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AO 2025

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This weekend we flew down to Melbourne to attend the finals of the Australian Open. The AO, as it likes to be known, but without the little horizontal part of the A. I imagine they paid some branding experts a lot of money to remove that little line. Our flight was full, what with the tennis being on and, as it turned out, included an opportunity to do a bit of celebrity spotting. It’s funny how people get excited about seeing celebrities going about their everyday lives, but I get it, I do too. Last year, on a flight from Dubai to Manchester, Sir Alex Ferguson was sitting in an aisle seat as I made my way past him wearing a Spurs t-shirt. I could tell he spotted my allegiance by the pitying look on his face. On our flight to Melbourne Tracy was in front of me, as we proceeded down the aisle, and turned to give me one of those expressions that says, ‘look who I’ve just spotted’. At that moment, my eyes fell on an instantly recognisable face. None other than the greatest batsman in Aust...
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Paris 2024 Reflections

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  It is difficult to reflect on our experience at Paris 2024 without sounding like one of the cliched news reports that accompany the end of the games. The IOC president said it was ‘sensational’. I’ve not heard the ‘best games ever’ term being used yet, but in truth how do you compare? It certainly was a fabulous experience. Our six nights in Paris were not flawless. The inadequacies of our hotel led to them refunding us four nights of our stay which, given Olympic level pricing, is a substantial sum of money. But I don’t want to dwell on that because in no way does it reflect our overall experience. There is a stereotype of the French that the British have long held; arrogant, a bit aloof, not really all that friendly. This event firmly put paid to all of that. One of the best things about the organisation was the hordes of volunteer helpers with their giant foam fingers pointing us in the right direction. They appear to have been briefed to create a sense of joie de vivre. Somet...
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Vienna waits for you

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  Before telling you about Vienna, a quick update on Shieldaig Lodge. I posted my Review on Tripadvisor which elicited a long apology email from the manager. She thanked me for my detailed feedback. I’m imagining her gritting her teeth as she watches the horse depart through the stable door! Thankfully no such dramas at our Vienna hotel which was excellent. I may even give them a Tripadvisor review too, although I’m put off by their gifts of chocolate tagged with “we look forward to reading your review” as we left. This is not the first time we have been encouraged to provide a positive review in this way. I understand why they do it but find it a bit distasteful. I have to confess that in my school days history was my least favourite subject and I dropped it as soon as I could. Given how interesting I now find the topic I can only imagine that it was badly taught. When I think back to what Vienna meant to me in those days I’m reminded of a girlfriend who I dutifully took to see he...
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Scotland (High Land, Hard Rain)

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  We’ve been travelling in Scotland, not as glamorous as Peru or Galapagos, although I guess if you were from Peru it would be. One of the things I’ve come to realise on our travels it that faraway places seem exotic until you get there and then when you do they’re just, well, here. What I think I mean by that somewhat obtuse observation is that everywhere is home to some people and for those people what seems exotic to us is just normal for them and vice versa. Despite living in England for 42 years and travelling to many places far and wide in that time I spent no more than three days on Scottish soil. Tracy, having Scottish heritage, has been many times and was keen to show me how beautiful it is. We decided to do the NC500, a drive around the coastline of the highlands (the bit at the very top). Dreamed up by the Highlands tourism people in 2015 it has been a great success in encouraging tourism. Although some of the locals are not so happy with the curse of the hired motorhome...
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Key West (not East!)

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  I try to be informing and amusing when writing these posts in the hope that some people might enjoy reading them. I am going to start this one by sharing something informative. It may be that your knowledge of geography is better than mine in which case grant yourself the right to raise your eyebrows and consider me a fool. But here goes… Key West, where we have been for the last few days, is the furthest point south in the United States and, being in Florida, on the East Coast. We flew here from Guayaquil in Ecuador, which is on the west coast of South America. When we took that flight, I knew we were flying from the Southern Hemisphere to the Northern Hemisphere, but I also thought we were travelling Eastward. You know, towards Ol’ Blighty, our next destination, over there to the right on the map. Wrong! Guayaquil: 79.9 degrees W, Key West 81.8 degrees W. South America is south of North America but it is also, in the most part, to the east. No wonder I was so easily fooled, the...
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In Praise of Galapagos

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  If you’ve been following our posts on social media since we arrived at Galapagos you probably won’t be surprised to learn that the Amazon Rainforest’s reign as ‘the best thing ever’ didn’t last. As it turns out it rains longer than it reigns. Our experience in Galapagos was simply fabulous. ‘Wow, just wow’, as Pam Bewes put it when commenting on one of our posts, just about sums it up. If you have a bucket list, put this place on it. I'm sure it helped that we chose the best cabin on the best and newest boat operating in the islands. Come on, it was Tracy’s 60th, if we weren’t going to ‘push the boat out’ then, when would we? Through their evolutionary history, over tens of millions of years, the species here survived with no predators. Left to get on with it themselves they developed their own fear free ecosystem. So, when man turned up some 400 years ago, they were sitting ducks, or sitting tortoises to be more precise, and their trust in man proved to be unfounded. Fortunate...
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Ecuador, or Equator doh!

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Tracy has been preparing for this trip by learning Spanish on Duolingo. She’s better at it than she admits and a damn sight better than me. I can list the number of Spanish words I know on my fingers, although since arriving in Ecuador I will be engaging one more finger than previously. It’s only after I arrived in the country, and after having been on the planet for almost 59 years, that I realised Ecuador is the Spanish for Equator. It seems blindingly obvious now. If you pronounce the words using the same vowel sounds they are pretty much identical, try it. Because we don’t, it never occurred to me, and I suspect the same can be said for many other English speakers (go on, admit it). Somewhat bizarrely, the country has named itself after a line. An imaginary one at that! I’d have thought if any country were going to name itself after a line it would be Colombia. It’s easily arranged, just swap the lombia for caine, job done! Eric Clapton’s already written them a new national anthem....
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