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How had it come to this? Standing on the bank of a raging, rain-swollen river and the only route to the other side and the path home was via a fallen log. A log which was no wider than your average telegraph pole and was suitably slippy due to the incessant rain. We took a collective intake of breath as the first person of our group inched onto the 20m walkway to safety.
Deer Mountain, at 915m, towers over Ketchikan, Alaska. It is screaming out to be climbed, with the trailhead being walkable from the town.
I was sat in one of the outside seats on a small boat heading towards Fingal’s Cave on Staffa Island, sea air flowing over my bald head, eyes fixed firmly overboard, scanning the speeding sea. The waterways of the Inner Hebrides are inhabited by whales and dolphins, and if they were here, I was determined to see them.
It was a frigidly cold New Zealand winters morning. We’d left the eerily mist-covered Lake Taupo pre-dawn and were now whistling our way 200 miles north. Colm, my travel-buddy was asleep in the double-bed above my head and I was humming ‘The Fields of Athenry' whilst driving our RV in the direction of the Waitomo Caves.
Tomorrow I will visit the Jesuit Missions of Trinidad and Jesus in southern Paraguay and I am unsure of what to expect. I knew that undertaking this challenge would take me to some places that I wouldn’t ordinarily be interested in, this seems to be the case here.
After a long drive from the Northumberland Coast, where I’d spent a day exploring its coastal castles, I arrived at the miserable and sodden Herding Hill campsite. As I sat in my car, waiting for a gap in the weather so that I could pitch my tent, I wondered what life must have been like here nearly 2 millennia ago when the Romans were in town.
Grouse Mountain towers over the North Vancouver skyline. It has a rich history, a huge range of activities and an extreme fitness challenge. Sounds like the place for me.
Come out of the car park and turn right to head south along the Pacific Rim Highway. Walk along the hard shoulder, being careful of oncoming traffic. Start counting the telegraph poles as you walk and turn onto the path just after the 15th pole.
As I surfaced at the top of the magnificent 10-sided Eagle Tower, looking out from a perfect vantage point over the Menai Straits, I was struck by one undeniable truth - Wow, my legs hurt! Caernarfon Castle is a wonderland of turrets, towers and magnificent gates but having now traversed its entirety, I was really wishing I hadn’t climbed Snowdon the day before.
Snowdon is a liberally accessible mountain nestled in the spectacular Snowdonia National Park in North Wales. At 1,085m high, its mountain environment needs to be respected, and the appropriate clothing worn - certainly you’ll need more than just your underpants!
Portmeirion is many, many things. It’s a personal crusade. It’s a sought-after filming location. It’s an architectural masterpiece. It’s a natural wonderland. It’s a home. It’s a tourist attraction. It’s a collection of Mediterranean inspired buildings on Wales’ west coast. But most of all, I think, it’s a curiosity.
Goa in February is a wonderful place. Temperatures are in the high, balmy 20’s and it’s possible to collect the total rainfall in a small Balti dish. The contrast to the Northern Hemisphere winter is absolute. When you add the fact that it is Goa Carnival during this month then surely there are few better places to be on earth at this time of the year.
I had mentally prepared to witness some difficult scenes. Cramped living spaces, lack of hygiene and malnutrition were some of the things to be braced for. Mahim Junction train station was the location and I was about to embark on a walking tour of Dharavi - the third largest slum in the world.
Anjuna Beach in Goa, India is a Psy Trance fuelled party paradise. However, online event information is sparse and planned parties can change at late notice. So, if you arrive late in Anjuna, you’ll need to find out where the action is fast - fortunately, there is one fail-safe method. Read on to find out how.
I arrived in Mumbai, India without a huge number of preconceptions. The trip was a last-minute booking so I hadn't had months to investigate my destination via google or any other search engine for that matter. There are others, right? This didn't stop me being surprised at every turn.
My year-long sabbatical from work to travel the world was over. Finished. The End. It was time to return to London and back to 'the real world'. However, my new version of 'the real world' would be very different from the one I left prior to Tunnocks World Tour.
I wasn’t well rested. The neighbourhood dogs and cockerels saw to that. However, I was excited and hopeful. I'd been booked in to visit the ATM Cave in Belize for three days straight, but each morning I'd arrived at the Explore Inland Tours to be told that due to flooding, the caves were still shut. This morning though, after no further precipitation, I was certain they would be open. They had to be, I was due to leave for Guatemala tomorrow.
To understand how this is possible you first have to understand the Alaskan people and their relationship with fishing. They love it, and you'd do very well to find an Alaskan that hasn't wet a line at some point in their life. So, when I travelled to Alaska in 2016 I had my eyes on one very big prize.
Sat shivering in a beaten up old truck, icy Alaskan air blowing in through the rust holes, waiting for my host to complete a federal drugs test, the question of whether this was what I wanted for #tunnocksworldtour was extremely pressing. The mangy dog at my feet was probably pondering the same dilema.
I was stood, rooted to the spot, holding a kayak under one arm and a dry bag full of my possessions under the other. The news that my ferry had just been cancelled was slowly sinking in.
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