Blog posts tagged "Travel"

February 13, 2009 8:29 am No Comments

I am on a deserted train to Oxford. Departing Paddington at 05.58, not a soul stirs all the way to Oxford – only the conductor, sorry the customer service manager. As usual the bike racks are half a mile from your seat. But that’s not my gripe. This train, deserted as it is, is classified [...]

February 4, 2009 11:16 am No Comments

Curiously, my brief sojourn in Colombia has fuelled me up, for Cartagena is straight out of Greene. Black-hatted priests bent against the wind, striding two abreast beneath the sharp shadows of the un-sunny side of the street. Large tolling bells. A white stucco church, pantiled houses beyond with assorted ochres, yellows, and reds. Somewhere beneath [...]

February 2, 2009 9:16 pm No Comments

I am looking down on the Pacific waters at the mouth of the Panama canal. Below, evening sun splashes silver across the sea, silhouetting the shipping waiting to enter. I count 50 vessels: container ships, bulk carriers, cruise liners, each momentarily detailed as our plane descends to land at the airfield nearby. I haven’t been [...]

4:47 pm No Comments

Once in a while the gods deal you an unexpected hand. I am attempting the apparently Latin-American impossible: Colombia to London inside 24 hrs. The signs are not good. An hour and a half to go to take-off, and no-one is at check-in either side of the desk. Then I see why. The previous flight [...]