Once upon a time, cocktail hour was an occasion. A sacred space. When the work day ended, you visited your favourite bar to put a little distance between the office and home. This was not excess; it was ritual. A quiet moment of reflection. In the words of Sinclair Lewis, a “canonical rite”. We lost this practice somewhere along the way. I think because we live in a society that has...
The Australian adventure lifestyle magazine Bare Essentials ran an 8-page interview with me back in November/December 2010. Their questions were fun and original, and I thought you might enjoy reading the full spread. Here’s the text in it’s entirety. Click the banner at the bottom of the page to grab yourself a copy. They did an excellent job on the layout, and it featured photos by...
The chapel was bathed in cool subterranean light, filtered through high window slits as though between lily pads into the chthonic depths of a pond. Sitting in a pew, I felt as though I had drowned. The faint sound of religious music piped through hidden speakers became the Music of the Spheres, the sound of my consciousness as it fled my drowned body. All was stillness and shafts of light. The...
Liechtenstein is a strange place. It’s a monarchy ruled by a prince in the middle of Europe, landlocked in the Alps between Switzerland and Austria. At 62 square miles it’s the 6th smallest country in the world, but has the world’s second highest GDP per person thanks to it’s status as a tax haven. It’s the sort of anomaly on a map that people pop into for an hour, just to say they’ve been there...
One night in Noumea, the capital of the French South Pacific territory of New Caledonia, I wandered into a kava bar. It was a difficult place to find. I had a rough idea of it’s location on a map, but darkness sinks as thick as lies in the South Seas night. There weren’t any streetlights and I didn’t know the name of the road. I circled the area half a dozen times, the headlights of my car...
I landed one day late in December 2010 to explore the French overseas dependency of New Caledonia. It’s the third largest island in the South Pacific, after Papua New Guinea and New Zealand. Its coasts are fringed with barrier reefs, romantic lagoons, and more lost beaches than you’d care to count. In the interior of Grand Terre — the main island — rugged mountains climb to mist-fringed...
It’s been quiet here in Road Wisdom land, but it’s the silence of distant places rather than the silence of inactivity that has fallen over my blog… I’ve been on the road these past couple months. Exploring the rugged interior of New Caledonia in the South Pacific. Navigating the hectic city streets of Tokyo, and the quieter corners of northern Honshu. And more recently in...
Happy Gnu Year! It’s been several weeks since I’ve had a chance to write. I’ve been offline in the South Pacific, and now in northern Japan celebrating the New Year Japanese-style. It’s the big family holiday here (rather than Christmas), with lots of amazing food and far too much to drink. I’ll write more about the foods and sites of Japan in the coming weeks, as...
I’m still drifting through Central American memories, looking at my life 10 short years ago…
The present has rippled and the past intervened. It’s leaking through the walls of this cold northern room, and all those feelings are coming back with it.
This is from Chapter 4 of Vagabond Dreams. It’s about traveling alone, and that first time you set out on the road.