The Travelling Life

Travelling is a strange beast. It stirs things up that may otherwise lie dormant. It gives you all the time to consider the big life questions. And you don’t always have the answers.

You’re seeing new things, meeting new people and constantly wondering what comes next. It can be rewarding and exhausting in the same moment. You’ll want to discover somewhere new and also crave the comforts of home. It’s a rollercoaster of a ride and one I’m only half stepping off as I head back to Sydney in a few days.

It’s definitely had its challenges. Living out of a suitcase can get old pretty fast. Never being able to find what you need or being stuck with the same wardrobe for months on end can be both freeing and totally dull. Constantly running through plans and logistics, train and flight timetables and scheduling in site-seeing can be tiring. Sometimes the minute we arrived somewhere, we’d already have to be checking how we’d get to the next stop. Or at least researching where to head for our next meal. And through all of that, it can be intense spending so much time with one person, even if that person is someone you love.

It’s a luxury in so many ways too; to have the time and space to be making these decisions and having the freedom of so many choices. To have be able to go wherever we wanted (budget allowing!) And it was easy to sound spoilt and ungrateful when we’d say we were tired and just wanted to rest in one place for a while. But some days that was the truth.

We started in Sydney, flew to Singapore for two nights - a chance to see somewhere new but also a way of breaking up the journey. We spent a few days in London before flying to Italy for two weeks; a wedding, a week with my sister and another week exploring Rome and Florence. Ending with four nights in four different hotels. We spent a full summer in London, soaking up the sunshine and beer gardens, went to Wimbledon and swam in the sea at Whitstable. I flew to Spain for a few nights with one of my oldest friends and her family. We celebrated my Dad’s 70th, Jack’s sister turned 30 and much champagne was drank. I had ten days in New York flying solo. We flew to Canada and had three months exploring Toronto, Kawartha Lakes, Prince Edward County, Ottawa, Quebec City and Montreal; starting with September sunshine and ending with a November snow fall. We managed to squeeze in two weeks in Mexico to recharge before flying back to London for our first Christmas at home in five years.

It’s been a whirlwind and it’s nothing but surreal to think we are heading towards the end.

The adventure doesn’t stop here. We fly back to Sydney with our cups full. Full of adventure, full of the kind of love you only get from those special London souls. Full with the excitement that we have our Sydney loves waiting for us on the other side to start our next chapter in the land of sunshine.

Here’s to many more adventures ahead.

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