Au revoir Sydney, Paris - Here we come! We look back to when we first started travelling and simply don't recall nerves. Given our experience these days I wonder if I'm nervous when we head off simply because of extensive years of experience and a well baked in awareness of all that could go wrong. Or I can simply blame Covid, when the world came to a screeching stop and the borders slammed shut - enough to give anyone ongoing heebie jeebies about the great unkno...

It was a great stay in Mudgee with our anniversary hot-air ballooning outing, some stunning walks in amazing scenery and great drives - not to forget the awesome shopping and coming home with a fair load of homemade country preserves, antique finds, new jewellery and whatnot. But jeez it was great to be home too. No dog responsibilities for one thing, no one to look after except us. Petite apartment vs massive house - and our super little neighbourhood - though p...

Saturday 29 June - The time finally came, after some drawn out and half-hearted packing, to launch into gear, undertake a massive laundry day, make up the bed, bathroom, hoover, wipe down the kitchen, empty and defrost the fridge to finally, have an early night and prepare ourselves for a 'stupid o'clock' get up time. And of course, we were up an hour earlier than we had to be - why oh why do we do it to ourselves? We were seated on the Western Explorer XPT at Ce...

What can we say? Paris and Sydney are our two favourite cities. There are many that we love - just not as much as those two. It was great to be back, our stomping ground hadn't changed a bit (well they appear to have finished the footpaths in Potts Point, finished George Street and the light rail in the city and are getting started on the rejuvenation of Crown Street…) but by and large, just great to be here. We had a great sushi feast from one of our loc...

Qatar Airways - what can we say - it is undoubtedly our favourite way to fly. We had a wonderful experience in the Qatar Premium Lounge in Paris (even before departure) then trundled onboard and settled ourselves in. It is beyond a first world problem (obviously) but because we had been squeezed onto the Friday night Paris departure, it was a full cabin and our two Qsuites were in the second business class cabin - see - definitely a first world problem. It's only...