And here it is, the hardest task of the entire trip so far… How to condense 704 photos and two months of such varied aesthetic rapture into a single digit gallery, the sole purpose of which should be to make every single recipient immediately open another browser window and book the next available flight to …
Bogotá never stood a chance. With all the Colombian marvels that had preceded it over the previous two months, the city that not a single person had anything positive to say about was always going to struggle to live up to the rest of the country’s experiences. Infamous for its terrible weather, horrendous traffic, and …
And breathe… Wow, that was intense. As desperate as I always am to arrive at each new destination with zero expectations and a blank canvas onto which to paint my new adventures, sometimes it simply isn’t possible. When backpacker gossip and itinerary discussions with proud locals repeatedly combine to highlight one specific locality, the hype …
Dubai was open for business, to all intents and purposes. Malls, restaurants, bars and museums were all operating fully, though with reduced capacity, and the metro was uncomfortably crowded at all times. São Paulo felt like a city that knew harsher restrictions were coming (they just have) and decided to double down in a last …
STREET ART – ARCHITECTURE – CRAFT BEER – PEOPLE In no order of importance, these are the four criteria by which I evaluate the urban exploration ranking of any given city that invites me to visit. It is no surprise that New York, Melbourne, Cape Town, and Tokyo are my all time favourite urban playgrounds, …
It is all about the timing. It always has been, with me. As my fingers hovered above the mousepad button in my hotel room in Dubai, I could almost sense that moment of scientific discovery in a faraway laboratory. That exact moment when the researcher pulled his head back from the microscope, petri dish awash …
Whilst this most unexpected of first travel destinations may have provided aesthetic and cultural stimulation beyond my wildest imaginations, Dubai will only ever live in my mind as irrefutable proof that people make places, and that putting in even the tiniest of social effort will offer the greatest human reward. In contacting Aga, an ancient …
So far, so very good. Given the somewhat hurried nature of my departure to a destination more or less imposed on me, my first fortnight on what has now imaginatively been christened The Big Trip has been a nothing short of a resounding success. And this despite needing to extend my stay by an additional …
The running joke of the Dubai street art underground scene is that you need to be able to spray paint equally well with both hands to make it as a successful artist. Not so that those hard-to-reach metro underpass corners can be evenly coated from multiple angles, but rather so that the artist has another …
[ORIGINALLY POSTED 22.01.2016] The time draws nigh. Disappointed by the non-manifestation of my much anticipated midlife crisis one entire year after my 40th birthday, and without the financial or legal means to acquire an appendage-extending Porsche 911, I have decided to take the matter into my own hands. So goodbye job of 14 years, au …