travelling allrite

Where's the magic gone? I hope that I find it tonight at Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince in concert. Right now I'm not feeling it. Outside the panoramic windows of the Opera House is black and bright lights. The giant floodlit P&O cruise ship is still dwarfed by the outlines of the Harbour Bridge painted in blue light to support the NSW State of Origin team. Beneath it, ferries and other boats chug past as a series of bright rectangles. In the background, the ride of Luna Park flash and dazzle. Oh how I've fantasised about holidays beginning like this. The trip to the city at night, the stay at the airport hotel, grabbing last minute goods for the journey. The reality is far harsher. Honestly, if you told me I could go straight home to my own bed I'd be happy. It would still be a holiday, away from all the other tasks that pollute everyday life. After a beautiful clear sky today the bureau is forecasting high winds tomorrow and there's a turbul...

The in-room dining offers laksa and satay skewers, but we are not in Singapore or Malaysia yet. By this time tomorrow that's where B and Alex will be. From our room on the top floor of the Stamford Plaza we overlook Sydney Airport. The heavies sail into the air from the main runway on their way to adventures in far away lands, while the smaller jets' engines roar as they turn northwards off the third runway to places closer to home. I try to watch the action. Unfortunately I have work to do. Time off is precious and I don't have time to spare. With B at work Alex and I left in a rush. The wait for the bus is too long, so we drive to the hotel instead. Quickly up to the room, I whip out the laptop and connect to my teleconference fifteen minutes late. Afterwards there is more to do. No matter how much I've done, and I've done a damned lot these past six months, there is always more to do. I'm tired. I'm also sad. I don't know why, but right no...

His little legs scrambled desperately to escape the leash and run back to his owners, who had no choice but to turn their backs and farewell their beloved pet. And so it was with more than a touch of sadness that a journey in the dog's honour began, though he could not himself follow, trapped by age, quarantine laws and an unwillingness to travel. Kita means north in Japanese and jaws in Finnish, the choice of name from his Japanese Spitz and Finnish Lapphund ancestry. Our journey will take us north into the icy jaws of Winter, to Finland and the other mainland Scandinavian/Nordic states via Japan. We leave behind the sticky heat of the Sydney summer. A few days ago I was wondering if I would have the constitution to begin these 19 days of travel. Mid last week I suddenly developed an inflamed elbow which turned out to be a staph infection. The side effects of the antibiotics felt worse than the bug, putrid in smell and flavour, nausea inducing and requiring a frequency ...

A field of amber points interspersed with green and yellow, lights momentarily obscured by the aluminium and carbon fibre flying beasts that roost within them. The flickering of warning strobes from the scurrying vehicles servicing the sky bound cousins. We are staying at the Rydges Hotel Sydney Airport, right across from the International Terminal. There are views of the main runway across to the Domestic terminals. It's a nice hotel, if a little bland, and about as convenient as you can get. For dinner we just crossed the road to the airport food court. Thai for Alex and B, Vietnamese rice paper rolls for me. Unchallenging food. Tomorrow we fly to Osaka. My heart is heavy with concern, despite my head reminding me that it will be okay. There is yet another typhoon, Kong-Rey, lurking in the Pacific, likely heading for Japan. Great sky rivers of wind crossing the continents, the jetstream. Clouds and winds stealthily approaching the city at night to banish t...

Here we are again at the beginning of 2016 staying at an old friend. It's a place of many memories, from our wedding night fourteen years ago, through to a work conference, pregnancy with Alex and a tenth anniversary. The Novotel Brighton Beach has seen changes in that time, with sad farewells to the waterslide and Balinese pool and waterfall, to old Playstations in the rooms. But it still has the fantastic views of Botany Bay, of the airport that pokes out into the waters of the bay busy with activity against a backdrop of Sydney city. It's so nice to lie back and relax, a bottle of spiced ginger beer (non-alcoholic, of course) watching the plans fly people off on adventures. Tomorrow we'll join them. Appropriately enough my 21st year old international travel will begin with a return to my very first international destination: Singapore. I need the rest. It's been so busy lately, with juggling work, looking after a seven year old on school holidays and p...

My lonely hotel is lonely no more. It began life as a Hilton Hotel, sitting near the bridge across the Cooks River and overlooking the International Terminal of Sydney Airport. A brown and boxy building, I never found it particularly attractive but, as a young and inexperienced traveller more familiar with roadside motels and caravan parks, the Hilton brand gave it a mysterious cachet. We often passed the hotel on our way to the city or the Eastern Suburbs and I would wonder who were these important people lurking behind the curtains, the gold tinted rectangles in the night? What adventures were they about to set off on? I developed a "thing", almost an obsession, for airport hotels, especially those of Sydney. An airport is a living place, full of movement and action, huge machines and people setting off on adventures or arriving home from them. Yet it also stands in near isolation. In the region surrounding Sydney Airport are warehouses and container yards, golf cours...