The world is full of happy idiots. I should know. I’m one of them. Maybe you’ve known this but were too polite to say. Thank you for sparing my feelings. I got off the train, guitar in one hand, rucksack in the other. No I didn’t feel like Paul Simon on Warrington station about to […]

Read more "Training an Idiot"

So I’m walking down the road in this wayward northern settlement of Rawene. It’s 30 degrees and the wide Hokianga river is still, the sky is a deep blue and the herons and pied cormorants line up on the mudflats ready for the next fishing opportunity. I’m off to the boardwalk over the mangrove trees […]

Read more "Mission Accomplished"

I’ve left Auckland after a fab few days. I was feeling I hadn’t quite got the pulse of the culture after four days. This, despite the fact I’d spent a day at the out of town 49th Auckland Folk Festival, a quiet little affair in the equestrian hills north west of the city. Woodstock it […]

Read more "Alazin Sane"

Ponsonby is so much like Glebe, where we lived in Sydney… every second storefront is a bustling bar or restaurant, there’s a woman’s bookshop, a tattoo parlour, a herbarium, a sustainable veggie burger joint, endless coffee bars, and an evening view to CBD down across the valley towards the Pacific Ocean. Hipster heaven. This trip […]

Read more "Minus TC and counting"

There are ninety nine ways I could end this blog. Dubious stories I never got round to. More myths and legends about Australia. Hilarious anecdotes. Twenty pages of conclusions and insights into the Australian condition. But when it comes down to it, I just want to tell you about Harry. Harry is in his 70s […]

Read more "The Green Green Grass of Home"

My mother doted on me and believed I was wonderful. Well, she’s always been insightful. She also kept me cute. I was a snappy dresser before I walked, and by the time I could, my hair was kept with a Cliff Richard quiff, courtesy Amami Wave Set Lotion. I think it’s fair to say that […]

Read more "It’s the Real Thing"

The most popular visitor attraction in Australia is – a prison. I wasn’t sure what to make of this, so I decided to add Tasmania to the itinerary so I could investigate on your behalf. Oh I know, I hear you groaning. What is it with me, this endless selfless doing things for you? I […]

Read more "Penitentiary, my dear Watson"

You know, there really are some fab things about Sydney. And there’s some stuff that’s pretty ordinary. But there is one thing that sets this city apart. One thing that raises it to a state of grace and splendour. One thing above all that makes Sydney magnificent and beautiful.  Look, don’t get me wrong. I […]

Read more "So long, Syd"

There’s nothing quite like a long slow train journey, a languid meander through the contours of a landscape, carved where it would let 19th century frontiersmen through. I’ve done this before. In Peru, sitting on the plate of a packed locomotive threading its way back from Machu Picchu to Cuzco after hiking and camping along […]

Read more "The middle of nowhere already"

This week, your intrepid investigative journalist has been exploring the practice and business of ecotourism. He has travelled by scary single prop plane to the remote Lady Elliot Island way out on the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef. I hope you’re grateful I’ve endured this hardship. No Australian we knew had heard of […]

Read more "Happy together"