Archive for 2009
Travel highlights of 2009.
Tuesday, December 29th, 2009
Another year has flown by (they really do fly the older you get) and it’s been another great year of travelling for me. I feel so blessed to have these wonderful opportunities to travel like I do and there were many ‘highlights’ in my travels this year. And often the highlights are not necessarily about a place as such, but about the people you are with, the food you ate, discovering something so new or simply a beautiful moment. So, I thought I’d put together a list of my Top Ten Travel Highlights from 2009 (in no particular order)… (read more)
World’s Best Hotel (minus the stained sheets)
Monday, December 21st, 2009
A survey released this week by travel website Travel+Leisure ranked Bushmans Kloof Wilderness Reserve in South Africa as the world’s best hotel in 2009. The survey ranks the tops 500 places to stay across the globe, and was compiled based on the opinions of the website’s ‘experts’ and thousands of readers. A night at Bushmans Kloof (about 3 hours away from Cape Town) will set you back US$715 (A$803). Second place went to the Oberoi Vanyavilas in Rajasthan… (read more)
Christmas in Killarney.
Monday, December 14th, 2009
I’m not having Christmas in Killarney, nor have I ever had Christmas in Ireland (it’s a Bing Crosby song), but I have had quite a few Christmases overseas. Coming from balmy Australia my first white Christmas was truly magical. I was living in London (as Australians do), but I wanted my first Christmas away from home to be in the snow so a big bunch of us booked a chalet in Les Diablerets in Switzerland. On Christmas day we wrapped ourselves in tinsel and skied all day. My Christmas lunch was a frankfurter and chips. That’s because we had our Christmas lunch on Christmas eve like a lot of Europeans do. I’ve had four Christmases in Switzerland and… (read more)
Books like these.
Sunday, December 6th, 2009
Although I have been a bit slack on the reading front this year, I did manage to get through a handful of travel books: some old, some new, some borrowed and one with stories from a Sue and Stu. Here’s my list of travel books for 2009:
New Europe – Michael Palin
I like Michael Palin. I like his TV travel series and this book is a very enjoyable and funny journey through the former Soviet bloc countries of Eastern Europe. My only gripe is that it’s all somewhat premeditated and contrived. A research team goes out and plans the entire trip, including finding ‘wacky’ festivals to attend and ‘wacky’ locals to interview… (read more)
Holidays with Sheep!
Saturday, November 28th, 2009
I was in the newsagency today checking out travel magazines and by gosh is there a lot to choose from. I remember a few years back (okay it was quite a few years back) when there was Vogue Entertaining + Travel and that was about it. There were over 30 different titles in my local newsagency covering just about everything to do with travel (except holidaying with sheep – which you think would be a big hit in New Zealand). There are travel magazines targeting couples, travelling with kids, retirees, luxury travel, backpacking, walking holidays, cruise holidays, island holidays and even one called… (read more)
The world’s top 10 party towns.
Thursday, November 19th, 2009
In today’s Age newspaper there was a piece on the world’s top 10 party towns – which came from Lonely Planet’s list in it’s new guide ‘1000 Ultimate experiences’. Here’s the list:
1. Belgrade, Serbia
2. Montreal, Canada
3. Buenos Aires, Argentina
On ya bike.
Friday, November 13th, 2009
Yesterday I went for a two hour bike ride on the bike track around Port Phillip Bay. It was a beautiful hot spring day (the 6th day in a row over 30 degrees) and it really is quite a lovely bike track that weaves through bush, past cafes and grand beachside homes and, best of all, along the beach (as in right next to the sand and lots of girls in bikinis). The Port Phillip Bay bike track even made it into the top 10 bike rides of the world according to the Guardian newspaper a couple of years back (read it here). It’s the only one I’ve actually done on their list, too. There was also a list… (read more)
World’s worst airport?
Sunday, November 8th, 2009
I’ve spent a lot of time in departure lounges this year and it’s actually nice to be ‘grounded’ for a little while (although I did pilot a 737 last week!). In the past 10 months I’ve had 38 flights and passed through 24 different airports (and around 200 airport shops that I wandered aimlessly around in with no intent on buying anything). In one of my long flights this year I wrote down all the airports I have been to in my travels over the years (and yes I was bored – I’d seen all the movies and read the inflight magazine twice). I have passed through 142 airports… (read more)
Have you ever seen a grown man naked?
Monday, November 2nd, 2009
On the weekend I flew a Boeing 737-300 and successfully landed it at Melbourne airport. Well, I may have run off the runway a couple of times on landing but I did manage to get back on it by the time we came to a stop. Okay, I was actually in a 737 simulator at the Ansett Aviation Training centre at Melbourne Airport. And it was so much fun. It was part of an ‘event’ with the Australian Society of Travel Writers, which included a very nice lunch of yabbie risotto and kangaroo steaks at the Airport Hilton, then a few of us stayed the night (it was so weird staying at an airport hotel without actually going anywhere) before our morning lesson in the simulator. It was all very realistic… (read more)
Karaoke World Tour – Austria
Thursday, October 29th, 2009
It’s time to jump back on Brian’s Karaoke World Tour and for Chapter Eleven we’re off to Kirchberg in Austria. When I worked as a tour leader for Top Deck dragging drunk 18 to 30s around Europe (the stories from that became my book Rule No.5: No Sex on the Bus) the itinerary would often include a couple of nights at Club Habitat, a traditional chalet in the heart of the Austrian Tirol. The quaint old wooden chalet had squeaky floorboards, squeaky beds, squeaky stairs and squeaky doors, but it certainly wasn’t squeaky clean. Club Hab (as it was affectionately known) had possibly the most debauched karaoke night in the world. The bar itself was nothing special. It was tiny with a low ceiling and the walls were covered with framed photos of the bar in full swing. And in full swing it certainly was. Most of the photos showed large groups of girls standing in neat lines at the bar with their breasts out… (read more)