The BBC Breakfast studio is really small and really dark and they seat you a good three feet away from the presenters so you feel as if you are talking to them across a chasm. Also that backdrop is painted on the wall. Who knew!? I had spent the previous thirty minutes before appearing on …
John left Bali yesterday. For good. Kadek cried all day. I stood, looking at all the junk he’d left for me to clear up, and scowled. When I first heard that John had been offered a job in London my first thought was, well at least there’s Skype. It was funny though because about three months before …
It feels like we are just cycling North. North north north. Does this island ever end? I thought it was only 3km long but it feels more like 30km in this intense heat with the bicycle wheels burying themselves every five metres into Saharan sized sand dunes. And then somehow we are back where we …
Everywhere we go we are watched. I feel furtive. As if a hand is about to fall on my shoulder and ask me please to come this way. I feel as if I’ve got a piece of priceless art stashed in my bikini (some might say I do, but you know I like to be …
As I was lying on the massage table I started musing on a conversation I had today when I mentioned to someone that I used to be on a senior management team. I had to pause at the time and try to remember the words in the right order. Then I had to shake my …
I’m not ready to hang up my travelling boots. I have started discussing with John a plan I am hatching for some time in the mid 2020s when Alula no longer needs stationary parents (or nearby parents for that matter) when we will buy an old airstream and drive across and around the Americas for …
I think I did part 1 back in India and I probably talked about wishing that I’d packed an extra suitcase rammed with Percy Pig fizzy pig tails. Also I think I probably talked about wishing I hadn’t wasted valuable baggage weight by packing three shades of nail polish. My friend Cynthia was right. Even …
Two days ago I was walking along the street, slipped on some cobbles and reaching out to steady myself, grabbed hold of a man’s penis. It’s been two days and I can still feel the giggle bubbles of hysteria breaking over me every time I think about it. It gets better though. After grabbing his …
A lot of people keep asking us why – what inspired us to do this trip? About six months ago I wrote my reasons on some Post-Its and stuck them on our bedroom wall next to a pinboard that I covered in pictures of white beaches, turreted chateaux, hammocks and clippings from the guardian travel section. Oh and this postcard. …
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