Category: Retro charm
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How to go for gold – on Queensland’s Gold Coast

Queensland’s Gold Coast is fixed into the holiday psyche of Australians who love to holiday in a place of variety, charm and colour which displays the aesthetics of a true playground for all ages. Winter is coming! So, make plans now to head north and follow the sun. Always appealing, always evolving, ever the charmer…
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How to make sense of scents

or a little dab’ll do ya! I think I’m more of a sensory person than a tactile one – but I do like to touch food, tree trunks, sand, gum leaves, woollen fabric . . . mmm, maybe I’m both. But back to sensory. I love and adore perfume. I do not go a day…
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How to capitalise on the capital

Australia’s capital city is a little different to those of other countries; it is confined to a territory and is surrounded by the bush, with a mountain range in the backdrop. It really began as a rather vast paddock with a view of the Brindabella mountain range to the west, the high country snow fields…
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6 Outback pubs to visit
What a great time to be travelling in Australia – winter is time to rug up and hit the road. No searing heat, no flies and plenty of time to enjoy the pubs and the locals. There’s nothing like the experience of walking into an Outback pub in Australia. You might be greeted with an…
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How to ‘do’ the top town

Getting close to crossing borders again – head to the top of Oz: Darwin Once considered the wild west, Darwin was a haven for maintenance avoiding men; dodgy people who needed to disappear, 20th century vagabonds and a town with a drinking culture to set galactic records. When Cyclone Tracy blew into town on 24…
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Vietnam’s Hanoi and a shining ritual

I do love tradidition, especially ones that have a gentle message.
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Travel: How to explore Tangier

Tangier, top of the continent and a name that conjures myth, legends and exotic stories of decadence is a city of intrigue. Go see for yourself. There’s the labyrinthine medina, an expat dream town, cafes and souks, tempting tagines – there is so much to uncover in Morocco’s top town. It’s a city on the edge,…
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Road trip: Go West
Forbes Town Hall. I wrote this post as the smoke pall was settling over Sydney and we were preparing to head outta town to support people in the rural areas. And then the hammer of Covid-19 slammed us, and we went into quarantine. Locked in and not going anywhere. As restrictions are cautiously being lifted…
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Postcards from the Seaside

I know my beaches. I grew up in Sydney and had the advantage of swimming at the great urban beaches in this part of Australia’s east coast. Golden sand, the smell of coconut oil and hot chips, squealing children and days so long that they went on forever. And as I grew older and began…
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Art Deco capital of New Zealand (and possibly the planet)

Not often you get to thank a natural disaster and community tragedy for a splendid architectural creation. In February 1931 a bastard of an earthquake rocked Napier, a town on Hawke’s Bay on the east coast of the north island of New Zealand. The ‘quake measured 7.9 on the Richter scale and rocked the Hawke’s…