Travel
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No wonder Albo, Bowen and the Davos crowd favour private planes. When I alighted from the flight to Manchester three heavily armed policemen were in the tunnel. Just like a reasonably priced cup of coffee and railway timetables that can be taken at face value, bobbies on bicycles two by two are very much a thing of the fast-fading past
April 12, 2024
5 mins
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Javier Milei made global headlines when he won a landslide victory with a promise to implement 366 'emergency measures' and take his famous chainsaw to a slather of government departments. All looked good for the most sweeping reforms in the nation's history -- until El Loca fell out with his vice-president and key coalition partner
April 6, 2024
13 mins
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Before my wife and I went cruising we had taken what seemed all the appropriate precautions, checked the government's advisory website and accepted the cruise line's assurance we'd be perfectly safe from the Wuhan wog. That proved to be true, but wandering the Pacific in search of a port to accept us was another matter
May 13, 2020
10 mins
The latest
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And, of course, you're not driving in Australia either, but in the wide-open expanses of the United States, where the states have retained their right to tax income and don't need to grub every last penny out motorists just a whisker over the limit. That's just one of the nice, civilised things about driving across America
January 28, 2020
9 mins
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Those with uneasy consciences hate to be reminded of the acts they have committed. Even discreet reminders, like a small chapel, may be destroyed, covered up or avoided when they inflame the troubled memories of a nation. Such is the provenance and history of La Chapelle Expiatoire in Paris
December 21, 2019
13 mins
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Greetings from snowbound Utah, where our trans-America trek has been stalled by a blizzard. Like the bleak and parched Dinosaur Monument Park, it's another reminder that climate change was at work long before SUVs and modern life so upset a certain teenage Swedish truant.
December 15, 2019
5 mins
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Look, I love Australia, but few things irk me quite so much as hearing the ninth letter of the alphabet abusively mispronounced. One of the good things about being in London, apart from observing the inspirations for Wodehouse's Drones Club, is not having my ears criminally assaulted
March 11, 2019
3 mins
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I was praying at the Western wall of Solomon’s Temple, the holiest place of Judaism, the place which witnessed the beginning of the transformation of pagan humanity into Western civilisation. The experience of touching the hewn stone blocks, polished by a myriad kisses and caresses, was profound
August 8, 2018
15 mins
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What's not to like about the only western US state with the good sense to reject Hillary Clinton? Not much, given the food, scenery and people are a joy to eat, watch and with whom to lament the decline of neighbouring California. Oh, and for Queenslanders there's an extra attraction
February 3, 2018
5 mins
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Gazing down upon Berlin are the substantial remains of a flak tower intended to protect the Nazi capital from RAF bombers. Less than entirely successful in that endeavour, they became citadels of misery and horror for those who looked to them for refuge
November 3, 2017
14 mins
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The offer of a free trip to the land of conquistadores and Aztecs, bullfights, bargains, mariachis and margaritas airlifted an eager traveller from his newsroom desk and deposited him in a country no less well known for mindless officialdom, lost bags and loose bowels
September 4, 2017
13 mins
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Russia has changed since the days when I fled the old Soviet Union, but a recent visit to my former homeland suggests not as much nor in the ways I might have hoped. When the best and brightest feel their futures lie elsewhere and queue up to leave, prospects are grim and unlikely to improve
June 25, 2017
11 mins