Wandering the world

The Second Great Girls' Adventure series This post is part two of a series of five that document the Second Great Girls' Adventure, a trip my daughter E and I took in October 2022. Our adventure included Amsterdam , Paris [this post], Nice , Cinque Terre and Milan [in that order]. Each place in this incredible list has its own post. I had been to Amsterdam and Paris previously, but was keen to experience both cities again, this time in more depth. Our other three destinatio

The Second Great Girls' Adventure series This post on our Milano meanderings is number 5 and the final one in the series on the Second Great Girls' Adventure that my daughter [referred to as E in my posts] and I experienced in 2022. Our adventure included Amsterdam , Paris, Nice , Cinque Terre and Milan [in that order]. Each place in this incredible list has its own post. A little bit of background📝 Our first Great Girls' Adventure took place in 2015, when E was turning 15

The Second Great Girls' Adventure series This post is number 3 in the series on the Second Great Girls' Adventure, a trip that my daughter E and I took in October 2022. Our adventure included Amsterdam , Paris , Nice, Cinque Terre and Milan [in that order]. Each place in this incredible list has its own post. I had been to Amsterdam and Paris previously, but Nice was to be a whole new experience. Exciting! A little bit of background📝 Our first Great Girls' Adventure took

The Second Great Girls' Adventure series This post is number 4 in the series on the Second Great Girls' Adventure with my daughter, referred to throughout my posts as E. Our adventure included Amsterdam, Paris , Nice, Cinque Terre and Milan [in that order]. Each place in this incredible list has its own post. I had been to Amsterdam and Paris previously, but not to Cinque Terre. I'd seen so many beautiful images of the five villages on social media, so I was excited to vis

The Second Great Girls' Adventure series T his post is the first in a series on the Second Great Girls' Adventure, a trip we took in October 2022. The "girls" of the title are my daughter [whom I will refer to throughout the series as E] and me! Our adventure included Amsterdam [this post], Paris , Nice , Cinque Terre , and Milan [in that order]. Each place in this incredible list has its own post. Going into the adventure, I was excited to experience all five places and to

A little bit of background📝 I spent three weeks in Toronto in July-August 2022 as part of my role as the Global Education Manager for an international travel assistance company. The organisation assists travellers in emergency situations from the help number listed in their travel insurance policies. The organisation I worked for is owned by a large insurance firm and it provides travel assistance to a number of other insurers and organisations. After almost 25 years in acad

A little bit of background📝 The subtitle of this post could be "part 2" as it documents my second trip to London in 2022 as part of the job I was in at the time as the Global Education Manager for an international travel assistance company. When I mean by travel assistance is helping travellers with insurance policies in emergency situations when they call the number in their policy for help. The organisation I worked for is owned by a large insurance firm and it provides tr

A gap in my travel experience resume🚫 There is a gap of almost three years between the London trip of this post and my last travel experience, to present my PhD research at a conference at Southern Utah University in June 2019. Of course I had no idea when I travelled to Utah that a global pandemic was coming. How could anyone have conceived of such a thing? I've called my month-long stint in London in 2022 "post-pandemic", but I'm not sure whether 2022 could be considered

A little bit of background📝 This post documents the six weeks I spent in London in 2023 during my time as the Global Education Manager for an international travel assistance company. The organisation I worked for is owned by a large insurance firm. The team provides travel assistance to policyholders from the parent company and a number of other insurers and organisations. I had left academia in May 2021 and worked in the newly-created role until August 2023. What a wild rid

A little bit of background📝 This post documents my travels to Cedar City in Southern Utah in June 2019 to present my PhD research at a conference whose focus aligned with the topic of my thesis on experiential learning. I presented at the conference when I was in the final stages of writing up my thesis before submission the following year. Little did I know then that this trip would be my last chance to travel before the global pandemic hit some six months later... All doct

A little bit of background📝 Back in London! This post explores my sixth opportunity to wander the iconic city. My four previous visits to London in the two-thousands had been part of conference and work projects. I’d be fortunate to use available downtime to immerse myself in all London has to offer during those trips. This London trip was a family experience, to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary in April of 2018. Our daughter, referred to as E in my posts, who was 17 a

A little bit of background📝 This post documents our Northern Ireland wanderings as part of a two-week 25th wedding anniversary trip in 2018. We spent Easter in London then flew to Dublin to explore a little of Northern Ireland before spending a week in the Republic of Ireland . To start at the beginning of our journey, read my post on our London wanderings here. We [husband W and 17-year-old daughter, E] flew into Dublin with Ryanair from Stansted Airport, relatively free

A little bit of background📝 This post documents our week-long self-drive around the Republic of Ireland in April 2018. Our wanderings were part of a two-week trip to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary, with our 17-year-old daughter, E, along for the ride. We started with Easter in London  then flew to Dublin. From there we hired a car and headed north, for two and a half days in Northern Ireland, staying in Belfast and driving up to the Giant's Causeway  before exploring

A little bit of background📝 This post documents the few days that I spent in Los Angeles with our son, D, in 2012 for a period of downtime on the way back to Australia. I'd been with D on a Colorado baseball tour in which D played for an invitational team in a tri-state tournament. This was my third visit to Los Angeles after our initial stopover on the way to London in 1996  and our layover on the way back from Orlando in 2008.  Since the Colorado trip, I've been again to

Why I was in Colorado⚾ This post documents my 2012 trip to the United States on a baseball tour with our son, who was 14 at the time. D, as he is referred to in this post, was part of a state invitational team – the Queensland Dolphins – playing in a Little League tournament in Denver, Colorado. Players, parents, and coaches spent two weeks together, participating in the tournament, exploring Colorado, and doing the tourist thing in Los Angeles on the way home. A little baseb

A little bit of background📝 This post recounts my incredible journey through Morocco in 2007. I documented my Moroccan trip in 2020 on an earlier now-defunct version of this blog, 13 years after travelling there. The trip came about through pure chance, from a morning walk conversation with my friend and neighbour, whom I will refer to as B in my posts. B was planning a girls' weekend in Dubai with a friend who was stopping over there on her way back to Perth from Manchester

A little bit of background📝 This post is part of a series on the Great Girls' Adventure of 2015. My daughter and I travelled to Türkiye, Greece and Romania. This post is on our Greek wanderings. There are posts on our Türkiye and Romania wanderings as well. Our inaugural Great Girls' Adventure saw us away for two weeks in October 2015, when my daughter, referred to in my posts as E, was just shy of her 14th birthday. This trip was special as it was just the two of us and a

A little bit of background📝 This post is part of a series on the Great Girls' Adventure of 2015. My daughter and I travelled to Türkiye, Greece and Romania. Each country on our adventure has its own post. Our Greece wanderings are here, and our sojourn to Romania here . Our inaugural Great Girls' Adventure took place in October 2015, when my daughter - referred to in my posts as E - was just shy of her 14th birthday. This trip was special as it was just the two of us and o

A little bit of background📝 I've written posts on the Manchester conference  that I presented at in 2011 and my post-conference London wanderings.  I was away from home for two weeks on that trip: the conference, seven days in London staying with a friend, and a solo sojourn to Europe for three nights and four days. I bought a Eurostar package for the Brussels trip that included the return train journey from London to Brussels and hotel accommodation. The Eurostar packages a

A little bit of background📝 We live in the southern hemisphere, in a part of Australia where it never snows. Christmas is summer for us, hot and humid, like it is for a good portion of the year. I'd had a long-held dream to have a proper winter experience , complete with heavy snow and a white Christmas. I’d also always wanted to visit Chicago as the lake and the city architecture fascinated me, and, like a lot of travellers, NYC was on my bucket list. This post is the fir