DAY 1: Melbourne to Tokyo Nihon e Yo-koso. Welcome to Japan! It’s now mid-morning on Monday and we are already on our first Bullet Train! The countryside is whipping by as we travel at more than 200km/hr on the Hayabusa 19 from Tokyo to Hakodate. Hakodate is a small city on the south end of…

ATHENS: Friday/Saturday 9th and 10th September 2022 DAY 1: Friday 9th Disembarking the ship in Lavrio early on Friday morning was super easy, and we picked up our suitcases at the portside terminal and then easily negotiated a taxi to take us the one-hour drive into Athens. Often negotiating taxi fares or routes is problematic…

Greek Islands: Monday to Friday, 5-9 September 2022 The promise of a four-night, six-island journey around the South Aegean on a cruise liner with some of our closest friends had been keeping me awake at night with anticipation and is the perfect final phase of our European vacation. To take up where we left off…

HYDRA (YDRA) 2/3/4 SEPTEMBER 2022 (part 3) It was just what we needed… rest, sunshine, warmth, good food. Hydra was all we had hoped it would be and perfectly timed after a couple of tiring weeks on the road, traversing central and eastern Europe. As you know, we started our five night sojourn on Hydra…

HDRA (IDRA): THURSDAY 1st September. ‘Hold your horses’ It’s the saying Harriet (of Harriet’s Hydra Horses) used, with a wry smile, each time she wanted us to stop on our four hour guided horse trek from Idra town to Palamidas beach, about five kilometres south-west along the coast. The day started early, as the agreed…

HYDRA (IDRA): 30/31st August (VERSION 2) Blah Blah Blah… Yesterday (when I was in my philosophical mood) I wrote a long post about how I’ve worked hard all my life and how as a result of some significant health and well-being issues earlier this year, I’m learning to put my well-being first… I have decided…

THESSALONIKI: 27/28 August 2022 I’m sure many of you would have heard that the Melbourne Greek diaspora, at 425,000 (2021 census), is the third largest Greek population in the world. It takes no guessing that coming in first is Athens, the capital of Greece, with 3.15 million. But who knows which city comes in second?…

BITOLA, NORTH MACEDONIA 26/27 August 2022 FLORINA, GREECE 27 August 2022 A couple of people have asked me why I take up valuable holiday time to write blog posts. There are many reasons, not least of which is to keep a record to help us reminisce. We feel incredibly privileged to travel, especially after a…

SKOPJE, NORTH MACEDONIA: 24th August 2022 PRISTINA, KOSOVO: 25th August 2022 On careful review (Dave keeps a simple word document) we have discovered that as we landed at Skopje Airport and passed through North Macedonia immigration, that I had, in fact, hit country number 52! (not 50 as I mentioned previously) Wednesday started earlier than…

BUDAPEST, HUNGARY, Tuesday 23rd August 2022 I know ‘these are a few of our favourite things’ is a line from the Sound of Music, set in Austria rather than Hungary, but today was a day that we each got to do our favourite thing. (Also I have been singing Sound of Music songs since we…

BRATISLAVA, SLOVAKIA: Sunday 21st August 2022 Trains, Planes and Automobiles have been our choice of transport thus far, but today we changed it up and caught a ferry from Vienna to Bratislava. The ferry wharf was a 15 minute suitcase drag through Vienna’s cobblestone streets, and set along a tributary of the Danube that comes…

Vienna, Austria: 2nd Instalment (Saturday 20th August 2022) The day began like any other… haha, I feel like I am writing a fairy-tale. Actually it feels like I am in a fairy-tale! Saturday did start with – eating, of course 😉 The Neuermarkt’s hotel breakfast was a step up from their hard beds and dodgy…

PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC, 17/18 AUGUST 2022 ‘9 to 5’ is usually a phrase I think of about working, but since arriving in Europe, it has been my sleeping hours. By 9pm I am exhausted and ready to crash, and by 5am I am awake, up and ready for action! Thankfully the bouts of tiredness throughout…