Vignette
Years of going places, written down while I still remember them.
961 photographs · 12 countries · 8 journeys · 14,948 km travelled
Where I've been
Open the map →Journeys
All trips →
France 2026France · Spain24 stops · 284 photographs · 2 countries · 3,797 km2 – 29 May 2026
Ladakh & Kashmir 2025India8 stops · 153 photographs · 1 country · 900 km13 – 23 Sept 2025
Brisbane 2024Australia10 stops · 54 photographs · 1 country · 443 km4 – 10 Sept 2024
Sydney 2020Australia2 stops · 33 photographs · 1 country · 52 km22 – 26 Jan 2020
Eurotrip 2019Austria · Germany · Slovenia · Croatia · Italy · San Marino20 stops · 249 photographs · 6 countries · 3,809 km1 – 14 Sept 2019
Brazil 2016-17Brazil11 stops · 129 photographs · 1 country · 4,142 km10 Sept 2016 – 23 Feb 2017
Cook Islands 2016Cook Islands7 stops · 32 photographs · 1 country · 81 km20 – 22 Feb 2016
Brazil 2015Brazil7 stops · 34 photographs · 1 country · 1,724 km29 Jun 2015 – 14 Jul 2015
Recent photographs
Open the map →Places worth going
All places →Symbio Wildlife ParkDon't missActivities · Symbio Wildlife ParkLoved this place. About three hours and we had seen the whole park.
Cockatoos were sitting on the picnic tables before we had properly got through the gate. Kangaroos asleep in the shade, wallabies come right up and eat out of your hand. There is a cheetah as well, and cotton-top tamarins, and echidnas including a pale one sharing with a normal dark one.
Best bit by a mile was getting to hold a Tasmanian devil. Wrapped up in a fleece blanket, wide awake, looking straight up at me and completely unbothered by any of it. I did not expect to be allowed anywhere near one.
Under an hour south of the city. Give it a whole morning at least.Death and TaxesDon't missFood & drink · Death and TaxesDown a laneway off the Queen Street end, with a hooded skeleton painted on the wall so you know you have found it. The whole back wall is bottles, floor to ceiling, hundreds of them, and the point is that you tell them roughly what you feel like and let them make it rather than reading a list. Small, dark and busy, so go early or be prepared to stand. Best bar of the trip and the walk in through the lanes is half the fun.The StarDon't missViewpoints · The StarGo up for the sunset. The view from the top has the river bending right through the middle of it, South Bank and the bridges below you and the hills going purple behind, and it is the one place in Brisbane that shows you the shape of the city rather than the inside of it. Get there an hour before the sun goes so you see it in daylight and then in colour. The building itself is worth ten minutes on the way in - the atrium with the plants hanging down through it is a proper piece of showing off.Oporto Harbour TownDon't missFood & drink · Oporto Harbour TownHad the chicken with the chilli sauce, and it was every bit as good as I remembered. Oporto was my favourite fast food place of all time until every New Zealand one closed down, so getting to eat it again after years was just amazing - succulent chicken, the best chilli sauce ever made, divine! It sits in the middle of the Harbour Town outlets, so make it lunch on a shopping morning rather than a drive of its own, and get extra chilli sauce.North Stradbroke IslandDon't missTowns · North Stradbroke IslandDo the North Gorge Walk and do it slowly. It is a loop of maybe half an hour if you march it and about two hours if you stop at everything worth stopping at, which is most of it - the gorge with the surf pushing straight into the gap, Main Beach going off to the horizon in one direction, and an ocean that is genuinely turquoise rather than the colour people politely call turquoise. We had dolphins under the rocks, an osprey sitting on a dead branch about ten metres away, and kangaroos lying about on the grass at the end like they were waiting for us. Get the early ferry, take a hat, and give yourself the whole day rather than half of it.Grossglockner High Alpine RoadDon't missJourneys · Grossglockner High Alpine RoadOne of the great drives, and worth building a whole day around rather than just crossing over. Thirty-odd hairpins climbing to about 2,500m under Austria's highest mountain, the road stacking up the valley below you, a couple of little tarns and a hut at the turn, and cloud sitting right down on the ridges at the top. Lower down it opened out into blue sky and big white cloud. You stop constantly, because every corner opens onto something new. It's a toll road and it's not cheap, and I'd pay it again tomorrow.