I can’t report back on their technology, but for me, glasses based 3D gaming isn’t a major new thing to get excited about.

The other major “innovation” at the moment is motion based gaming. Sure, Nintendo brought this to the mass market in 2006 with the Wii, but neither Sony nor Microsoft had really made any efforts to get in on this, until now. Now, Sony has it’s Move, and Microsoft has Kinect.

Move is basically just the same as the Wii, but on a Playstation. The controllers look a bit like a cross between an illuminated ice cream cone and a pulsating phallus. You look particularly stupid waving them around, and there were lots and lots of people waving them around at Gamescon, as Sony had one of the largest stands. People were playing tennis with them, flailing them wildly in some hack and slash game (where the on screen characters seemed to ignore them and get on with their own thing) and using them as guns. I was not entirely impressed that it had taken Sony four years to come up with basically the Sony Wii, but there we are. I’m sure it will sell. Probably.

Microsoft’s Kinect, on the other hand, is a much more interesting proposition in my mind. Dispensing with the “wave a wand around like a demented runway controller” ethic, it uses a clever camera system to actually track a users body motion. This opens up worlds of possibility, with dance games, rafting games (what?) and er.. other games. It’s a bit of a new concept for developers to work with, so I expect games could take a while to properly take advantage of the technology. At least you aren’t waving a purple ended dildo-a-like around though.

Away from the consoles, I didn’t see anything else that was entirely revolutionary. There were, for example, a lot of World of Warcraft clones. If you aren’t familiar with World of Warcraft, it is from a genre of game called a massively multiplayer online role playing game, or MMORPG for short. It is, as the catchy genre name would suggest, a game where you play online with millions of other players in a fantasy setting. You can role play, if you wish. It has been phenomenally successful as games go, with around 11.5 million people playing (and paying monthly) to do so. Such a player base is rather tempting to other games developers, and it was inevitable to see a lot of games which looked rather similar to Warcraft in style, if not name, being demonstrated. I suspect they will largely fall by the wayside, with the exception of the upcoming Star Wars MMO, the Old Republic, which will probably be able to leverage the Star Wars fan base sufficiently to survive. Oh, and there is a Lego based MMO, Lego Universe, about to be launched also. I have a couple of beta keys for this, if you are interested, just comment at the end and I’ll give them to er.. the first people to post. Yep.

There were a lot of other games being demonstrated, I won’t go through them all. I noticed a distinct inverse correlation between the quality of title and the number of scantily clad ladies employed to woo people in. Again, the lack of camera had it’s downside.

One of my favourite stands was from Norton who, obviously not having a game to show off, being an antivirus company, just had a bouncy castle thing. Because however hard you try, anti-virus is never going to be interesting. Whereas everyone likes a good bouncy castle.

Some people turned up dressed as their favourite gaming character. Mario was oddly  popular. This being Germany, the food was also excellent, with sausages being front and centre of the menu options. Beer was also on tap, costing for some reason the same as coke. Clearly the former was the preferred option, to help soften the giant onslaught of marketing blows that were being directed at my head.

Finally, having wandered around a lot and played a wide variety of games (I spent some time invading Nazi Germany in Ruse before it occurred to me this was probably not totally politically correct), including the excellent looking LittleBigPlanet 2, it was time to head home. Which I managed without running into the police. Success all round.

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Inside Australia: Art in out of the way WA

There is, on a dried out salt flat deep in the heart of the Western Australian goldfields, an art installation by the renowned artist Antony Gormley. It is one of the largest outdoor art installations in the world, and absolutely worth the trek to get to.

Called Inside Australia, and comprising 51 statues spread out across a ten square kilometre area, the work will be familiar to anyone who has seen any of the artists other work. When travelling in Australia, my companions and I decided that a detour up to see the statues would be worth it.

To start with, the installation is not exactly centrally located. The nearest form of habitation, 55 kilometres away, is the tiny town of Menzies. Whilst not exactly a metropolis, Menzies does have a helpful tourist information office who will give you more precise directions to the Lake. Getting to Menzies requires a 125km drive from Kalgoorie-Boulder, Western Australias gold mining capital, also worth a visit in its own right. Here you will find Australia’s largest open cut mine, the Superpit, where you can watch insanely large trucks shuttling in and out of the hole in the ground. You can also take in the other highlights of the town, including the working brothels and the 24 hour bars where most of the barmaids parade in their underwear. I appear to have digressed. If you are still wondering where all these things are, Kalgoorie is 550km East of Perth.

Our journey to the salt lake had us arriving on a breezy November morning. We had managed to time our arrival to be just after a series of huge rainstorms which had caused the, presumably usually baked dry salt lake, to turn into a giant quagmire of mud, thinly covered by a veil of water.

Whilst this made getting around the site a bit difficult (no vehicles are allowed on the  lake), it did mean that the views were absolutely spectacular. The water caused incredible reflections, and the flatness of the lake caused it to merge into the sky seamlessly. We were the only people visiting the installation, and it literally felt like we were the only people left in the world, with these 51 statues our only remaining reminder of humanity.

Due to the conditions on the lake, and the fact that every step carried the potential for some serious mud based disaster, we elected not to do the full tour of every statue, which takes around four hours. Instead we took in some of the statues, and climbed the conveniently located conical hill a couple of hundred yards into the lake which provides an excellent view of much of the installation.

We also discovered a campsite in the creation, just on the edge of the lake, which is probably finished by now. I would highly recommend stopping over for the night if you are out here and the weather is a bit better than we had, as I can imagine the experience of watching the sun setting across the statues and the stars wheeling overhead would be quite phenomenal. As it was, our weather wasn’t great, so we scuttled back to Kalgoorie for some restorative beers, and some time to reflect on what we had experienced.

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To the parents

Parents. Love them or hate them, you are usually stuck with them. We don’t get much choice or say as to who our parents are, and given the overall influence they end up having on our lives, that’s a pretty big thing.

I’ve just returned from a stop over in the UK, a stop over which felt a bit like the filling in between two mighty loaves of trip, a year in Oz (just done) and a year in New Zealand (about to start). A week of this was spent staying with my parents, who I hadn’t seen for around about fourteen months, and who I am unlikely to see again for a potentially similar amount of time.

This, I would suggest, is the main problem with travelling. It is, by it’s nature, an almost entirely selfish activity. We set off on our trips, floating around the world like hot air balloons whisked into a giant jetstream, and end up leaving our friends and loved ones far behind. Certainly, we can keep in contact, via the myriad social tools available to us these days, and I did my best to keep my parents in particular involved with my trip around Oz, sending them updates via e-mail as to every aspect of my trip, which they then carefully plotted onto a giant wall map of Australia. In some way, it felt like they were partaking. But it’s obviously not the same as physically being there.

So, my parents. They are incredibly supportive, and in fact, have been throughout my life. My love of travelling is entirely their fault. When he was in his early twenties, for example, my Dad set off on a road trip around Australia, in a classic land rover. (Well, I had to get the idea from somewhere.) When I was growing up, I was carted off all over the world. Europe, Africa. Nowhere was entirely out of bounds. My safety, I’m sure, was always important, but new experiences were deemed a necessary part of growing up.

When I was about to turn eleven, having led a relatively normal life up to this point (other than the year or so living out of a VW camper van), they moved to the Seychelles, and took the rather brave decision to take my brother and I with them, where we ended up having to educate ourselves whilst living on a tiny desert island, a long long way from anywhere.

When I turned fifteen, and decided I wanted to leave this island paradise and go get educated more thoroughly in a boarding school in the UK, they were again tremendously supportive, and sent me off into the world. And so it goes. All through my life they have continuously let me go my own way, and make my own mark on the world, always willing to offer support and advice where I wanted it. More recently, I rang them up to inform them that the seven years of career I had had, built upon the private education and university studies that they had funded, were probably about enough, and I felt this urge to go and see a bit more of the world. Again, support and advice were offered. Criticism was not.

So. I’m not saying my parents are unique. Anyone willing to take up the mantle of responsibility and sleeplessness that producing offspring requires must be a pretty wonderful person. But i feel lucky to have them, and thought they deserved to know. Thanks for reading.

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Essential English food

Experiencing a nations food is a key part of any travelling experience. Here, therefore, is my guide to some things you will want to try out if you are wandering around England. This isn’t going to be a list of gastronomic delights, rather it’s an overview of your more classic (read: unhealthy) English dishes.

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Travels with a smoker

As I sit here, at Manchester Airport, waiting for my inevitably delayed flight to convey me back to Germany, with depressed people sitting all around in that manner that only an airport full of people can effectively convey, I feel I should convey to you, my possibly non-smoking audience, the mysteries of the world as a travelling smoker.

I am not, I should mention, a smoker, but my dear girlfriend is, and the spin that this addiction puts onto any journey is quite interesting. If you are a smoker, you will notice that the smoking world appears to be getting smaller. Places where you can smoke freely are shrinking. In Japan, when I was there last, smoking appeared to be restricted to pubs, lighting up on the street except in specially designated areas was definitely a no-no. In the UK, smoking in pubs is entirely out of bounds, as is smoking in pretty much every other covered place. In the Northern Territory of Australia, one of the last bastions of smokers freedom in the country, smoking is, as of writing, still legal, but one can no longer light up in hospitals as of July 2009. In Germany, smoking is usually not allowed in any kind of pub or bar, unless they have registered as a smoking club. The number of registered smoking clubs has somewhat increased of late.

Clearly, transportation mechanisms and hubs are a bit of a tricky one for your average smoker to navigate, as pretty much all of these are smoke free environments. As soon as one enters an airport terminal building, or boards a train or bus, there is the fear and serious likelihood that one may not be able to get a nicotine hit for perhaps hours, or in the case of a long haul flight to the other side of the world, days to come. A lonely huddle of people, frantically sucking on their burning tobacco leaves, can usually be spotted just outside these buildings, or inspecting fire doors furtively, hoping for a bit of freedom and a last reprieve.

If you are particularly lucky, the airport management will have set aside a spot for you. Chinese airports are particularly good at this, largely I suspect, as smoking is a national pastime. And so it is at Manchester. It is not, I hasten to add, an easy venue to find. Some questioning of airport staff and travels down abandoned feeling corridors is required But amazingly, after the hard work, you are rewarded with a rather wonderful little spot, and somewhere I would never have experienced had I not been travelling with a smoker.

I had feared that some sort of underground basement room, thick with the fug of years of past smokers offerings, would be our fate, and the maze of corridors we headed down had not given me any hope for anything else. However, we emerged into a pleasantly breezy area near the top of the terminal, with lovely views of the.. well.. airport. Yes, it still had that wonderful smokey aroma, and hints of dribbled ash around the place. But the view was lovely as the sun set magnificently across aircraft tails and runway lights blinked excitingly in the distance. It wasn’t somewhere I would have visited had I not been travelling with a smoker, and it was almost worth the passive smoking risks to discover.

I was given my standard issue boiled sweet to suck upon as compensation for not lighting up and started to ponder, as I gazed out to the setting sun, what other wonderful little hideaways I am going to be discovering as I continue to travel with my chimney like other half.

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Why travel?

As I write this, I am sitting in my parents house in Wales, at the age of thirty. Currently I’m unemployed, although as I’m not looking for work nor claiming any form of benefit, I prefer to think of myself as retired, or between careers, awaiting the right opportunity.

I have recently returned from a year long trip around Australia, and am shortly to embark upon another trip, this time a year to New Zealand.

I have been incredibly privileged in my travels in my life thus far, having covered significant portions of Europe and Africa, as well as dipping my toe into the Americas and the Far East.

So, as I sit here, watching the grey clouds filter carefully over the Welsh hills, pondering another year of adventure ahead, it strikes me to wonder what drives me, and well, us, those folk who seem to wander, gypsy like through the world, to keep on going, to eschew the material world and the security of a permanent job, to throw large parts of civilisation aside in the quest for… for… well. Something I assume.

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To Harlech!

One thing that I definitely missed whilst traipsing around Australia, if there was anything I could miss whilst my brain was being gently blown away by the staggering scenery, was old stuff. Ok, sure, Australia is host to one of the oldest peoples on the planet, and evidence of their existence certainly appears all over the place, but when it comes to newer, well, old stuff, it is missing out. By newer old stuff I mean things like seriously old buildings, and in particular, decent castles. Australian new old stuff usually is no more than 200 years old, and revolves around the fairly amazing expeditions that the early explorers set out on. I digress.

The UK, whilst perhaps not having thousands of kilometres of glorious blue skied outback to wander around in, does come up trumps with regard to old buildings, and in particular castles. And so it was yesterday, as the weather did that thing it does so well in Wales (i.e. unpredictably drizzle), a trip to Harlech castle was scheduled in.

Our route took us through Barmouth, a classic Victorian seaside town, which as far as I can tell hasn’t changed hugely from the eighteen hundreds. In the rain, people mill around in a confused manner, stumbling from rock shops to amusement arcades and back again, occasionally diverting via the fish and chip shop, or perhaps the pub. Barmouth took some time to pass through, tiny though it was, as tourists wandered zombie like into the roads on one of the routes from building to building. Generally, a seaside town in the rain is a terribly depressing place. Further digression appears to have occurred.

Harlech Castle, a few miles on from Barmouth, is a wonderful example of classic English castle building. I say English, because it was built in the 12th century by the English King to keep the rowdy Welsh, recently quelled in an uprising, from doing so again. And it was, admittedly, built by a chap from the continent. However, it looks pretty classically English, as castles go, all turrets and massively thick grey walls and arrow loops. There are a whole chain of these castles up the coast, Harlech just happened to be our closest.

It scores highly on my personal castle-o-meter, as you can access pretty much all of it. Too often these days we are tempted by the sight of intriguing looking spires and turrets, yet held back by formidable gates and warning signs. Harlech Castle eschews, for the large part, personal safety in the name of exploration, and I applaud them for it. So it was that we climbed the highest part of the Castle and wandered along the battlements. This also afforded us a tremendous view of the Welsh countryside out into the sweep of Cardigan Bay, and the grey, cloud covered and angry looking mountains of the Snowdon area. The highlight of the castle trip for my travelling companion did appear to be a large ginger cat who gave the impression of owning the place, but at least some culture was absorbed in the process.

After the castle trip we had some rather tasty ice creams, and then headed back along the coast home, stopping on the way to see an ancient burial mound. This mostly consisted of some carefully balanced rocks, but as they had been carefully balanced over four thousand years ago, they were worth a bit of a look see. We looked and saw.

Finally we returned home, via an extended stop off in Barmouth where a thorough walking tour was given (including the highlight, the pub I worked in for three hours as a Chef before it was discovered I wasn’t, in fact, a chef, my shortest career ever), before we got back to the house and dinner was served, courtesy of my brothers girlfriend, Rosie. Normally I wouldn’t go into much detail on dinner, and I won’t now either, suffice to say, if you lovingly bake my initial into the pastry top of the meal I am about to eat, you will win my stomach forever.

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Snowdonian explorations

I have started to notice a definite obsession in the general British media with regards to the war and Hitler. Normally I suspect this is something I would perhaps not notice, but due to my current status quo of visiting the UK with my significantly German other half, it is something that is definitely more noticeable. I’m not entirely clear why it is brought up quite so regularly, and Vera doesn’t actually mind of course, as this wasn’t really anything she had anything to do with, but it is, nonetheless, quite a strange phenomenon.

The war aside, we have spent a rather lovely couple of days in rural Wales. The setting of my parents house really is quite stunning, right on the bank of the Mawddach river estuary (Vera is having tremendous fun trying to pronounce Welsh place names), at a point where the tidal river estuary is nearly two miles wide. From the house we can see across the estuary and up into the might of Cader Idris, one of the highest mountains in the region, and a tremendously nice climb. We haven’t as yet climbed it admittedly, as currently my travelling companion and family are being gently eased into the walking lifestyle with a series of shorter, less strenuous walks, but it is on the list.

Our first trip out was up into the hills at the rear of the house, which take you up to an elevation of just around 1000ft, affording splendid views up the river estuary and of the whole Cardigan Bay area, starting with the sea side towns of Barmouth and Fairbourne. We even saw a steam train puffing across the bridge, further proof no doubt that the UK really is just a giant Harry Potter set. We bumped into a group of hikers, on the final day of a four day expedition, and gave them hope that they were nearly where they were going. Ice creams, i assured them, were just over the next hill.

We also wandered around the quaint village of Dolgellau, all grey stone houses with slate roofs, and chomped down on a honeycomb and clotted cream icecream, roundly concluded by all to be tip top. At any moment, I suspect, my life will turn into an Enid Blyton novel. Lashings of Ginger Beer will soon be consumed. Maybe even bread with honey.

The rest of the week has further walks planned. Today is a day of rest due to various blisters needing healing (well, a pub trip is planned in for lunch), but I have hopes that should the weather continue to not rain, then Cader will be conquered. Possibly even Snowdon, Wales’s highest mountain, and one that I have never actually got round to climbing. And, if all goes well, a final send off before I return to Germany will take place, in the form of a large bonfire in the garden. Pyromania all round.

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Of treehouses

There is something quite fine about a well executed party. The ebb and flow of people. The sipping of beverages. The meeting of old friends, the acquainting of new. The pounding beats and the mellow vibes from a delicately contrived playlist (well ok, Marilyn Manson during the grandparents tea and cakes was mistimed). The lights playing gently in the trees as swathes of bubbles float gently past. The swaying in huge cargo nets, suspended as a spider would weave her gossamer nets in the sky.

Admittedly, not all of these experiences happen at every party, but then not every party is held at a treehouse. It’s hard to describe the venue particularly well… I guess I could sum it up as a wasted youth. When other kids were out playing on their BMX’s, or supping furtively on a bottle of cider in a bus shelter, for some reason friends of mine and I spent happy weekends building a behemoth construction at the bottom of their garden. Literally years in the making, the treehouse has grown beyond all our imaginings, to a venue that has catered to parties of over three hundred, accommodated in areas ranging from the aforementioned suspended cargo nets, to an underground tee-pee village. Quite a surreal place really.

Anyway, the party was most excellent. Catching up with folks I had not anticipated on seeing for at least another year. Congratulating people on recent engagements, missed birthdays, new babies. Thanking people for making the journey, some from as far away as Newcastle. Sitting around, swopping tales of the past year, the adventures of life that I had missed out on, as meat was grilled over the fire and quantities of beer were imbibed. After much jollity and fun, when the embers of the fire were burnt down and the beer supplies had been steadily worn away, the lights were turned out, the music ended, and beds were sought, as the birds were preparing for their dawn chorus.

Post party, the Sunday recovery effort largely featured a walk around the area. A pool was swum in, despite it feeling roughly as warm as the Tasman sea in winter. Our walk allowed us to spy the spires of Oxford from afar, a city which is as pretty to behold from a distance as it is to wander around up close.

Today, we have conquered the quirks of the Welsh railway network, on a journey which has taken us a little under six hours to travel something pitiful like 200 miles, to the rural and mountain filled landscape of the Snowdonia national park, where I am catching up with the majority of my family (having a compact family certainly has its benefits). My parents seemed genuinely delighted to see me, and having not seen them for fourteen months this is perhaps not unexpected. The weather is looking changeable, but I have high hopes of getting some walking done. I’d like to finish this post by thanking everyone who made the week thus far what it has been, for turning up, for being fun, and generally, just for being, well, you. And everyone else who is reading too: have a smile on me.

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Oxford meanderings

First off, let me preface this post by letting my more regular readers know that I am going to attempt to merge two blog themes, the first being travel, the second being drinking, into one mashed up post. Less regular readers, welcome. Where have you been?

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Leaf blowing

I spent a veritable chunk of yesterday handling a leaf blower, a tremendously fun device that turns the chore of raking leaves into a whirlwind of excitement. It is perhaps not the most effective way to tidy an area, but I am happy to sacrifice effectiveness for fun when I can.

The reason for this gardening related activity (and it has been a while since a gardening related topic has featured) is that a large party is planned for Saturday, at an outdoor location, and as the venue has not really been tidied in around a year, a large amount of forest has landed on it. So some sweeping and blowing has been required. I also spent some time wiring up some speakers and resurrecting an ancient amplifier, as well as testing various lights, none of which actually worked. A trip to a lighting store is now planned to ensure the party has all the requisite ingredients. In good news at least, the three bubble machines are working.

Our host, a great friend of mine from the early mists of time, was tremendously impressed by our work ethic. Well, I say our. For some reason playing with a leaf blower and messing around with speaker wires didn’t totally qualify as work. He was more impressed I believe by the Amazonian qualities of Vera, who spent a very long time sweeping various tree suspended platforms with a broom. So long in fact, that she managed to break the broom. I live in fear of a woman who can snap a broom handle in two as if it were kindling. Slight fear of one’s other half is, no doubt, a healthy quality for a sustainable relationship.

This is all taking place in the wonderful back drop of the English country side, just outside the city of Oxford, a town which we will be visiting later on today, to ogle at the marvels of the colleges, to wander around the intelligent feeling Bodleian library, and even perhaps to delve into some of the many rather fine pubs. A more full update on that will follow, perhaps even with pictures and possible travel related information. Even though I have received feedback recently that I have been focusing too much on the travel tales and too little on the tales of drinking. You can be a tough audience sometimes folks. I will try to please you all. More to follow on our adventures in Oxford, the tree based party and life, as it flows on by.

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Ah, English summer

After a fairly protracted trip from Germany to England, involving a tram, four trains, a tube and a Toyota Prius (the last five miles of the trip were therefore fairly environmentally friendly), we have now arrived into a glorious English summer, where I am delighted to report a steady and persistent drizzle is upon us.

The transport for most of the way was fairly smooth. The German side of the equation was, as one would expect, efficient and on time. Travelling from the village of Walberberg to the airport of Cologne/Bonn was a relaxed and easy affair. Of course, as soon as we entered the side of the transport system which involved English transportation mechanics, it went a tiny bit off the rails. The flight was delayed slightly, but not too much. The train that then whisked us into central London was, at least, rather timely. And then I decided that a patented guided walk along the Thames from our arrival point at London Bridge, to our meeting point for lunch with some friends just near Westminster, was in order.

If you don’t have much time in London, and are just passing through, a walk from London Bridge to the Houses of Parliament is one of the easiest ways to get as many sights in as possible. Just take the Thames Path along the south side of the river and you will see a whole manner of sights, starting with Tower Bridge, passing the beautifully recognisable St. Paul’s Cathedral, past the replica of the Golden Hinde, along the front of the rather imposing former power station that is the Tate Modern (and accompanying odd looking Millenium Bridge over the river), past the quaint Gabriel’s Wharf and then onto the South Bank arts area proper, where you can take in the hilariously angular South bank arts centre area, including the Royal Festival Hall and the Hayward Gallery. If you happen to be in slightly less of an Easyjet inspired rush, you could even stop at some of these destinations for a peruse. In our case, however, we rushed on, past the skating park under the South Bank and to the Jubilee Bridge, from where you can see the massive ferris wheel that is the London Eye, and right down the sweep of the Thames to the Houses of Parliament and the Ministry of Defence buildings. If I had had even the tiniest amount of time to spare, a visit to Gordons wine bar, just next to Charing Cross and set in an underground cave, would have been entirely in order. Sadly this was not to be.

Obviously, when doing a rapid fire walking tour, it is important to know your audience. Rambling on at length about the brilliance of Sir Wren’s architectural triumphs is likely to fall on deaf ears if your charge happens to be more interested in which parts of the Thames featured in the most recent Harry Potter movie. I predict I will be strung up when my other half reads this.

Finally, after swinging through Trafalgar Square, and peering down the length of the Mall to the dot that was Buckingham Palace, we arrived at our lunchtime destination, a friendly pub on Whitehall, just across the road from the Horseguards and number ten downing street, possibly setting a world record for number of sights seen in a forty minute walking tour.

Lunch was a passable affair, despite the efforts of the barstaff to keep us sat at our table, and not destroying the system by ordering actual drinks from the actual bar. They exacted their revenge upon us by delivering Vera’s salmon well after the rest of us had finished. The food was excellent nevertheless, one of the finest pub burgers I have had in a long time. Some people measure restaurants by their eggs, personally I prefer a less complex and more meat filled burger ranking system. This one did well.

After lunch it was another quick dash across London, this time by tube (although if we hadn’t been lugging heavy backpacks, the new cycle hire scheme would have been put to good use, there are stands literally everywhere) to Paddington, where our train to Oxford had happily been cancelled. It’s always a pleasure to introduce someone new to the vagaries of the English transportation system, and the railways in particular. Still, with some helpful advice from a nearby staff member, we navigated our way to Oxford via an alternative route, and managed to arrive only two minutes later than we had planned. Where our lift was awaiting, to carry us in fine style to our lodgings for the next few days. More on these to follow in another post.

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Packing philosophies

There are various methodologies employed when packing. I normally sway towards the theory that everything should be left until roughly the last thirty minutes before I go, and then hoping that the sheer panic that sets in when I realise I haven’t packed will carry me through to victory. Admittedly this can sometimes backfire horribly, when I land somewhere toting only one Hawaiian shirt and seventeen pairs of underpants, but most of the time it is a spot on philosophy. Spending too much time thinking about the packing just results in disaster, in my case anyway, I just end up with loads of stuff that I really didn’t need or want. On one trip, I ended up re-packing my bag two days after arrival into two bags, one which contained the things I actually needed, and the other which I didn’t open again for the next five weeks.

I haven’t, therefore, packed as yet for my trip to the UK tomorrow. I will probably leave it until tomorrow morning, at around six am, which is around half an hour before we have to leave. My dear girlfriend, on the other hand, appears to be opting for the “panic over the clothing to take the night before” option. And not wishing to stereotype, but girls do seem to have it harder when it comes to selecting outfits for travelling. I can hardly blame her. I have informed her that England is likely to be cold, that we will be attending an outdoor party at a giant treehouse, and we will spend a number of days tramping over Welsh mountains, as well as some other days wandering around the Oxfordshire countryside and associated pubs. Who could know what to pack in such a scenario? Luckily my entire life has been compressed down into a rucksack already, so it’s not so much a question of choice, more a question of what is clean when I randomly select it and stuff it haphazardly into my Easyjet approved hand luggage sized day pack.

Anyway. The point of this post is that I am off to the UK on a little excursion tomorrow. The first half of this trip will be meeting up with some absolutely wonderful friends who live in Oxford, who are kindly accommodating me, where we will spend some time wandering around Oxford (one of my favourite UK cities) and I expect, visiting pubs. We’ll also be having a large party at a treehouse. This is a fairly hard venue to explain, and will probably be the subject of it’s own blog post at some point.

The second half of the trip will be visiting my parents in Wales, and wandering around the mountainsides of Snowdonia, which is a spectacularly beautiful part of the world. I really can’t wait. I will, of course, be blogging about the whole thing on the way and with any luck, the trip won’t be quite so alcohol based as my previous trip to the UK, where from what I can hazily recall, I largely stumbled from pub to pub with my brother and various friends, presumably in some sort of misguided effort to set some kind of world record for pub visits in six days. Which we no doubt failed to achieve.

One final thing. A friend of mine has recently started her own blog, and as she is about to embark on a year long trip to Australia, it will probably be worth checking out. Her name is Katie, and her blog can be found here. Enjoy!

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Ten tips to make the most of your travels

You may be a seasoned veteran traveller, or you could be off on your first big adventure. Whichever part of the travelling spectrum you fit into, I thought some ideas on how to make the most of your travels, based on my various travelling experiences, could come in handy. In no particular order therefore, here are my ten tips to get the best from your travels..

Tip 1 – Tear up the plan: Having a plan is certainly a good idea, particularly if there are certain places or things you are keen to see. But don’t be too inflexible, or unwilling to throw your plans out of the window and head off in a new direction. You never know who you might meet, or what you might learn on your trip that could cause your travels to go in a new direction. Often it is the unplanned things that we cherish the most from a trip.

Tip 2 – Try new things: Your travels are an adventure, so trying new things should almost be a given. This could be as easy as trying the local delicacy, or as exhilarating as throwing yourself from an aeroplane. New experiences are the goal here, so try and get as many of them as possible, you might be surprised with what you learn about yourself.

Tip 3 – Meet new people: Often it is the people you meet that make the trip. Travelling is a tremendous opportunity to meet folk from all kinds of backgrounds and places, with stories to tell and information to swap. But don’t expect people to come flocking to you, it may be that you have to make a bit of effort, or leave your comfort zone a little in order to make first contact. I found this particularly true when travelling as a couple. The rewards are worth it though. And don’t forget to exchange details when you part, something as simple as exchanging Facebook details will let you keep in touch with your new friends even as your travels draw you apart physically.

Tip 4 – Stay a while: If you are on a long term trip, don’t be afraid to put down roots for a while in an area. Often as travellers we find ourselves rushing from destination to destination, skimming the surface and “checking off” a place before heading on. Slowing the pace down and absorbing an area more fully can be highly rewarding as you get to know the people, culture and place more fully.

Tip 5 – Keep a record: Take a lot of photos, keep a journal, write a blog. However you want to capture the experience you are having, just do your best to capture it. Once your trip is over you’ll want to look back it, and if your memories fade, you’ll be able to remember the experience in much greater detail with some aids.

Tip 6 – Travelling companions: If you are going to be travelling with one or more people, make sure you are likely to be a compatible travelling group. If you plan to spend your whole trip hiking up giant mountains, whilst your companions are more of the beach dwelling type, then you could have a problem. There is no right or wrong way to experience a trip, but ensuring you are all looking for something similar before you set off, or at the least, planning to satisfy everyone's needs, is a better way to start. And don’t be afraid to part ways if a trip isn’t working out as you had hoped, often this can be better for everyone involved rather than trying to keep something going that clearly isn’t working for everyone.

Tip 7 – Pack appropriately: I have a more detailed post on packing tips here, but essentially, do some research into where you are heading and try to avoid taking anything unnecessary. The world isn’t quite as remote a place as we like to think, and often if you are short on something you will be able to find it where you are going just as easily. One more thing - don’t take anything that is irreplaceable, you never know what might happen.

Tip 8 – Get insurance: Ok, there had to be one sensible tip that sounded like your mother. But seriously, you have no idea what could happen to you when you are on your trip, so insurance, and in particular medical insurance, is a must for any trip. Long term travel insurances are available, and could save you an awful lot of money if you end up in trouble.

Tip 9 – Budget: Lordy, these are getting a bit serious. But money makes the world go round, and running out of it at an inappropriate moment could really mess up your trip. Keeping a track of your money, maybe setting yourself a daily or weekly amount you are happy to spend, could help you avoid issues. But don’t skimp out on a possible great once in a lifetime experience for financial reasons. More money can always be worked for. And it’s amazing how easy it is to save money. From shopping in second hand shops to couchsurfing, there are a myriad of opportunities to save money. And remember the old adage: the best things in life are free.

Tip 10 – Planning: Finally in the list, having advocated a willingness to throw plans out of the window, I will now recommend that you do a certain amount of planning before you set off. It could be that the country you are visiting needs specific vaccinations, or carrying nuts into the country is going to result in you losing all your gear. Other pre-trip things you may consider doing are making electronic copies of all your important documents, in case you should lose these. Consider having a credit card or other emergency money supply located somewhere that won’t be lost if your primary gear is gone. Basic planning such as this won’t enhance the majority of your trip, but it could stop a bad situation becoming worse.

Finally, the best advice I can give you is to enjoy yourself. Soak up the new experiences, revel in the adventure. We only get, as far as I can tell, one go at this whole thing, so we may as well do our best to have fun on the way. If you’ve got any tips to add to this, feel free to share in the comments below!

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