The Interislander Ferry left it’s berth in Wellington Harbour on time, at 8:45am. We’d arrived as requested at 7:45 for an airline style check-in and the big bags were taken off our hands and stowed somewhere on the ship where they store big bags. It was great not having to lug them around. The ferry is pretty big, it’s a vehicle ferry and it was full of all sorts of vehicles and all sorts of people.
We had an average breakfast and a terrible coffee as soon as we got on board, then discovered the proper café and got a much nicer coffee once we were settled and on the way out of the harbour. We wanted to beat the rush for food, but patience should have been exercised instead. I was desperate for a caffeine fix mind as the machine in the ‘departure lounge’ wasn’t working.
We were lucky with the weather; it was a stunner of a day, warm, calm and clear. Everything you want for a crossing of the Cook Strait, the band of water between New Zealand’s North and South Islands. We were heading south, across the strait and down through the Marlborough Sounds to Picton; about 3 hours and 30 minutes away. It’s about 93 kilometres in total, with two thirds being inside the sounds.
Eleanor and I have done the journey before, but I was keen to share it with Paula, as on a good day like today, it’s a stunner of a trip. It lived up to the reputation I’d given it as well.
The ferry sort of hugs the southern coast of the North Island for a while, providing some great views of the rugged coast line. I spent a lot of time on this part of the journey trying to spot dolphin pods, or even better whales; but sadly, other than a few seagulls, there was no other wildlife to see today.
As we approach the top of the South Island it is almost impossible to see the narrow entrance to the sounds from the strait and it sort of pops into view at the last minute.
The highlight was undoubtedly the final hour navigating through the stunning Marlborough Sounds. The water turned a deep turquoise as we weaved between the hills that plunged dramatically into the sea. Small isolated homes appeared occasionally along the shoreline, accessible only by boat.
As we approached Picton we carved through a monstrous pod (swarm? herd?) of jellyfish.
I’d tried to arrange a shuttle ride from the port in Picton the thirty or so kilometres to Blenheim, where I’d booked us into a motel for the night. I thought the booking had failed, but the driver was waiting for us with a sign with my name on it as we got off the ferry and collected our bags. It was an expensive ride.
We had a fairly simple motel, it was comfortable, quiet and perfectly fine. We weren’t planning on spending a lot of time in the rooms. The shuttle driver had recommended the St Clair Vineyard for lunch so we took a taxi there and were lucky to get a table – only because we’d booked ahead just before leaving the motel. It was very busy.
Marlborough is wine country and there are a significant number of vineyards in the surrounding area. Some brands, like Cloudy Bay, are very well known in the UK. I think it would be fair to say that sauvignon blanc is the primary grape variety grown here. Marlborough sauv blanc is available in most places in the world that sell wine.
St Clair wasn’t a wine producer I’d heard of before so I was keen to sample some of their product. We’re not huge fans of sauvignon blanc, much preferring the pinot gris variety of white wine. We also like a gewürztraminer, which is less well known in New Zealand, though St Clair had a very nice one.
Fortunately the vineyard only allows bookings for a couple of hours so we were turfed out nice and early. I could have sat there in the sun drinking cold wine and eating cheese for hours; though would have been broke and a bit ‘under the weather’ if that had happened.
Our South Island adventure was off to a cracking good start.
When planning our New Zealand travels, Napier was high on the list – especially after missing it on our previous trip due to Covid restrictions. What makes this city particularly fascinating for me is its remarkable architectural story, born from a terrible (and probably terrifying) event.
On 3 February 1931, Napier experienced a catastrophic 7.8 magnitude earthquake that lasted just 2.5 minutes but completely transformed the city. The earthquake tragically killed 256 people and almost totally destroyed the city centre, as well as causing severe damage to residential areas and the surrounding countryside.
By 1933, Napier had completely reinvented itself as an art deco city. Embracing current design trends, with a local flavour, the city was rebuilt from the ground up. Remarkably, much of that 1930s rebuild remains behind and walking through the city centre today feels like stepping into a perfectly preserved 1930s film set.
With over 140 well preserved art deco buildings, the city now markets itself as the “Art Deco Capital of the World.” I would love to visit when they properly celebrate this and ban all those pesky modern cars that park in front of all the interesting bits.
We arrived in Napier after a 5 hour drive from Rotorua, and with only an afternoon in town we were out looking at buildings soon after dropping our bags in the motel, which was directly over the road from the beach. It’s always relaxing being near the sea.
We loved Napier, and I wish we’d had more time to just walk around the city centre and admire the beautifully maintained buildings under a nice blue sky. There is a (mostly) friendly vibe here.
I took a lot of photos as we walked.
It’s a small city centre and with little time we focused on the central streets. There are a couple of locations away from the business and commercial centre, though we didn’t really have time to visit them. I would have liked to have seen some of the residential properties. I’ve saved those for next time.
Late afternoon we stopped for a drink and a sit down at Community Burgers, a really nice little bar that I would’ve been very content spending more time in if I hadn’t had a burger for dinner last night. A rare bar playing decent music.
Walking back to the motel for a break before convening again for dinner, we had the only unpleasant moment of the entire trip. We got engaged in a random conversation with an oldish man, who stopped us on the street. He was clearly drunk or on something, and it started off being just a bit weird but moved on to him making an extremely racist comment, at which point we left the conversation. This resulted in him telling us to ‘F off’ and us returning the compliment, before heading off in different directions.
Luckily, we only let it ruin our day for a few minutes, and after a planned rest, we walked to the beautiful Masonic Hotel for a very nice dinner and a settling glass of wine, or three.
Our trip to New Zealand was always going to be a short one, with not enough time to do all the things we want to do. Naturally, any time spent in New Zealand has a family focus, but I also want to show Eleanor, and on this visit, Paula, some of the good bits, which are mainly outside of city centres. When Eleanor and I were here last time we had numerous plans to see the country, all of which were thwarted by lockdowns, or in the end when we were due to fly back to the UK, Covid-related nervousness. This time there were no such restrictions, self imposed or otherwise, though now, time time itself is the restriction.
Paula hasn’t been to New Zealand before, so it was important that we dropped Rotorua into the road trip. We also wanted to visit Napier, a place we had to drop last time. There wasn’t much else in the north that I wanted to show off, and with limited time, the South Island is where visitors should go. So that was where I focused my planning energies; not that I would get to many of the best places myself.
I split the road trip into two sections; with me renting a car for the North Island leg and Paula renting a car for the south. Car rental in New Zealand is not terribly expensive, unless you want to return the car to a city different to the one you collect it from. Then it’s madly expensive. I broke the trip into two to save us some money, and Paula could collect and drop off the car from Christchurch airport, saving hundreds of pounds, which we could spend on getting the scenic train from Blenheim.
We waited at Mum’s until the morning rush hour was over before saying farewell and thanks, and then set off for day one of our less than grand tour of New Zealand. The rental car is huge by my standards, yet still only a medium-size SUV, a Mazda something or other. I’m not a car person. It was white and everything worked perfectly well and it ‘seemed’ reasonably economical. At least it was comfortable to drive, other than being comparatively huge. Here it is, parked outside our cabin in Rotorua.
Our first stop was at Hobbiton, something that Paula specifically wanted to do. We had tried to book tickets a couple of weeks ago, but it was sold out. We arrived with the faint hope there would’ve been cancellations. We were wrong, it was packed. Oh well. It was sort of on the way and at least it was a nice day (so far) and the countryside is pretty.
I was really surprised at how good the roads were, and that the motorway out of Auckland, and later in the trip, into Wellington had been massively extended while I’ve been away. I’m not an advocate for building more roads in most instances, but there was a real need to improve on what existed and it has made a huge improvement to journey time, and to road safety and emissions.
We spent the first night in cabins in a tourist park in Rotorua. Accommodation anywhere is expensive and with a lot of nights away we are staying in a mix of cheap and (hopefully) cheerful and mid-market places. This was definitely at the cheap and cheerful end of the scale.
After dumping bags, we drove to Kuirau Park in the centre of the small city. Rotorua’s claim to fame is thermal activity, it’s a hot bed of activity (apologies for the pun). Boiling, steaming pools, geysers, it’s all here, there and everywhere in Rotorua, often popping up in residents’ gardens. There are some fantastic thermal parks here, but most require time and money and we were short of time. Kuirau Park has a few free examples of thermal activity and is worth a visit and we saw some quite cool stuff, well I think there was something cool here; hard to tell with all the steam!
We timed the visit to perfection. Heading back into town it absolutely poured with rain, the heaviest rain I’ve experienced in a long time. Luckily the downpour was short lived and we did park right outside the café we went to for dinner.
The next day, Wednesday, we were back in the car early for the five hour drive to Napier, stopping at the spectacular Huka Falls for a look and a walk before taking breakfast and a much needed coffee in Taupo.
The drive to Napier was lovely, especially the winding Mohaka Gorge section through beautiful native forest with the river running below and alongside the road.
We were really looking forward to visiting Napier, it is the most preserved art deco city in the world and was going to be our main holiday when we lived here, before Covid ruined it for us. Napier deserves its own post and that will come next.
Paula finally got to drive on New Zealand roads the following day, I know she’d been dying to get behind the wheel, but country roads in New Zealand are not the best, or they never used to be. They are much better now and I was just being stupid. Paula drove us all the way to Wellington, our final stop on this leg of the road trip.
We stopped in Hastings for breakfast and took a short detour to the Hastings suburb of St Leonards, just because my flat is in St Leonards on England’s south coast; next to Hastings, and we found it all quite amusing. I like my St Leonards more.
The drive to Wellington was great, especially from the passenger seat. We arrived late afternoon and had a bit of ‘fun’ finding our hotel, and somewhere to stop in the very busy street. We did a quick bag dump and then I took the car back to the rental company and that was the end of road trip one; only three days, but we saw a lot and enjoyed ourselves.
With an early ferry booked in the morning we only had the one evening in Wellington so didn’t linger in the hotel once I returned. We took a roundabout walk catching the harbour, and the (in) famous Bucket Sculpture, the Beehive – New Zealand’s parliament building – before stopping for a decent curry in Cuba St.
After dinner we walked back around the harbour, stopping for the worst glass of wine we had in New Zealand at a waterfront bar. With this being the second disappointment at a harbourside venue, we have definitely learned the lesson, this time.
It’s an early start tomorrow for the ferry to Picton, but before that we go back in time to yesterday when we visit Napier.
On Saturday, Paula, our friend from London arrived in Auckland and we picked her up from the airport in Mum’s little car just after midday. Before picking her up, we drove to my ex-brother in law’s house to see him, my niece, nephew and his partner. We then dropped my niece at my sister’s on the way to the airport. It was good to catch up with my BIL, as I’ve rarely seen him on past visits to New Zealand as he was working in Australia. We had a family get together in the evening. My niece lives in Christchurch and was up for a few days and this was the only time we got to hang out together. As always, hanging out with my family is a stress-free affair, though I was driving, so avoided the wine after a single glass. It was the final family meal for this trip and it was sad saying goodbye to my sister. I made up for wine the following day.
An absolute highlight of any trip back to Auckland is a visit to Waiheke Island. We had the offer of the bach (holiday home) we stayed in last time but couldn’t fit in an overnight trip, though next time we will. We had good intentions of visiting a couple of wineries, but as is always the case, we enjoyed the first one we went to and didn’t move until it was time to head back into the city.
The day started quite early for a Sunday, the intention was to get the train from Mum’s to the city, but there was track maintenance and the trains weren’t running so I got some ‘pre-India’ Uber practise in instead. Mum is kindly staying with a friend and has let us have the run of her two bedroom apartment in the retirement village for a few days, so the three of us can stay together without having to pay for accommodation.
We had the worst coffee and an average, very uninspiring/uninspired breakfast at a city waterfront café (a lesson we failed to learn when we later had the worst glass of wine in New Zealand in a waterfront bar in Wellington.) We didn’t let it spoil the day. We had left early to avoid the rush. It was a glorious sunny end of summer day and we knew the vineyards would be popular and didn’t want to miss getting a spot in our favourite place. We had bought ‘executive’ ferry tickets, which meant we could use a special ferry. A group booking failed to arrive so there was just eight of us on the ferry and it was very nice indeed. We were welcomed with a glass of wine, which set the day off just right and compensated for the lousy breakfast. The journey through the Hauraki Gulf to Waiheke takes about 40 minutes and the sea was calm and the sky was blue and I could have spent all day on the ferry just enjoying the air and the small, and not so small, islands we pass on the way.
Eleanor and I loved Casita Miro, a Spanish themed vineyard, last time we came to Waiheke and decided this was the best place to start showing Paula New Zealand wine and Auckland island life. The bus ride from the ferry passes some lovely beaches along the way and this really does add to the joy of being out of the city, any city; even London. I like Waiheke a lot.
The mosaic mural at the entrance to the vineyard that was still being worked on last time we visited has now been completed and I love the Gaudiesque madness of the tiling along the wall and the other art works scattered around the gardens.
We grabbed a spot under a young olive tree and other than adjusting position as the sun moved around the sky, we didn’t really move for four hours. We just enjoyed wine and food and each other’s company. It was a lovely afternoon and I was so glad Paula enjoyed the place as much as we do.
The following day, Monday, brought us back to earth with low, thick clouds and persistent drizzle all morning. Though, I got an early opportunity to test my new raincoat, and it passed with flying colours. Thankfully
We waited for rush hour, and the school run, to pass and caught the train to Grafton, then walked to and up Maungawhau/Mt Eden. The view from the top over Auckland city is normally fantastic, but there was less of it today. Still it was a nice, if rather damp walk, and Paula got a bit of perspective of the city. I like it up here. A lot of work has gone into preserving the Māori history and the landscape of Maungawhau, and the other extinct (we hope) volcanic cones that make up the centre of Auckland City, all 53 of them… This is a well used tourist spot, though I noticed that tour buses have been banned from driving to the top.
We stopped for a very nice brunch in the café on the mountain before walking back into the city, passing near the Air BnB apartment we stayed in (and I hated) for three weeks when first arrived in Auckland in 2021.
It’s St Patricks Day today and Paula has had a pint of Guinness to celebrate every year since she was a teenager, so it would have been wrong of us to break that run in Auckland. We found an Irish pub (there is always at least one in every city) and Paula got her Guinness and Eleanor and I had a pint of something else as it’s not our thing. The pub was rocking for early afternoon, though sadly we couldn’t stay as I had to pick up a rental car at the airport for our road trip adventure to start tomorrow…
This holiday was a long time in the planning. We started talking about it well over a year ago, though we didn’t start to book things until late in 2024. Unusually for us, we’re splitting the holiday into a couple of sections. We have one of our good London friends, Paula, joining us in Auckland tomorrow (Saturday 15 March) and all we’re going to road trip to see one of my sisters in Dunedin, which is close to the bottom of the South Island and from there we separate. I’m going to Brisbane in Australia for a night and then onto Delhi, India via Hong Kong ,before going back to London. Eleanor and Paula are going to road trip in New Zealand for a few more days before going to Sydney and Tokyo and then on to London. Eleanor and I will be apart for 16 days, the longest we’ve been apart since 2019, at least.
Considering the circumstances, our time in Auckland was good. I have an unwell family member, thought it’s not the right time to speak on this, and my aunt’s husband, who has been sick for a while, passed away in hospital during our visit. I guess I’m of an age where visits back home are not always going to be a bundle of laughs.
We arrived in Auckland on Friday 7 March on a warm and sunny day, a welcome relief after what seemed like three months of cold and grey in London. Most of our time in New Zealand, and for me Brisbane and India, was spent under a cloudless sky. It was so nice to be warm again.
With only a week in Auckland we had a fairly full schedule, we wanted to see friends and family as well as revisit a few of our favourite spots from when we lived here during the Covid lockdown of mid 2021 to early 2022. On revisit some of those places brought a happy smile, but some just were a bit ‘meh’, I guess we’ve moved on since the days of lockdown. Our favourite places remain favourites though and it was a joy to walk around and even more of a joy to sample the huge variety of delicious pinot gris wines available in NZ. None of that pinot grigio pish they sell in London.
Highlights
Spending time with my family. It was great seeing mum, my sister, niece, nephew, aunt and my son and grandson. I’ve been away from family for 13 years and it’s been three since we were last ‘home’, though my sister and son have visited us in London between. I’m conscious that every visit is important and getting to hang out with family, even for a few days is precious and not to be taken for granted.
The afternoon we arrived we went for a nice walk from my sister and son to nearby One Tree Hill. Auckland is blessed with a number of great parks and green space and during the early days of Covid in 2021 we took numerous walks here. It is a go to place whenever I come to New Zealand.
Millie, my sisters dog came with us. She looks like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, but she’d have your legs off in a flash if she took a dislike to you.
As with every visit back to New Zealand Mum and I visited Muriwai Beach. We scattered dad’s ashes here in 2007 and it’s an essential part of any visit. Muriwai had long been a happy place before then and it’s somewhere I would be happy to have some of my ashes scattered as well. I think about these things now I’m in my 60s.
It was a hot and sunny day and Muriwai was at its best. There had been a significant weather event here in 2023 with major damage to property (and a couple of lives sadly lost) due to land slips.
The area where we scattered dad was closed off and almost unrecognisable as a large chunk of it had slipped down hill. Fortunately the famous gannet colony was largely unaffected and the council have repaired access to the viewing platforms. It’s the end of gannet season and it was a pleasant surprise to see a few still nesting their young.
On the Saturday, my son took Eleanor and my grandson for a short road trip up to a small farm holding owned by one of my son’s friends and his partner. D is an old boyfriend of my daughter and now a good friend of my son. D is English and I stayed with him and my daughter on a few occasions when they lived in Bristol, he’s a nice guy and it was fun seeing him on his farm. Eleanor finally go to try feijoas, a fruit that is very much a part of late summer in New Zealand. She wasn’t that impressed, which is fair enough as I’m not either.
As well as growing a lot different fruit and vege for a market garden stall, D has a couple of calves and chickens. My grandson had fun too, in fact we all had a good time.
A secondary reason for visiting the farm was it’s location, not to far from the town of Warkworth. Warkworth is one of the key locations for the NZ TV series ‘The Brokenwood Mysteries’. We are slightly obsessed with Brokenwood, though no-one we spoke to in NZ knew much about it. We stopped for a drink in one the bars in Warkworth which is the location for one of the bars in the series. We were a little excited about this.
We also found the church used in the series not too far from mum’s place in Henderson.
Though it was a particularly wet day, which we were very unprepared for so subsequently got completely drenched, mum and I had a nice walk and lunch in Devonport on Auckland’s north shore. We caught the train into town and then the ferry across the Waitemata Harbour and walked to the Navy Museum where we had a damp lunch, before getting the full soaking on the way back to the ferry.
I ended up buying a new rain coat and throwing away the cheap jacket I’d had for 20 years that I found was no longer waterproof. Last time we were in Devonport we had ice creams that melted over and down the side of the cone as it was so hot and sunny. It was the only day where the weather impacted on the day’s activities for the entire month I was away.
Eleanor and I like to walk. We walked a lot when we lived in Auckland for seven months during Covid and then I sold my car soon after we returned to the UK in 2022. We walk a lot in London, and I was doing longer walks than usual to build a bit of walking strength for this holiday, particularly when I go to Delhi in a couple of weeks. We walked a lot around Auckland, it was nice, especially on those clear and warm days.
We visited the Winter Gardens in Auckland Domain. They were closed when we were here last time, and my memory said they were more crowded with plants than they were this time so I was a little disappointed. They were still nice to visit though.
We walked down one of the tree lined paths from the Domain back into the city. I love the trees in Auckland, especially the big old Pohutukawa’s, the New Zealand Christmas tree, and there are some great sprawling examples in the domain. When we were living here I started a folk horror short story that was set among these trees, though I never finished it. I had a good start and a good middle, and even a good end. I just couldn’t find may way from the middle to the end at the time. I must revisit it one day; walking here reminded me of the story.
Auckland has a wonderful seafront and we very much enjoyed a couple of bars and cafes in the Wynyard Quarter as we lived nearby. This trip we found a new bar at Westhaven Marina, a location that has been in desperate need of a place to stop for a coffee, a meal or a glass of wine. We had a couple of really nice walks near the sea; something I miss when living in London, and weirdly while I love walking the seafront at St Leonards, and can’t wait to get back there, it’s not quite the same as walking here. It’s the city person in me I guess.
The trip and my main memories seem to be related to bars. The wine in New Zealand is spectacular, and so much cheaper than in the UK, especially with the exchange rate as it is. We’ve also become quite fond of the old fashioned (whiskey based) cocktail and had a couple of nice ones. Friends recommended a new rooftop bar at Number One Queen St, which we managed to get a table late one afternoon. The view over the ferry building and harbour was just stunning, and their old fashioned was very nice too.
Last time we were here I was introduced to the joys of Debrett’s Kitchen a small bistro attached to Debrett’s Hotel, a very old Auckland establishment. As well as making a very nice old fashioned, and a damn good flat white, its just a cool place to hang out. It’s always been quiet when ever I’ve been there and the music has always been good. My favourite drinking hole in Auckland.
And a final highlight for me was mince on toast. Not something I see in the UK very often. Eleanor thinks it a combination of weird and disgusting, but I thought this one was fantastic!
I’m back in London, and have been for a couple of days. I’m still joining all my India thoughts up, and depending on where I’m at in the sleep/wake cycle those thoughts tend to vary. I’m really glad I wrote lose notes on most of the days I was away so I at least have some record of events to refer to as it was all a bit of a blur. A very slow moving blur as nothing happens at pace in India.
I’ve surprised myself by not yet editing many of the photos I took over the month I was away in New Zealand, Brisbane, Hong Kong, Delhi and Chandigarh. In the past I’ve been disciplined (or interested enough) to edit and write most days. This trip I’ve barely done any at all. I’ve (hopefully only temporarily) lost the enthusiasm I had for photography, writing and editing those photos and words. It was inevitable really, I’ve been doing this for a long time.
Before we left I’d been thinking that this month long break, the first long break in three years, was perhaps going to be a transition period and my interests would lie somewhere else once I’m back home. I’ve been thinking more about aging and what that means, I’m only four and half years away from the UK retirement age of 67, I ache and my pension(s) are not going to keep me in the lifestyle I’ve become accustomed to, so it’s time rethink how I live. This was something I planned to do while I was away on my own, though I never really got around to it; my brain is full. Something to do now I’m home.
What did I think of Delhi? I almost said ‘What did I think of India?’, but Delhi is as much as a reflection on India as London is on England so it would be a terrible crime to cast of all India into the one Delhi shaped pot. Overall, my view of Delhi is probably no different to the view held by most people who don’t hate it; though I can certainly understand any westerners who dislike it that much. It’s a deeply frustrating, and occasionally annoying city, it’s also (reasonably) welcoming, a lot cleaner than expected, less polluted, easy to get around and overall I enjoyed it. Though it isn’t necessarily ‘fun’.
Would I go back? Probably not, though I’ve seen most of what I wanted to see, so there isn’t any reason to go back, other than to transit to somewhere else in India. I would go back to India; though I won’t travel solo again as I found it too hard this time. It’s not just age that has caught up with me, I’m not as adventurous as I used to be, and to be honest with myself, I was never THAT adventurous in the first place.
What did I like about Delhi?
It’s a surprisingly green city, especially the New Delhi and South Delhi areas where I was staying and sightseeing. There are a lot of trees and some lovely parks. Yes, it’s dusty and a little grubby, but you can’t help that when you’re not that far from a desert. There is also a ‘no burn’ policy; which means there are piles of leaves everywhere, which amused me as every morning near my hotel the house keepers would sweep the leaves into piles, and overnight those piles would redistribute themselves back over their driveways, just to be swept back into piles. Rinse and repeat as the young folk say. There are quite a few electric buses and even electric auto rickshaws. It will take a long time for everything to change, but it will.
Other than the first day I wasn’t bothered by pollution, I occasionally wore a mask, but it wasn’t as bad as expected.
At no point did I feel unsafe, or even uncomfortable, admittedly I’m a white man and the experience of female travellers will be very different. I walked a lot and not always just on the main tourist routes and at no time did I feel like I was in any danger, other than possibly falling into a sewer.
Other than a couple of occasions I was generally left alone, the Delhi-ites didn’t care about me. I used the Metro a lot and other than the last day I didn’t see another westerner on any of the trains; I was occasionally included (not overly subtly) in some selfies, but mostly it was like the London Underground, everyone ignored everyone else. I was expecting constant hassle from drivers, guides, shoe shine boys and beggars, this just didn’t happen outside of places like stations and the big tourist attractions. I walked a lot and other than being hot and the occasion sewer stench it was fine and hassle free.
Delhi has (surprise, surprise) an amazing history and there are some fabulous old buildings, in various states of repair. There are the big attractions (Red Fort, Qutub Minar, Humayun Tomb) that are fabulous, but just walking around I stumbled across a number of ancient structures just in residential streets.
My hotel was fine; it was in a ‘posh’ suburb, with quiet tree lined streets and not far from a Metro station. It served decent, it limited food, had a nice roof terrace and had beer and gin – but only from 5pm. I liked staying there, and had two evenings where I spoke to other guests.
Uber. I don’t use it in London, but Uber saved my holiday, as I’m sure I will detail in a future post.
Once you get used to walking in, or crossing roads, and understand that the honking is often advisory (for instance I’m coming up behind you and know you are there), it’s actually not too bad. There are few footpaths, and where there are they often more hazardous than the road, getting used to walking with vehicles around is a must.
Food. I ate a lot of food, 90% of what I ate was local food, I did eat western food twice; once in Delhi and once in Chandigarh. I practiced as well as I could good food hygiene, particularly hand sanitising before eating and other than a couple of tummy rumbles early on I was fine, I didn’t get ‘Delhi Belly’.
Metro station samosa, I had a few of these.
Making my banana paratha as part of the old Delhi Food Tour I joined.
What didn’t I like?
Signage is poor, there are few signs showing the direction to places of interest. For instance; on the London Underground you will be told to ‘exit here for the British Museum’ for example. While the Delhi Metro is fabulous and cheap and reasonably simple to work out, and announcements are in English as well as Hindi, it would be good to hear ‘please exit here for Red Fort’ or something. I guess a lot of western tourists (there is significant internal tourism) use guides and cars rather than walk or use the Metro.
There are lots of government buildings in central Delhi, near a lot of the tourist areas, this means there are lots (and lots and lots) of armed police and they are remarkably unfriendly and on occasion intimidating. There are lots of police barriers.
Scams. Yes, I got scammed. Twice in hindsight, though once wasn’t really a scam per se and didn’t cost me anything. This guy…
The ATM provides 500 rupee bills, which are about 5 pounds. Lots of things cost significantly less than 500 rupees and no-one has change and it’s really hard to get smaller value notes.
Not Delhi’s fault, but in the end I felt quite lonely. The other guests in the main stuck to their groups, which is fair enough, and I didn’t meet other people as I travelled about. Other than the food walk tour I took on my second to last day there was zero engagement with other tourists and I found this tiring in the end.
I mistook people saying things in English with ‘they understand English’, when often they only know a few phrases and any questions outside of their knowledge sometimes resulted in an agreeable ‘yes’, which I thought meant they understood what I asked, when clearly they didn’t and results could be unexpected. This was not their problem. This was my problem. I don’t understand Hindi, at all.
So overall, if you have any interest in different cultures, in food and in history, then Delhi is absolutely worth visiting. It’s safe and easy (ish) to get around and it’s a big step away from your everyday western life.
I took over 1800 photos while I was in New Zealand, Brisbane, Hong Kong, Delhi and Chandigarh and it’s going to take time to go through them all and write up posts. I plan on doing this over the next few weeks, starting at the beginning (as it’s a very good place to start) of the holiday, with New Zealand.
I started this post soon after I visited, but am finishing over a month later, lounging on my bed in Delhi as I wind down an afternoon and await feeding time in the hotel I’m staying in. There will hopefully be a lot of Delhi, and other holiday, related posts over time, though I’ve lost the blogging urge.
In the last couple of posts I’ve touched on getting myself ready for the few days I spend in Delhi and I think it has paid off to a degree, I’ve coped well so far (day three), we’ll see.
I’m sort of just posting this for the record.
Oxford is a university town. While I’m sure many of those who have lived in this small city for generations will disagree with me to some degree, but, the university is Oxford and for this reason alone it is a hugely popular tourist destination. It was busy, and I’m glad I chose to overnight on Friday rather than Saturday. I almost had to battle against the stream of visitors coming from the station to the old town in the wind and rain late on Saturday morning as I headed home. Friday was less frantic and the weather was significantly better.
There are records of teaching in Oxford as far back as 1096 making it the oldest English language university in the world. It expanded rapidly in 1167 when King Henry II banned English students from going to Paris University. The university comprises 43 ‘colleges’, some of which I visited today. All students must belong to a college. Some of the colleges are incredibly old, for instance Balliol was founded in 1263 and claims to be the oldest college in Oxford, and the world.
A number of the buildings date back to the 1400 and 1500s, many constructed from yellow sandstone and they all look lovely. The old, university bit of town, is a great place to walk around, even though it was somewhat busy there were little oasis(es?) of peace if you wanted a moment of solitude.
Getting to the old town from the station, and the ‘hotel’ I stayed in nearby, you pass through some of the newer parts of Oxford, and it was looking a little sad to say the least. There are a lot of boarded up or otherwise closed shops and a few of the buildings look like they’re patiently waiting for the demolition that will put them out of their misery.
Once in the old centre I walked in many different circles and took lots of photos, and here they are. Sadly it was too long ago for me to actually remember the names of the buildings and colleges. At least in Delhi I’ve been keeping a rough record of what I’ve photographed! Oxford id lovely though and I’m really glad I finally spent some time there, it was long overdue..
To finish, here is a stuffed kakapo found in the Pitt Rivers Museum, and a hand segue to the next post which will about New Zealand.
A couple of posts ago I noted that I’m going to ‘practise’ being on my own before I spend solo time in Delhi as we make our individual journeys home from New Zealand. Eleanor and I fly to Auckland on 5 March and spend a week there before we’re joined by a London friend, Paula. The three of us will road trip down New Zealand to Dunedin, where we then separate. I fly to Brisbane for a night to see my family before going to Delhi. Eleanor and Paula spend a few more days in New Zealand then go to Sydney and Tokyo. I have 10 days on my own; and most of that will be spent somewhere that is different to the London I call home. Very different indeed.
I’ve not done the solo travel thing in a while and know I’m going to find aspects of life in Delhi challenging. I want to avoid finding aspects of being on own challenging while I contend with the challenges of Delhi. If I can manage the things I can control then I will be better positioned to manage the things I can’t. That is the theory anyway. Understanding more of what I feel I can control has been an objective of the last few weeks.
To help this I decided to taking a night away by myself and I chose Oxford. It’s not too far from London, it’s always busy with students, their visiting families and other tourists, and it has a good mix of historic architecture with a tiny bit of mid-century concrete mixed in. Other than its cold right now in the UK and Delhi will be hot, I’m going to find the Oxford experience will be just like Delhi, right?
I travelled up on Friday and though it was quite cold the sun was shining and it was a nice day to walk around semi-aimlessly taking photos of buildings of various ages.
Overall, it was a successful couple of days and I enjoyed myself and learned a more about how I react to being by myself and working with crowds and busy tourist venues. I will cover more of the two days in the next post, along with photos of the ‘proper’ Oxford. Today, I’m going to share photos of the limited number of 60s and 70s brutalist buildings to be found amongst the ‘old shit’.
Hilda Besse Building, aka the Common Room and Dining Hall at St. Antony’s College, was the most visually interesting of the brutalist buildings I wanted to see. A number of the concrete buildings, and seemingly a third of Oxford were surrounded by scaffold. A full refurbishment of Hilda was completed in 2021, and thankfully the building has remained true to John Partridge’s original 1971 design. The interior is supposed to be lovely, but like everywhere these days you need a pass to get through the security barriers. I love the window frames and have not seen the like before. They look so much like wartime bunkers I expected to see gun barrels poking out of them.
Just around the corner is the Denys Wilkinson Building, the astrophysics department of Oxford University. Its neighbour, the Thom Building, is being renovated and there was scaffold all over the place and a number of the paths around the building were blocked which was frustrating. I’m learning to accept that not everything is going to go to plan when I travel, so this was good. I also was trying to memorise directions between places, a ‘skill’ I feel I’m losing as I’ve become reliant on my phone to always be there to give me directions. This worked well so was I pleased to find I can do it with little effort, and getting slightly misplaced is often part of the enjoyment.
The Philip Dawson design Nuclear Physics Building first opened in the late 60s and was renamed The Denys Wilkinson Building in 2001 to honour the famous physicist, (and no, I don’t know physicists, famous or otherwise; being interested in brutalist architecture teaches you many things). The fan building houses a Van de Graff Generator.
I know nothing about the Oxford Centre for Innovation building other than where it is, and that it was difficult to photograph as it’s partly wrapped around Oxford Castle Mound and the castle butts up against the back of it.
It was raining on Saturday, and windy, cold and quite unpleasant, so after photographing the innovation Centre I took myself to the Ashmolean Museum, stopping for an excellent coffee in the most unfriendly and pretentious café I’ve been to, and I’m unfriendly and pretentious so have some expertise in this field!
I arrived at the Ashmolean soon after it opened and it was nice and quiet. I had a look around most of the galleries; there is a lot of pottery, something I have very limited interest in. I was seeking out galleries that housed North Indian and South East Asian collections as I’m still fascinated by the complex ancient history of these places as well as the religions that were so key to the buildings and art that were created hundreds, if not thousands of years ago. I was momentarily distracted in the Egyptian collection and this magnificent relief on the side of the tomb of Nubian King Taharqa who died in 664BC, he is believed to have been the last black pharaoh of Egypt. The detail is stunning!
The Indian and Asian galleries were interesting, with some lovely Buddhist and Hindi artefacts. I was especially interested in this beautiful 16th bronze of Saint Tirumankai Alvar which is soon to be returned to it’s home in the Tamil Nadu region of India. While it’s not know whether this statue was stolen, it also can’t be proved that it wasn’t so the museum is returning it. Much as I like to see these lovely objects in UK museums they should be returned to their traditional homes.
As the weather hadn’t improved while I was in the museum. I caught the train back home to London where Eleanor and went to a fantastic restaurant in Stoke Newington to not celebrate Valentines Day.
The next post will be all about the Hogwartsean, Disneyesque Oxford we all know and love.
Every great adventure starts with a train journey. Though, it’s fair to say today’s adventure wasn’t great, and neither was it that adventurous, but it did start with a train journey. All 15 minutes of it.
For the past few months, I’ve had some discomfort/mild pain in my groin. I thought it might be a hernia so my doctor referred me for a scan at the Loxford Polyclinic in Barking, 15 minutes along the Suffragette Line from home followed by a 10 minute walk from the station. There are an awful lot of signs advising that the reception area I was sent to (1b) didn’t have a receptionist; this didn’t stop every person who arrived after me asking if there was a receptionist on today. I did get seen quite quickly.
I wanted to make this visit a little more enjoyable and “adventurous” so mapped out a walk home via the large heath/common area that I just lump into the generic name of Wanstead Flats, though there are official names for all the chunks of open land that is carved up by busy edge of London roads. One of those bit is Wanstead Flats, I just have no idea where is starts or ends.
I was expecting a grey old day but I wasn’t expecting to walk for 90 minutes with cold drizzly rain as my constant companion. However, the rain and very low cloud kept the people away and muted the noise of the traffic to a dull hum. It also blanketed any buildings on the flats’ edges making the walk feel endless and isolating and I really enjoyed the solitude. I walked without headphones and just ‘was’. It was nice. Cold, wet, but nice. My working week just seems so full of noise and I’m starting to appreciate quiet when I can get it, and this means listening to less music than normal. I’m finding this change quite liberating. Music has been with me for decades, and is critical to my wellbeing and I’m not giving it up, just slowly releasing it as a crutch, and allowing myself time in my own head has it’s own rewards.
Other than getting some miles into my legs before we go to New Zealand in four weeks (less three days; and I’m very excited), I’ve been wanting to photograph some garage doors that back onto a dirt path on the edge of the health for quite some time. I know that ‘garage doors on the edge of a heath’ is quite a ‘Phil’ thing to want to photograph, but I’m interested in these luminal spaces where human-made things butt up against natural things. Admittedly, the heath is hardly natural, particularly at this particular point as it’s just football fields, but you (hopefully) get what I mean.
On Thursday I bought myself a new 27mm lens for the Fujifilm xt2 camera I use and wanted to test it out before we go on holiday. It’s a very small lens and makes the camera a little less obvious, something I wanted for when I go to Delhi where I hope to try some street style photography.
Many of these garage doors are blocked by scrub, some are graffitied and some are pristine and obviously used. It’s also kinda weird that these garages back onto parkland that is part of Epping Forest, I’ve no idea how that happened.
I started the nicer second half of the walk just inside the A406, the dreaded North Circular road that slices through a large portion of northern London and is just a constant traffic jam. I’d just walked from Barking to Ilford so it was a relief to not be walking on the pavement of a busy road. I entered the ‘flats’ at the end of Forest View Rd, and it must be the most southern point of Epping Forest. There is not much forest at this point.
I walked past Alexandra Lake before cutting around a couple of football pitches with kids’ matches going on before I headed north west towards the ‘garages’.
I kept local landmarks Fred Wigg and John Walsh Towers as an earthly North Star as I walked. I’m trying to plan walks before I leave home so I rely less on the maps app on my phone. I feel like my memory is waning rapidly as I just rely on technology too much another thing I want to practise before I go away; though I suspect mobile phone theft is less endemic in Delhi than it is in London.
The heath is a mix of football pitches; mostly unused today, and small patches of bramble and scrub, with the occasional clump of trees tossed in for good measure. It’s criss-crossed by roads though both the heath and roads were quiet today.
It took about 40 minutes of weaving and wandering to get to the ‘garages’, and to be honest I was a little surprised I found them, my vague plan had worked! I’ve only ever walked to them from the other end and then taken a sort of random path back towards home. I’d never approached from this angle before so it was a confidence boost to know that my brain hasn’t fully atrophied with constant mobile phone use.
The new lens was perfect for these conditions; a narrowish tree and scrub lined path between fields and houses, the low, dull sky and drizzle needed a crisp and ‘fast’ lens and I’m happy with the results. The weather suited the subject material as well. This is a not-quite grotty bit of east London edgeland, it shouldn’t be photographed under a warm blue sky. Today’s conditions were perfect.
Fred and John stayed as my marker beacons as I cut across the deserted football pitches back towards a warm and dry home. It’s hard to believe it’s only 1pm.
When I woke up this morning I’d intended on making a full day of today, Eleanor is out with friends and I’d wanted to get a really long walk in, but after two hours out I was cold and my trousers and boots were wet from the long grass so I went home, put music on, edited photos and wrote this instead. No regrets, I’d had a good day, and not just because I bought chips from Leytonstone’s best chippie on the way home
It was with some nervousness that I asked Eleanor if she wanted to do a weekend away in St Leonards, I knew she would be up for it, but I wasn’t sure if I was. I haven’t visited since I rented out my flat in April 2023 as I like St Leonards and miss having somewhere to go when I occasionally want to escape London and not pay £100 a night for the pleasure. I love my flat but I think I’m going to sell it when we come back from New Zealand in April. I want to find somewhere a little bit cheaper to make the mortgage more affordable, and I’d like somewhere not on the third floor. My knees aren’t getting better with age.
In the end we agreed it was the right thing to do and here we are a few weeks later, on a train heading back to London from Bexhill as the rain pours and the wind howls outside. We did have a nice time though.
Yesterday was the twelfth anniversary of our first date so it was just the weekend to go away, except that there are no trains running to St Leonards this weekend (the usual ‘engineering works’) and as it was a special weekend for us we wanted to somewhere nicer to stay than was on offer in St Leonards or Hastings. I booked a nice boutique hotel in nearby Bexhill, there is a direct, albeit much slower train, from London Victoria to Bexhill, and at least the service was running. Though the idea of cleaning windows is something that has not, apparently, occurred to Southern Rail.
Miraculously, yesterday was a glorious sunny and still day, seemingly the first of the year; and lordy it has been a looooooooong slow leaden sky start to 2025. We arrived in Bexhill at mid-day and were fortunate to be able to check into our room early and dump bags before taking lunch in a local pub.
The walk from Bexhill to St Leonards is one we’ve done many times and I’m sure I would’ve written about it in the past. It’s mostly a nice walk, especially on a sunny and still day, though the railway yards and commercial buildings that line the inland side for a section of the path aren’t exactly attractive. Luckily there is always the sea to look at.
I’d arranged to collect some mail from the flat, and snuck in and out without seeing any of the neighbours, and without taking a photo of the place. There are enough on here as it is.
We walked though Bottle Alley, one of St Leonards architectural highlights, to Hastings, then turned back to St Leonards as we were meeting the neighbours I didn’t want to avoid for a pre-dinner drink. It was fun, as was dinner where we unexpectedly ran into some other friends and ended up staying out to midnight.
Sunday was slow, which suited us fine. The weather turned overnight and it was incredibly windy. Windy enough to change the train booking to an earlier one, which worked out well as heavy rained arrived soon after we started the journey back to London. Between breakfast and the train we walked west from Bexhill towards Cooden Beach. I like this walk, it’s so different to the eastbound walk to St Leonards which is much more open, this way we pass the back gardens of the large houses that follow the coast and a strange array of beach ‘huts’. It’s very WW2 bunker and there is so much concrete and brick and so little wood and grass, it’s like these beach huts and houses are still fending off the Hun, 80 years after the war ended. It’s mad and I love it.
Back in Bexhill we stopped for coffee in De la Warr Pavilion with it’s magnificent curving concrete staircase before catching the train back to London.
I had missed St Leonards and it was lovely to spend a day there, and yes I loved it and now I can’t wait to come back. x
Where is Phil now? 
You must be logged in to post a comment.