Author archive
23 May 2020
Today, Jo and I flew down on the 1230 flight to Queenstown for a minibreak. It’s our first travel experience in the post-Covid world. As we’re still under some restrictions in New Zealand, physical distancing is still required in public places. As a result, there were a few quirks in our travel experience: Entry into […]
30 March 2020
For an introvert, lockdown wasn’t too difficult. All businesses except for essential services were closed. Practically it was only supermarkets that were open. No cafe, takeaways. OK, it was a hassle to not have a fallback to eat out. I’m pretty good with cooking. I did miss my gym, yoga and swimming. I enjoyed the […]
28 March 2020
Many people like to vilify large corporations but I think small businesses can be equally bad. Just before our lockdown, I went to our local neighbourhood greengrocer. Broccoli was $6 and cauliflower was $14 per head, while prices were normal at the nearby supermarket. I will remember this when choosing where to shop in the future. […]
24 March 2020
I was meant to fly out tonight. But nope. It would been pure dumb. But it would also have been impossible with various legs of my itinerary cancelled. It was a bit of a process to get everything cancelled and refunded. Timing was critical as I wanted, as much as possible, the provider to initiate […]
20 March 2020
I have friends and family who are wondering what to do with their travel plans, especially flights, in the coming months. They have been asking my view on what to do. No one knows how long this pandemic will disrupt travel for. First of all, if your travel is not imminent, don’t do anything hasty! […]
19 March 2020
In the meantime, Malaysia, Australia and New Zealand had all closed its borders to foreigners. Covid-19 cases climbed rapidly in many countries. Travel was no longer wise. Travel restrictions and low demand meant that many flights had been cancelled. The risk of getting stranded was very high, in addition to the risk of getting an […]
12 March 2020
In January 2020, some six weeks before my visit to Manila, Taal volcano blew up. There goes my day-trip from Manila! Covi-19, a corona-virus outbreak had been brewing in China since late 2019. In February, things started going international. By early March, the world outside of China was significantly impacted. I was still happy to […]
1 March 2020
A great tropical adventure I have to travel regularly from New Zealand to see Mum in Borneo. She is 93 this year. I often combine the visit with somewhere else in the world. After all, New Zealand is far from everywhere else, so when I travel I make the most of it! Back in August […]
28 February 2020
We woke to a calm cloudless morning. If only the weather had been this perfect yesterday; not that it wasn’t good enough. We had plenty to learn about overnighting on the boat. Having left the windows open overnight, there was condensation on most surfaces on board. We needed it for the ventilation through the night […]
27 February 2020
Kim has had several boats in his lifetime. He has had his current one for a couple of years but we’ve never taken it much further than around an hour from Auckland, let alone on an overnight trip. It’s something we’ve wanted to do for more than a year but sometimes the weather conditions aren’t […]