Welcome to the ramblings

13 May 2020

Update (2020-11-25): The ramblings concept mentioned here was a good idea, I’ve switched to using micro.blog for short ramblings-style posts. I’ve removed the hidden tags that stopped the ramblings posts from showing up in the main feed. Enjoy. Was having a big ‘ol think the other day after I posted another Coronavirus blog. That post took me a... Read more

Coronavirus Update

10 May 2020 Upnor, Kent, UK

It’s been 50 days since I first posted about Coronavirus and it’s fair to say that in that time, the world has changed. 50 days ago there were 289 deaths in the UK and yesterday’s daily government briefing announced the total is now 31,589 - which puts our little island nation second in numbers only to the USA. Italy was at the centre of the cri... Read more

Train to Turkey - Leg 7 - Belgrade to Sofia

28 Mar 2020 Belgrade, Serbia

It’s fair to say that this is the part of the journey we were most worried about. The daily train between Serbia and Bulgaria is the one which we have invested the most research and nervous phone-checking during our trip. We even had the staff in the hotel double-check that the train is actually a real train and contacted people online who had b... Read more

Coronavirus

21 Mar 2020

The past few weeks have been quite extraordinary. The current Coronavirus pandemic has begun to affect our lives in the way nothing like it ever has before - and I suspect that we’re very much still at the start line. on Friday (20th March 2020) in a live TV address to the nation the prime minister, Boris Johnson directed that as soon as reason... Read more

Belgrade, Serbia

07 Jan 2020 Belgrade, Serbia

After spending an entire day on a train the day before we woke ready to explore the city of Belgrade. Weather was in our favour and pulling the curtains we saw everything for the first time in daylight, Europe was truly behind us, we were now in a place that neither of us were familiar, with another currency and another language - one which we h... Read more

Deeper, Darker and Scarier - PADI Tec45

03 Jan 2020

When I started diving five years ago I never could have imagined that I would certify this far on the PADI tree. Passing my Tec45 has taken a lot of effort, the knowledge reviews and exams really do require some serious investment and the training and certification dives require confidence, practice and second-nature ability in the water. That’s... Read more

So Long, Squarespace

02 Jan 2020

Want to hear something frightening? Since I moved my blog to Squarespace I have given them $1,210 dollars. That is INSANE. It’s enough for a trip to NYC! Time for a change and today I’m very pleased to welcome you to my new blog which as you may have noticed looks remarkably similar to the old blog. The key difference if that it no longer costs... Read more

Kyiv, Ukraine

27 Oct 2019

Kyiv wasn’t on the itinerary for the #TrainToTurkey because there are unfortunately no trains across the Black Sea. Or ferries either, for that matter. Thankfully economics were in our favour and we were able to make a literal flying visit. There are direct flights from London to almost all capital cities in Europe, North Africa and the Middle ... Read more