Blog

Jun

Camp Island the Great Barrier Reef’s newest private island escape, Queensland Australia

On a quiet Sunday afternoon in locked-down Melbourne, my beautiful daydream is of Camp Island, on the Great Barrier Reef.

The little island is at the top of the Whitsunday Islands group, and when you take it, you take the whole island. To get there, I had to dodge two cyclones, a COVID outbreak and several COVID scares, but it was worth it. While the island is located in the curve of Abbot Bay, in between Airlie Beach and Townsville, there was almost no sight of another human.

To discover more about Camp Island, click here to read my story in the Sydney Morning Herald/The Age‘s Traveller section.

Jun

Reports from locked-down Melbourne

Melbourne is back in lockdown – it’s our fourth lockdown since the beginning of the global pandemic.

On 1 one of our new regime, I had a chat with ABC News Radio in a short segment ambitiously titled, “How to survive a lockdown.”

I might have snorted a little when asked whether photographer Jude van Daalen and I were going to produce a sequel to our book, Together Apart. If it means locking down for another six months, um, no thanks!

Currently, the whole of Victoria is on Stage 4 restrictions, which means working from home, all non-essential shops closed, the ability to travel no further than 5km from your front door and schools closed.

Tune in if you want a little reminder of what’s going on down here in the snap-frozen south – so far, the one-week circuit breaker has been extended for another week, let’s hope it doesn’t continue past that date.

The feature photograph on this post is by photographer Jude van Daalen/The Melbourne Portrait Studio, and features in Together Apart: Life in Lockdown. Click here to order your copy.

May

First look: new Next Hotel Melbourne

I love hotels. I love the time warp that hotels lead us into: suddenly, there’s a different view from the window, my toiletries all smell more exotic, I have far better bed linen.

It’s bizarre to think that, in the midst of a global pandemic, hotels would still be opening. But life still goes on, and here in Australia, we’re luckier than most.

Recently, I embraced the call to arms to #letsMelbourneAgain, and took a staycation in my own city, Melbourne.

The sparkling, new Next Hotel Melbourne is located in the hottest piece of real estate in town, 80 Collins Street, “up the Paris end of Collins St,” as we say. Not just because that’s where all the boutiques are (Dior, Chanel, Vuitton etc), but also because that’s where you’ll find a lot of the glamorous, turn-of-the-century architecture built with the flush of gold-rush money. In between the ornate street lights and those funny old-fashioned bathrooms that were built beneath the pavements, rise the glossiest skyscrapers – all cunning angles and unexpected entrances.

Compressed tomato in white soy stuffed with stracciatella with basil. Photo supplied.

The entrance to Next is next-level discreet. Entered from Little Collins Street, you’ll first see Ingresso, a little coffee and Campari bar, with little fixed stools inside and out, for a touch of laneway chic. (Ingresso means ‘entrance’ – see what they did there?)

The Clef d’Or concierge at the door is a hint of things to come – the hotel is embedded in the DNA of the CBD (if you fancy a few acronyms), with a restaurant and cocktail bar worthy of a visit in their own right, not just as accoutrements to your guest room. Sicily meets Hong Kong as chefs Daniel Natoli and Adrian Li rule La Madonna, which set the pace with a fabulous compressed tomato with white soy, stracciatella and basil entree, and ended admirably with a cannoli spiked with Fernet-Branca bitters and pistachio.

Follow me to the bedroom: firstly, there are 255 of them, each looking out to a cityscape, be it a cafe-filled laneway you never knew existed, or bigger views across the tops of skyscrapers. From my eyrie, I spy champagne bars, Mexican restaurants, jewellers and designer sneaker shops all tucked into the angled architecture of the 80 Collins St precinct.

Back in the room, toiletries are supplied by Melbourne brand Hunter – the body wash blends grapefruit, tangerine peel and rum, for a spicy scent, and the hairdryers are top-of-the-line Dyson which cost more than a room night, for top marks in the bathroom. There’s also a Bose sound system, if you’re going to order a cocktail made with the hotel’s own barrel-aged spirits. Otherwise, pull a stool up at the bar for a romp through Negroni nirvana, and listen to Phil, the Master of Spirits, wax lyrical about the spirit world.

Next Hotel Melbourne guestroom. Photo supplied.

The next morning, I did pop into the gym for a little stretch, but really, the whole point is to hit the city streets again. So an early jog down quiet Little Collins is an easy heartstarter, and will make you feel better about ordering the black pudding for breakfast (chef Adrian’s special recommendation).

What it is not: it’s not splashy. You won’t find here is a signature rooftop pool or a pair of neon angel wings in which to photograph yourself in front of.

What it is: tricky to find, with a dark and moody palette and serious food and drink credentials – Next fits this city like a glove.

From $289 a night. 103 Little Collins Street, Melbourne, nexthotelmelbourne.com

Apr

In the pink: nine of Australia’s best pink lakes

What’s hot right now? Pink gin. Pink salt. Pink hair. Pink lakes. Yep, pink lakes, of which Australia has plenty.

From champagne to candy, with rose and bubblegum in between, is it any wonder we love them? The natural phenomenon occurs only with the right balance of salt, sun and some hardworking micro-organisms.

In this piece, I rounded up nine lovely pink lakes around Australia with the hottest hues, for your pink perusal. Some, like the pink lake that occasionally lives beneath Melbourne’s Westgate Bridge, are easy to find. Others, such as Western Australia’s Lake Hillier, are our most iconic, but also the hardest to reach.

Click here to read my story in Traveller about nine of Australia’s best pink lakes.

Mar

Ingineous: testing Bass & Flinders’ at-home custom gin blends

What do Ginona Ryder, Jusgin Beiber and Osama Gin Laden have in common? They’re all custom gins blended at kitchen tables around Australia, with a little hand-holding by Bass & Flinders’ master distiller, Holly Klintworth.

During Victoria’s COVID-19 lockdowns, some of us cuddled up to a packet of Tim Tams and Netflix, others re-tuned themselves into uber-athletes (ok, so not that many, but enough to make it a think on social media), and others had the local boozer on speed-dial. Mornington Peninsula distillery Bass & Flinders put its creativity hat on, and released an at-home custom gin blending kit for housebound gin drinkers to turn to. The clincher here was that all the botanicals supplied are native to Australia – think strawberry gum, wattleseed and – my favourite – native lemongrass.

Following an easy-to-watch video tutorial by Holly, I blended my own gin, which I named Lockdown’s Gindolence. Is it going to take the gin world by storm? Honestly, maybe not. I’ll leave that to Holly and her brace of beautiful gins, available at the distillery in Habitat, the artisan precinct in Victoria’s Dromana Industrial Estate, which I’ve written about here in the past. Click here to read my story for Essentials magazine.

Cheers!

Roadtest: Bass & Flinders’ at-home gin masterclass kit

Mar

Secret seven: best places to see the Aurora Australis (Southern Lights)

Life lessons I have learned: a pitching boat in the Norwegian Sea is not the only place to see an aurora, and definitely not the best place to photograph one, as adroitly illustrated by my dodgy pic of the Northern Lights, taken from the top deck of a Hurtigruten ship off the Norwegian coast.

Far closer (and much warmer) for those of us in the antipodes, our own Aurora Australis is gearing up for a solar maximus in the coming years.

“We’re just coming out of solar minimum, building up to a solar maximus, so we can expect to see increasing solar activity to peak in the next three or four years,” forecasts Tasmanian aurora watcher Margaret Sonnemann, who I’ve interviewed several times, and is an aurora expert. Stemming from her appreciation of the southern skies, she began what’s now Australia’s biggest online Aurora Australis information group (see facebook.com/groups/auroraaustralis).

I’ve rounded up seven best places to see the Southern Lights, from Tassie to Victoria and – travel bubbles willing – New Zealand. Find recommendations in designated dark sky sanctuaries, from a plane in the air or even in car parks. Click here to read my story for the Sydney Morning Herald/The Age newspapers’ online travel section, Traveller.

Feb

Egypt; The four unmissable sites of Cairo

With pyramids and gold pharaohs, towering temples and cursed tombs, it’s no wonder Egypt’s been on the tourist trail for the last 4500 years.

One of the stories in the inaugural issue of Arrived, a new quarterly magazine by the family-owned The Travel Corporation, is about the upcoming, loooong-awaited opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM). To complement it, I’ve listed a few more unmissable sights in Egypt including Coptic Cairo, with sites dating from the birth of Christ.

Built over Roman ruins, the Hanging Church (pictured above) is one of the earliest of Cairo’s churches, and definitely its most visited. But don’t bypass the nearby cave where the Holy Family sheltered from the wrath of Herod, which to my mind is far more atmospheric, hidden as it is beneath the Church of St Sergius and Bacchus. Last time I was there, there was talk that the cave was closed to visitors, but we mingled in with a government group to once again breathe the damp, sacred air in this subterranean cave. Walking through the chaotic laneways of Coptic Cairo really is the most extraordinary experience, don’t miss it.

Feb

Driving the Snowy Valleys Way, Australia

Stop the clock, skip the highways and take the slow road through forested vales, rolling farmlands and vibrant villages. It’s time to linger longer.

I’m pleased to show you the new website for the Snowy Valleys Way, a driving route through the foothills of the Australian Alps, from Gundagai in NSW heading south through the western foothills of the Snowy Mountains to Beechworth in Victoria’s High Country.

Writing this website was a way to escape the confines of Melbourne’s COVID-19 lockdown, where I could travel to wild swimming holes and historic streets, stay in a stone farm cottage or a stylish highway inn. In my mind, I revisited farmgates and markets, walked apple orchards and visited century-old museums.

Hopefully, the website inspires you to visit these gentle landscapes, on the NSW-Victorian border, not just in your mind, but in your car, on foot, by bicycle or perhaps on horseback.

Click here to visit the new Snowy Valleys Way website.

Nov

Luxury lounging on the mighty Murray River, South Australia

‘Silver linings’ is a phrase that’s getting a good airing during this pandemic, and the silver lining for the travel industry is our eagerness to explore our own country. Take, for instance, the multitude of villages and historic towns that line our beautiful Murray River. Renmark is a case in point, with its history of paddleboats and fortified wines (surely a match made in heaven?)

Just outside Renmark, in the village of Paringa, The Frames is a luxury property comprising three completely private suites that all look out onto the slow-moving Murray. Watch the waterway from the spa, on the balcony or, one of the suites, even from bed.

I absolutely recommend a visit to the 23rd Street Distillery for a little libation, and a cruise through the backwaters of the Murray River to spy wallabies and emus, kingfishers and goannas going about life in the riverlands.

To read my review in the Good Weekend magazine, click here.

The Frames

7 Panorama Court, Paringa; (08) 8595 7217; theframesluxuryaccommodation.com.au

Nov

Roadtripping on the Anti-Great Ocean Road, Victoria, Australia

Do you remember what the Great Ocean Road was, pre-COVID? Bumper-to-bumper cars ogling the 12 (or so) Apostles, the crashing surf and the koalas.

You can rail against the international travel ban (and god knows, we’ve all suffered as a result of it), or you can look for the rainbows: no more foreign tourists bogging up the scenic spots, we’ve got it all for ourselves.

Alternatively, you could try what I’ve dubbed the Anti-Great-Ocean-Road, the Hamilton Highway, which runs from Melbourne to the pearl of the Road, Port Fairy. Green fields, stone walls, historic pubs and a great dollop of indigenous and Irish history.

I wrote a piece for the Traveller section of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, take a look here for some Victorian travel love.

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