Author: author (Page 3 of 9)

How a watch took me on a new adventure

5 February 2020 / author

Citizen Altichron, indicating 6,010 meters above sea level

Sometimes, just like that, dreams come true. Usually, you have to work for them, and usually really hard, even if, like me, you start with an unfair head start from that rock-solid launching pad called white male western middle class privilege. But sometimes, things just happen. And so it is that I find myself the winner of a competition, along with three others from around the world. One is Malaysian, and he’ll be my room-mate on the adventure I was lucky enough to win. The other two are a mystery for now. It’s been arranged by a Japanese promoter, and we’ll have the opportunity to meet and interact with an American named Eric Larsen. He’s an explorer specializing in polar regions. One of those polar regions has been a dream destination for me for much of this century.

And now I’m going.

Once Upon a Time…Northern Vietnam

1 February 2020 / author

Sixteen years of marriage. The ups, the downs, the really downs, the ups again, and the promise of more ups than downs to come. The constant? Love, respect, and commitment.

Our first trip as a married couple was our honeymoon in northern Viet Nam. They were the days – the days of fresh faces and film.

With love for the person who doesn’t need to read this because she’s on all the Journeys, &c.

Wreckage of the Southern Cloud

29 January 2020 / author

Sir Charles Kingsford Smith in front of the “Southern Cloud” (photo from Ed Coates collection – used with permission)

Time Magazine, April 20, 1931:

Even as Col. Lindbergh joined the staff of T.A.T. and Pan American Airways… so did Wing-Commander Charles Kingsford-Smith return home from his famed flights to become managing director of Australian National Airways Ltd. One day last month …his company’s … Southern Cloud took off from Sydney for Melbourne, over 450 mi. distant… [and] was not again heard from. As did Lindbergh when the T.A.T. plane City of San Francisco vanished in New Mexico in 1929, Commander Kingsford-Smith flew to the search. Day after day planes criss-crossed the wilderness north of Melbourne. In such territory survivors might live for many days without reaching means of communication. Last week hope for plane and occupants was abandoned.

What happened to the Southern Cloud? Since I first heard about the plane 20 years ago, I’d wanted to find out the whole story. In January 2011, I finally did…

Mt Jagungal and the Rolling Grounds

16 January 2020 / author

This was written in 2013. I wonder if it could be written like this in 2020. With the world changing, will it ever again be safe to hike deep in the Snowy Mountains in summer?

Summer in the Snowies. Fire risk, hot wind, horse flies the size of your fist. Perfect for a four day hike, right? Maybe not, but if you stay indoors with the air-con you also miss the alpine meadows, cool, fresh streams, snow gums and mountain huts. And above all, you’d miss the wonderful views from mighty Mount Jagungal, crows soaring in the updrafts, a glorious place on a deep blue sky day.

Death From Above: Eagle Hunting in Kyrgyzstan

23 October 2019 / author

If you’re a vegan, look away now. If you love fluffy bunnies, look away now. If you don’t like blood and guts, look away now.

Because out on the steppes, it’s survival of the fittest. You hunt and eat, or you die.

Well, it was like that. But the dying tradition is still alive if you know where to look.

They call it the GRAND Canyon

16 October 2019 / author

The Grand Canyon. As the guidebook said, “Heard of it? Still here, still frikkin big”. And, it should have added, still frikkin amazing.

Biking down the east coast of …a lovely place

10 October 2019 / author

Depending on the hat you’re wearing, and who you’re talking to, and where, you might describe this place as Taiwan, Taiwan Province of China, Chinese Taipei, or the Republic of China. Any of those terms will annoy some of the people some of the time; occasionally leading to major problems if you mix it up in a professional context. This can happen even when you’re a “China Hand” – I once gawped as a foreign diplomat in the People’s Republic of China cluelessly thanked his host for the “warm welcome to the Republic of China”. Oops. So Heaven help the average person who gets caught in that little trap. Perhaps the best solution is to refer to the city name – “I’m visiting Taipei” – and if discussing it outside of the physical territory in question, dodge words like “country” or “province” and say “what a lovely…place”. It’s not unlike the useful word Australians use when we’ve forgotten someone’s name. “Hi there…mate!”

十一

1 October 2019 / author

Ten years ago today I was stuck in my apartment complex, or 小区, alone and hungry, and lucky to be in, not out. Because the authorities had locked down everything within a few blocks of Tian’anmen Square and Chang’an Avenue for the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. Today’s the 70th, and though we’ve now left China, from all accounts this lockdown is even heavier than the last. For all the wonderful memories I have of China, there are many like this, too: the raw display of power over people; the infinite urge to control.