Pictures from the countryside? Yes please!

A week on from the little excursion out of London, I’ve snatched ten minutes to edit a few more snapshots. Let them guide you through the second day of the trip…

Near the door of the hostel was a nest box. This little bird was bringing back a worm every 5 minutes!

We decided to go for a stroll in the woods. Here, we're emerging into a quaint little town...

Along the way, we passed a horse. It pulled funny faces.

Then, it started to rain. Sheltering under trees just didn't quite cut it.

So, we all retreated into a cosy little pub to sample ale.

The end… or is it?

Spring Time and South Bank

The click is the cure. No matter the malaise – in this case, too much time spent with my head in books about media – the simplicity of a walk with my camera is my favourite detox.

Spring has well and truly arrived: new life in the graveyard next to my flat.

Top 5 Wilderness Moments of 2010

I’ve done some serious travelling this year: 5 months of dedicated travel in Australia, Ireland and Scotland, plus what amounts to 3 months in London. Of that time, much of it was spent exploring far-flung, wild areas well away from the bustle of city life. Here’s the 5 moments I enjoyed the most while off the beaten track in 2010.

1. New England Night and Sunrise, Great Dividing Range – at the start of my road trip, I ventured into the depths of New England National Park for a night. It was clear, freezing cold and remote. The Corolla was tested for 20km of potholed dirt road to get to the campsite, and I shivered through a frosty night. I woke in the predawn and continued to the top of the mountain, to a stunning view and silence more complete than I’ve ever experienced.

It’s all the little things

Moving halfway across the globe to a city a dozen or so times bigger than what I’m used to? Easy! Getting used to those little things? Not so much. So here I present to you a list, in no particular order, of the little things I’ve noticed about life in the UK…

• Pennies. I’m so glad I grew up in Australia after we got rid of one and two cent coins. Maddening! The coin system, in general, is rubbish – the denominations are barely visible on the coins; the twenty cent is smaller than the ten; and pennies!

I think I will just throw them in a box until they accumulate to something of value. Like a brick.

• The infinite repeat workday. No, I don’t mean the radio. Automated messages are everywhere here!  “Mind the gap. Luggage door in operation. Please swipe your next item. The next station is South Kensington. Insert coins, or select pay with card. Unfamiliar item in bagging area!” Get away, robots!
• Upside-down maps. I went for a walk to get a mobile phone yesterday, then I wanted to get to Oxford Street. I figured it’d be about three hours. Nup. Six hours. Why? I headed off without my own map, relying on my croc-dundee navigational abilities to get me by. Upon emerging from the underground and seeing a grey sky with no possible natural indicator of direction, I started down a random street until I found a map on a bus stop. Seeing Hyde Park to the left of where I was on the map, I headed west. Nup. Turns out the map was oriented to have south-west as ‘up’. HUH? So, yeah. I got a walking tour of Chelsea. It’s OK. Three stars.
• Holy multiculturality, batman! The Gold Coast is no monoculture, but the diversity of people in London is great. Clearly there’s a lot of tourists from everywhere, but people from all kinds of nationalities work here too. The impressive thing is that they manage to get by when English is so often their second language… hats off!
• Clean air, where art thou? Having just spent 4 months in Australia’s wilderness, then a couple of weeks on Ireland’s west coast, my first day back in London was a still one with low cloud. By the end of my six hour walking tour, I could have spat into a car’s fuel tank and charged them $2 a litre…

I can only imagine that there will be more of the little things, I just haven’t been irritated by them enough yet! What do you reckon I’ll be adding to this list in two weeks?

Where the ground is ice and the sky is fire

Australia’s a place where extremes can clash. At New England National Park, I was able to witness a broad morning vista explode into oranges and yellows, while crunching frosty grass underfoot. It’s not a place for the city dweller, but it’s hospitable enough that I survived, for one night at least. Rattling on at length about how cold it was, or how incredible it was to witness sunrise above the fog layer, or the eerie and total pre-dawn silence, wouldn’t do it justice. I’ll let the pictures do the talking.

It might not be the best photo, but this one brings the memories back to me most strongly...

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By the way, if anyone ever tells you to take the Eastern Dorrigo Way, they want to kill you. It’s a torturous, winding, narrow dirt track, with loose gravel and potholes galore, packed with blind corners and dropoffs on the side of the road. I averaged about 30km/h for a good 45 minutes of driving and when I finally was clear of the claustrophobic, rainforest-clad trail, I parked my car on some grass and stood outside for ten minutes vowing never to take that road again. I have some video which I might splice together when I get a chance: let it be a lesson to you!