Skip to main content

Give it a year

A year ago we had just arrived back from our tenth anniversary trip to Europe via Malaysia. Sometimes I think it can take a year or more to properly appreciate a trip, time discarding those memories of jetlag and weary feet, the race to stick a schedule and keep everyone happy and highlighting all those wonderful experiences in your mind.

Vignettes suddenly pop into your head, leaving a feeling of wistfulness for the year gone. A hotel room of toys with Alex in the centre of them, mountain scenery below, a meal in Paris, breakfast on the train.

The same thing happened in 2010, a year after my previous trip to Europe. Dreamily falling asleep to music alone in a hotel room, tinned mandarins for breakfast, a quiet walk through central London, cobblestones in Ghent.

As I said in my last post there is something special about travel to Europe and the long, long flights there. Whenever the earlybird fares are released I feel a tremendous urge to book them. I know what we want to do; just go around France, eat the foods and see the sights. But it's also the journey there.  Give it another year, or another, or another...

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Down the Oito Line

Riding the length of the Oito Line from Itoigawa to Shinjuku (well, Matsumoto, really, but you might as well go the whole way) has long been a dream of mine. It suddenly gained urgency when I read that the last length of it between Itoigawa to Minami-Otari would be closed once the Hokuriku Shinkansen to Kanazawa and Toyama opens by next year. Now, as mentioned last time, B and Alex are among those that would much rather catch the very fast Shinkansen, but in the end she decided to follow me, despite the very early morning. We rode the Hokuetsu Express from Toyama to Itoigawa, completing a little more of that West Coast for me. Though the coastal stretch was short there were some nice views at times. I should like to see more of Itoigawa one day, explore its geology. But now we had to quickly cross over the platform bridge to catch our train to Minami-Otari. To my great delight it was a KiHa 120 railcar, my favourite. I felt a degree of sadness standing up at the front...
Post a Comment
Read more

To Melbourne on the XPT sleeper

Excited by the prospect of reliving the experience of seeing my very first movie and hearing the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra perform it I bought tickets to The Empire Strikes Back in Concert in Melbourne back in February. Then I did nothing about actually getting there. Much as I love Melbourne, due to family commitments I didn't want to spend more than the Sunday away. Flights there and back made sense, but  my flight down to Melbourne in late October reiterated the fact that I usually don't enjoy descending into the city. And the concert was in December, a season of summer storms. I really didn't feel like driving the whole route alone and in a hurry, so that left one choice. The train. My very first trip up to Sydney from Melbourne was aboard the luxury Southern Aurora. Or it was supposed to be luxury. I wouldn't know because I spent the whole ride up very sick with the flu lying in the top bunk, unable to stay awake for my whole of night vigil. Now only...
Post a Comment
Read more