Sailing to Antarctica

Blog entry #1, November 26th Having already bonded like duct tape to a winch handle over wine and Tenador Libre, Captain Jakob, First Mate Paula and Motley Crew, Onne, Kieran, John, Jaye, Lindsey, Sjors and Dan set off with a cruisy ride down the Beagle and made it to Port Williams where we stopped for […]

Tajikistan: The Fann Mountain Trail

This article was published in the Nov/Dec 2018 issue of Trek & Mountain magazine … Bordered by the mountains of Afghanistan to the south, Uzbekistan to the west, Kyrgyzstan to the north and China to the east, Tajikistan is a small, land-locked country nestled in the centre of Asia. Though often overlooked, it is one […]

The Kokoda Track

This article was published in the Jan/Feb 2018 issue of Trek & Mountain magazine … The Kokoda Track takes you roughly halfway across Papua New Guinea in a straight, single-file line through the Owen Stanley Range, from Owen’s Corner on the outskirts of the country’s capital, Port Moresby, to the small village of Kokoda in […]

Bailem Valley

This part of my trip came about unexpectedly and so I didn’t get to explore as deeply into the Bailem Valley as I would have liked. But I did get to take some excellent photos of the famous locals in their typical garb, and it was enlightening to see the stark differences between independent Papua […]

Mt. Wilhelm

DAY 1 I was travelling with JD who is a friend of Moses, a local preacher I had met while staying at a mission in Port Moresby. When I arrived in Goroka Moses and his young family met me at the airfield, took me in and showed me around. On our tour of the town […]

So that’s what Madagascar is like

We left Japan in a lengthy and protracted hurry. Few of the things we had planned to have in place were there, we had no lawyer, no confirmed UK representative and no agreement with the Japanese insurers as to our plans or the future of Gemma’s case. But none of this, despite our best and […]

It’s Wakkanai!

This week (last week) we travelled to the very northernmost tip of Japan, where the kelp farms are busy, the seals are fat and the road signs are in Russian as well as Japanese. The jewel in the local crown is Wakkanai, a small fishing port that serves as a stop-off for Siberian sailors and, […]

Could-a, would-a, bicycle chain*

“I’ve been hiking with an ice pic and crampons in the mountains… staying in a stinky freezing cabin with no heating or running water that smells of feet and dogs at best..took crap on the mountains at 3 o’clock in the morning with -25 winds on my ass when attempting to climb kazbek, had a […]