Exiting from Kolkata airport into the Indian air was an assault on the senses I’ve experienced only once before. The last time I was in India!! It was early evening by the time I collected my bags and headed into town to find my hotel. The road was filled Kolkata’s synonymous yellow taxi’s, it’s colourfully decorated old buses and what seems like a million autos (motorised Tuk Tuk). With horns blasting, they all...

After China, Laos was always going to be about rest and relaxation. If there is a better spot than South East Asia for doing exactly that, then tie me down sport, and call me an Aussie!!. The instant you enter South East Asia the shackles come off, the pressure dissipates, stress disappears, you start to feel relaxed immediately. In this part of the world there is no hurry, no need to rush. Everybody is happy and smiling. Friendly faces...

Hi All, Almost 2 years to the day, after I got up at an Escape the City meet up in London, and asked if ‘Anybody fancied going for a drive?’, I find myself in Kuala Lumpur at the end of Leg 3. After 126 days on the road, 19 countries, 14,000 miles, 22,500 kms, Legs 1, 2 & 3, 10 Boris services, 3 borders crossed without the right paperwork, 2 x-rays, and one dodgy wrist, I’ve reached the end point of my journey east....

While I was in Luang Namtha, Laos I had the pleasure of meeting a fellow Kiwi called Stuart Biggs. Stu and I discovered we were both fans of the adventurer Alastair Humphreys. Stu was so impressed he had taken a leaf out of Alastair’s book and decided to go on a pack rafting adventure. What I loved about Stu was the simplicity of his decision making.  As far as I could tell his decision making process had gone like this. Stu liked...

I woke the day after we left Baku to a beautiful sunny day on the Caspian Sea. The cool sea air was refreshing. Optimistically I hoped that we would dock today, one day ahead of schedule. The first sign that things were going to be different was my mobile phone had lost any network connection. Contacting my guide onshore was going to be tricky. Everybody was slow to rise due to the night before’s vodka based celebrations. The boat...

I arrived at the Azerbaijan border and passed through the Georgian side in 5 minutes. Then began the queuing for Azerbaijan. It wasn’t moving fast so I settled in for a wait. A friendly local chap introduced himself and we passed the time with him teach me introductory Azerbaijani lingo. Overall it took about 2.5hrs to get through the border controls. I had to pay $65 for insurance and $40 for road tax. They had a look through the...