The Heysen Trail is a 1,200-kilometre walk from the rugged coast of South Australia to its arid inland. We are looking forward to the slow meditation that is long-distance walking but are a little apprehensive. We have walked long distances before but mainly in Europe, where there is a cafe every few kilometres and a warm bed each evening. On the Heysen Trail, we need to be self-sufficient and carry our own shelter, warmth and up to six days’ food. Do we have such a walk in us, we wonder? Read More
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Walking the Heysen Trail, South Australia: Episode 1.
The Heysen Trail winds between Cape Jervis at the southern end of the Fleurieu Peninsula and Parachilna Gorge, 1,200 kilometres to the north. The trail traverses beaches, sea cliffs, national parks, rural landscapes, historic towns and the ancient, rugged peaks of South Australia’s largest mountain range. It is named for the artist Hans Heysen, renowned for his paintings of majestic gum trees and the arid, beautiful Flinders Ranges.
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New Zealand: Two Islands, Two Walks. # 2, The Tongariro Northern Circuit
The four-day Tongariro Northern Circuit winds its way around the sacred mountains of Tongariro National Park; Ngauruhoe, Ruapehu and Tongariro. The stunningly beautiful volcanic landscape holds a profound cultural and spiritual significance for the Māori Ngāti Tūwharetoa iwi. In 1886, the iwi gifted them to the New Zealand people as the country’s first national park. In 1993 Tongariro National Park became the first site in the world to be inscribed on the world heritage list for both its natural and cultural landscapes.
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New Zealand: Two Islands, Two Walks. # 1, The Heaphy Track
Aotearoa, New Zealand, the land of the long white cloud. We fly in over the rugged snow-capped southern alps to breathtaking glimpses of Mt Aspiring, Lake Tekapo, ice-blue ribbons of water and the grey scoured ghosts of long receded glaciers. A dramatically beautiful landscape. Then the wild country vanishes and in its place are the neat, green fields and hedgerows of the Canterbury Plains. We’ve come to tramp two of New Zealand’s ‘great’ walks; the five-day Heaphy Track in the north-west of the South Island and the four-day Tongariro Northern Circuit in the centre of the North Island.
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Great Victorian Bike Ride: Grampians to Geelong
Prelude
A litany of creeks and rivers; the Merri, Mullum Mullum, the Maribyrnong, Kororoit, Dandenong, Moonee Ponds, the Yarra. All trails we ride with the impending Great Victorian Bike Ride in mind. Trees scarred with ceremony, the burnished gold cupolas of orthodox churches, a kangaroo by the western ring road unconcerned by the roar of trucks and tradies utes, artichokes and fennel growing wild, the last of spring’s wattles bright yellow with blossom. We train on the road as well, out in the hills beyond the city where tall trees grow and parrots flash past, a blur of neon green and red and blue.
Tour du Mont Blanc, France
Late Summer
The Tour du Mont Blanc is an epic 170-kilometre walk around the Mont Blanc massif, a dazzling landscape of snow-capped peaks, ice scarred mountains and tumbling glaciers. Its high, steep mountain passes are legendary and its wildness alluring. A walking journey through three different countries and cultures beckons (France, Italy and Switzerland). And the highest mountain in Europe, a fabled dome of snow and ice, will be our guiding star.
Summer in Provence
We are in Provence to visit friends and wander slowly through the heat haze of summer, travelling from the elegant former papal city of Avignon to the Mediterranean and up into the Rhône-Alpes.
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Into the Pyrénées
Summer 2016
Toulouse, capital of France’s southern Occitanie region, is close to the Pyrénées and perfectly positioned for a two-week sojourn studying french before we set off into the Haute-Pyrénées.
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Sweden in the Green Season
Sweden in the Green Season: Three Walks and a Beach
Just beyond the muted ochres and calm sophistication of Stockholm is a wilder world. Summer is the green season and it is greener the deeper into the woods you wander. You can catch a train to the last metro stop on the line going south or north and find yourself on a long-distance walking trail. Here is our story of walking the first section of three of these trails.
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Latvia: Rīga and Beyond
Late one warm Saturday afternoon finds us on the sundeck of the Rīga ferry as it navigates its way through the beautiful labyrinth that is the Stockholm archipelago.
We pass so close to some islands that we can exchange greetings with the summer house dwellers sunning themselves on the rocks. Islands upon islands, pine forests, red and yellow-painted summer houses, sailing boats, skerries. Then out into the Baltic Sea, calm enough on the night of our crossing to sleep without memory.
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