For the first time in years I’ve spent a full Christmas in the UK. I’ve eaten my body weight in cheese, consumed a lot of wine and watched an abundance of film classics on ‘the box’.
I accidentally timed my arrival in Antigua with the blooming of the jacarandas in its main square. No accident though, was my plan to see its Semana Santa celebrations, the most elaborate in Latin America.
I hadn’t expected it to start with a hill. As a lime green man-kini and its host buttocks pulled away up the gravel path, the tiny town of Reuil dropped away behind me, and I puffed my way through the first kilometres of France’s strangest sporting event.
If you’re anything like me, travel isn’t just something you do but a way of life. The enjoyment I get out of researching, planning and generally letting others inspire me to travel is often on a par with the trips I end up taking.
In early autumn, Canberra’s political and cultural centre takes on a different hue. Even the deep reds and picturesque rustiness of the trees encircling Lake Burley Griffin can’t compete with the vivid glow of the annual Enlighten Festival.
At the beginning of Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood, a voice breaks through the silence: “Time passes. Listen. Time passes”. Such a clever line, if acted properly, really does make time stand still.
I watched my first Grand Prix in 1993. Dad and I sat prostrate on the sofa of our French apartment, digesting a leisurely mediterranean Sunday lunch of mozzarella salad and copious amounts of baguette.