Interlude

If your life was a story, what is the title of your current chapter?

I recently came across this question whilst spending some of my far too abundant time online. Using some of my other time I also started listening to audio books a few weeks ago. I've never actually listened to audio books before but I found it as an awesome way to manage to get through more of the books I want to read faster. I'm sure at least some of you will understand the relationship between books I own/want to read and books I actually manage to read. Please see the very scientific graph below illustrating this relationship:

As this graph demonstrates the exponential amount of books that I want to read quickly out paces the linear amount of books that I am able to read, and this dear bibliophiles is clearly quite an issue.

So back to audio books. This effectively doubles my reading ability and also provided both excellent amusement as my cycles got longer and music no longer was making the cut, and also excellent motivation to get back on the bike to find out what is happening. So I started listening to Patrick Rothfuss' "The Kingkiller Chronicles" whilst reading Steven Erikson's "Malazan Book of the Fallen".

Let's start with the Malazan series. Click here to get yourself started or support your local bookstore!

This is an epic fantasy series of ten volumes and is a complete series. And for anyone out there who doesn't enjoy reading fantasy series themselves, having a complete series, especially if that series also happens to be awesome! The fact that there are also five further novellas, six canonical novels by the Malazan Universe co-creator Ian Cameron Esslemont, two further incomplete follow-on trilogies, and a yet to be published extensive guide to the series just makes the Malazan Universe even more exciting knowing that I'm going to be able to enjoy it for years to come. I've been reading these books for a few months now based on the recommendation of a friend and they are fantastic. There are a huge number of diverse characters that you get to know slowly and whilst the plot build-up of each book can be a little bit slow to begin with, the picture that is painted using this process produces an absolutely amazing climatic end of each book that has you reading longer into the night with each chapter and excited to start the next in the series.

And now The Kingkiller Chronicle. First one here or go peruse the shelves at your local book store!

I do actually have the physical copies of these books as well, even though I'm listening to the audio books. But I also have most of the physical copies of my e-books as well. I love books! Books books books! One word that won't lose meaning no matter how many times you repeat it!

I was introduced to this series whilst perusing the shelves of Elizabeth's Bookshop in Perth. It was heavily recommended to me by one of the staff of the store upon seeing the hearty pile of books I had placed on the counter to purchase. She was so enthusiastic about it I excitedly agreed to start the series. Over to the shelves we went, only to find the second book in the series... I was physically deflated upon not finding this book as I really wanted to read it after the recommendation. And so I went into the store regularly for months hoping it would come back in. For anyone who's not lived in Western Australia, books can be rather hard to come by and insanely expensive to boot, plus I enjoyed this book store and was happy to give them my custom. But every time I went looking, every time I was let down. But I eventually managed to track it down once I returned to the UK, and thankfully it was worth the wait!

The Kingkiller Chronicle is a fantasy trilogy of which two of the volumes are so far released. There is also one released and unreleased novella and one novel on different characters from the books and a further trilogy from the same universe planned. These books are a story of two threads: the first is of the 'present' day protagonist Kvothe (pronounced nearly the same as "quothe") and the other is of Kvothe's life story told in the first person narrative. It is presented in the form of him telling his autobiography to the character Chronicler with each book representing one day of the story telling. It is full of action, suspense and evokes plenty of empathy, allowing you to really get into the book. I have loved every word of this book including every word of character and plot development and I have moved on to listening at many other times besides cycling as I can't stay away from it.

And this book is what brings me to my chapter. Within the Kingkiller books, when we are with Kvothe in the 'present' day, the chapters are title 'Interlude'. Don't worry I won't actually reveal any spoilers. At this point in time in the books Kvothe is laying low, he is not his normal self and he is doing very little. And this is the point I find myself at now myself.

I came back to the UK in May and finished travelling around the end of August with a couple of very slow weeks in June applying for jobs as well. I spent my time applying for dozens of jobs, received a handful of replies and got one offer exactly two months ago in another stroke of serendipity. Two months! And I still don't have a start date. I can't do a huge amount with my time as unfortunately I don't have an income and money makes the world go around as much as anyone may hate that sentiment. If nothing else, petrol costs money. So I find myself waiting around, going slowly crazy, getting increasingly irritated with the state of the economy and human resource departments and not quite slowly dwindling my remaining savings on Christmas errands and getting out of the house enough to not go insane. So here's hoping to a rapid resolution of the seemingly convoluted hiring process. Apparently choosing to leave the country at all is a big negative check mark on the CV... Who would have thought in 2014?

So anyway, if anyone else wants to share your current chapter then feel free to comment below! I would love to hear your stories.

Until the next time.

Cakes, Puppies and Kittens!

So it's been 7 months today since I last wrote or released anything on here. This revival isn't timed purposely, it's just serendipity that makes it a nice round number.

Quite a lot has happened since then. I will very quickly summarise:

• I travelled around New Zealand
• I returned to the UK
• I travelled around the UK and Ireland
• I decided I want to get a job again
• I have got a job offer
• I have been doing A LOT of waiting.

And that last point is what ultimately brings me back here. I have nothing but time on my hands. I received a job offer about 2 months ago now but am still going through the various reference and security checks required and I still have no indication of when I might actually be starting... But enough of that for now.

I'm sure no one was hugely disappointed when I stopped posting, and I'm sure no one will be particularly excited that I'm back on here again but hey, just like photos of holidays are more for the person on vacation than to those they show them to, I'm sure some parallels can be drawn to blogging. Anyway, I stopped writing after the post about my Grannie. I released two more posts, but they had already been written before hand and all I had to do was press Publish. I just didn't really feel like writing after that and decided to just enjoy my time in New Zealand. That's somewhere I've wanted to to go for a very long time and even almost ended up moving there for work a couple months ago so I'm sure I will write the back logs of at least some of my travels still.

But for the moment, a slight detour on my normal travel writing and onto the subject of this post. I will have to admit, I have mislead you all slightly. Whilst I really want a puppy, this post is not about puppies or dogs. And whilst I really do not want a kitten, this post is not about that either. However, this post is about cakes! So into the moist, delicious heart of the matter.

If anyone recalls from the post about my Grannie (recap here if anyone really wants), I showed an image of Grannie at my cousin's wedding and mentioned that the rest of our chances have dropped significantly since losing Grannie's influence. Well, somehow, my eldest brother Ben has managed to convince, trick, blackmail or otherwise coerce someone into agreeing to marry him!

That's right:

Somehow, this...

Has managed to go to this.

I believe this is a classic case of what one might classify as punching above one's weight. But take heart; if Ben can manage this - so can you! Stay tuned for his best selling novel telling you all the secrets to a successful relationship!

All of this is in good jest, and far more importantly and more excitedly is my role in this: I have been asked to make their wedding cake! See, we got to cake eventually.

I'm sure many of you know that I love to bake and I'm sure many of you also know that I have made a couple of wedding cakes before. I ended up making two for one wedding for a very good friend of mine a couple years ago.

Now I wasn't blogging at the time so didn't document the process at all but it was a rather interesting time. I had moved to Australia about a month before their wedding and so flew back shortly after settling in. I was staying at their house and had ordered a whole bunch of baking supplies to get there in time for me arriving as all of my possessions were still in transit on a boat from the UK to Australia. So it was using an unfamiliar mixer, all new equipment and someone else's oven and all at the same time as having to make last minute preparations, shopping for clothes for myself for the wedding and also seeing some friends in my short time in the UK. It was a fun few days leading up to the wedding and the wedding was an excellent day and the whole process went fairly smoothly apart from one slight mistake of icing the wrong cake with the wrong icing. But I won't go on for the moment as this is already getting quite lengthy. See below the final products!

As I'm sure you can tell from the picture there was a cake for the bride and one for the groom as they both had different preferences for flavours. And yes those are Daleks bedecked in a veil and top hat. The bride's cake is lemon cake with my famous lemon curd filling and frosted in vanilla butter cream. The groom's cake is chocolate fudge with a strawberry coulis filling (I think) and a white chocolate Swiss butter cream frosting, complimented by white and dark chocolate tuxedo'd strawberries. I was given free reign on creative control after the initial flavour suggestions and I can honestly say that I am very proud of the results, but that creative control was rather stressful for someone else's wedding. So with that experience, I told Ben's fiancée Amy (obviously the one in charge of these kinds of decisions) that I wouldn't be taking quite such a leading role in these decisions this time which she was more than happy with. So with a bit of discussion so far, final decisions have yet to be made but it looks like I'll be heading down a more traditional style cake this time. But, to make sure that my life won't be too easy, the cake will have to be completely gluten free for allergy reasons. This should be an interesting challenge as I have not done much in the way of any gluten free cooking before as I love my gluten, but at least I have my own mixer and equipment this time. But that does mean that I should have plenty of test cakes to eat (and maybe even share) over the next few months.

I'm sure that's enough writing to chew on for the moment! So until the next time.

Humans of Perth

I was stopped in the street shortly before I left Perth by a very nice guy who's started a blog based on Brendan Stanton's 'Humans of New York'. He captures a photos a brief quote from a question he asks.

Here's my entry.

But check out the rest of his blog too: Humans of Perth, it's a very interesting read.

As Northern as a Yorkshireman

After racing up the coast to reach Exmouth, we are now as far north as we will likely be travelling in Australia. There's a possibility of getting up to Cairns on the east coast, but I'm not sure yet whether time will permit.

Exmouth Excitement

We spent about a week in and around the Exmouth peninsula. Originally developed as a World War II military base (evident by the old bunkers, monuments, the naval base and the massive radio antennae that used to be used for communication with submarines), now a days, Exmouth relies on tourism for its survival. With the spectacular Cape Range National Park and the incredible Ningaloo Reef on its doorstep, it's no wonder the town's population almost triples during the peak holiday season.

The beginning and end of our time in Exmouth was spent in the Ningaloo Caravan and Holiday Resort generally relaxing and trying to avoid the sun and oppressive heat. The staff were incredibly nice and friendly (with just a couple of exceptions unfortunately), prices on par with most of WA camping: $10-15 pppn and very nice and clean facilities, including a 25m pool that was very nice to use to wake up in the morning (alas - it had no shade for afternoon swimming). But, by far the most important and exciting feature this caravan park has, is the little Italian restaurant called Pinocchio on the grounds. Owned and run by the wonderful Sabrina and Salvatore, there are a good variety of reasonably priced (for WA) food and drink options, but most importantly is the gelato stand. This is some of the first, proper Italian gelato I've found in WA (hand made in house by Salvatore) and even though I've yet to visit a lot of Australia, I can confidently say, that this is the best ice cream that there is on offer in this country!

Every ice cream since has had the bitter taste of disappointment.

On our penultimate day, we decided to go for a kg of chocolate,
banana and amaretto ice cream.

There is a myriad of wonderful flavours that change regularly, from the regular chocolate, ferrero, etc. to some more original mixes, such as Tim Tam, amaretto, banana and tirimisu. We went back every day (and sometimes twice) to get ice cream, and I would thoroughly recommend anyone within 100km, to visit there (which is exactly what we did one afternoon whilst in the national park).

The rest of our time in the area was spent in the National Park. We camped at Lakeside, one of the few camp grounds with a a bit of shade provided by mature trees. We spent a few days enjoying the picturesque landscapes of limestone gorges, pristine beaches and beautiful near-shore and shallow reefs. In the waters are a plethora of flora and fauna to observe from rays to sharks to coral. Unfortunately we weren't there in season (winter) for any of the big migrations (whale sharks, manta rays, doogongs, dolphins and humpback whales), but it was the right time of year for turtle nesting and hatching! We went for a walk along the beach one night to hopefully see some nesting turtles but unfortunately we only saw one baby turtle being eaten by a crab and one turtle nest being raided by another crab - so a little bit of a sad ending to that venture, but we did get a great view of the Milky Way:

I love me some long exposure

Unfortunately my GoPro decided to flood at 3m on my first snorkel, so I don't have any underwater footage, but I will hopefully post some submarine pictures from Will in the album later. There are also a number of hikes through the limestone gorges, most notably at Yardie Creek and Mandu Mandu sites - here there's lots of opportunities to see an abundance of wildlife such as fish in the creek, turtles, galahs, pelicans, osprey, kites, falcons, eagles, kangaroos, hares, goats, black tailed rock wallabies and plenty of reptiles and insects.

Yardie Creek looking west towards the sand bar

When we weren't galavanting through the bush of the Cape Range, a lot of time was spent trying to rig up some kind of shade (mostly successfully and significant improvements made each day), napping in the searing heat or failing at fishing for short periods of time. There were plenty of sharks spotted throughout the week, including one feeding on something in some very shallow water by the beach one time when we were thinking about going for a late night snorkel. Gave that one a miss that night, and so I still have all my appendages to continue this blog!

Until next time.

The Motley Crew

It's less than 2 weeks until the adventure begins! Today was the first day back in work after a few weeks off where I had to, rather suddenly, pack all my belongings, organise my life to be shipped back to the UK and then to move out of my flat, all this the week before I was to head back to the UK to surprise my family for Christmas day. My oldest brother knew I was turning up, and originally he was to pick me up on the Saturday, but circumstances changed and had to head back a few days earlier and so I was then going to turn up on my mum's doorstep on the evening of Christmas day. Between my older brother and I, we predicted precisely what the other three were going to say:

Mum screamed "Oh my god!" - but that was an easy one;

Oliver said: "What are you doing here?" - don't worry, not quite as unloving as it seems - there was intonation involved!;

and Nick said: "Look it's a hobo." - sarcastically commenting on my magnificent, man-tastique new beard (yes there was plenty of facial hair jealousy involved), but again, not quite as unloving as it seems.

So this was me Facebook-ed a few moments after arrival:

But after that initial excitement I spent a very nice couple weeks at home and occasional trip out to see other friends and family.

But, now onto my initial reason for this post - sorry got distracted reminiscing about my holidays already, the introduction to myself and my lovely travelling partners! *Pause for dramatic effect and time for gasping/applause* Here we go! Please excuse the descriptions - just trying to provide some context (and relative to myself as it is my blog).

Tom (portraying myself): I am a 26 year old technology, adventure and food enthusiast. My hobbies include climbing, cycling, hiking, SCUBA diving and baking to name a few, but when I'm not running around I love to sit and read fantasy, sci-fi and popular science books (not all inclusive). I'm always on the run and always looking to experience something new, but I am a caring, loyal geek at heart.

Kim (as the beautiful girlfriend): Kim is a 22 year old qualified physiotherapist (they say you're only as old as the girl you're dating) who born and raised in Perth WA, but grew up travelling all over the world. In her spare time, Kim loves to spend time playing basketball, boxing, generally running around and teaching aerial silks and trapeze - this coincidentally is where we met. Kim quit her job late in 2013 to start travelling the world as well, and I am lucky enough to have her agree to join me on my adventures! Check out her blog here: This is me: Nothing more, nothing less!

Sam (fulfilling the role of Kim's twin sister): Sam is the older of her and Kim by a few minutes. However, it is widely agreed that this was because Kim booted her out of the womb after stealing many of her nutrients in-utero (Sam is the slightly smaller of the twins). Sam is also a qualified physiotherapist and also teaches aerials silks and trapeze, and whilst these two are very close and similar in a scary number of ways - Sam is very much her own 'special' person (just kidding Sam!). 

and Zoe (the far more travelled friend and resident expert (hopefully anyway)): Zoe is a 25 year old qualified mathematician, who decided that she would (rather wisely some might say), go teach English in China for a year after graduating. Having finished that last July, she has since spent the past 5 months or so working her way across SE Asia down towards Australia to join us across the continent. I have known Zoe for many years as our mum's were very good friends when they were young. Outside of travelling all over the world and being generally pretty awesome, Zoe also loves dance hip-hop and break dance - ending up in some fairly contorted positions.

Clockwise, from top left - Tom, Kim, Sam, Zoe

So I guess that kind of connects all of us four, we all have hobbies that would make the general onlooker wince in pain.

and together we make the...

>INSERT NAME HERE<

Well that needs to be decided, seeing as we aren't all in the same country yet - but feel free to give suggestions and input!

Over the next 3 months or so, we will travel around Australia and New Zealand. The rough plan is to drive up the west coast of Australia to Exmouth and back over February, drive along the southern coast and up the east coast over March and then explore the north and south island of New Zealand over April - hopefully getting some motorcycles involved in there somewhere (particularly NZ).

Come May, Australia boots me out of the country and Kim, Sam and I will be heading back to the UK to start tackling that part of the globe (here motorcycles will definitely be involved!)

So stay tuned for more updates! I can't wait for it to begin!

Obstacle Course Extravaganza

This past year I ran various obstacle courses in Australia and the UK as both a personal challenge and to raise money for various charities. The lengths ranged from 5km to 20km but the minimum I ran at any one time was 10km (ran a 10km one and the 5km three times).

I'd like to thank everyone that donated to my effort! It was very much appreciated by both myself as a sign of support and the charities that received the funds!

Check out the video compilation below. It's been a long time coming I know!

Hello World!

Hello world! Привет мир! Hej världen! Olá, mundo! 你好世界! مرحبا العالم!

I thought that when it comes to beginning travelling and writing that it would be best to start simple. Unfortunately there's not a simple program for this "hello world" and I will just tell you a little bit about me and what I hope to do with this blog!

For the past two years I've been working as a geologist in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Before this I was studying in the UK as a Mining Geologist and Materials Engineer. I lived in the UK for 11 years in North Wales, London and Cornwall, but am originally from Buffalo, New York. I have been lucky enough to live, work and travel in various countries around the world, but this amounts to a metaphorical drop in the ocean in the grand scheme of things. So this year I decided to resign from my job and venture off into the epic vastness of the world that I have yet to see. And yes,I know that 'epic' is rather overused nowadays, but I honestly don't think that there is a more suitable adjective to describe what is possible to see around this planet.

So what do I hope to achieve with this blog? That's a question I'm still trying to figure out exactly as I'm pretty new to this. I'm going to aim to document my journey and share my adventures. This means that I will hopefully end up with a very nice journal of my travels to look back on, allow others to see what I've experienced if they're planning on going somewhere similar and to make sure my mum doesn't worry too much that I've dropped off the face of the planet. So I'll be producing videos of my exploits, posting photos of the incredible sites and sharing stories, anecdotes and my experiences. This will hopefully be wide ranging from reviews of specific places, general or specific advice or even recipes I've picked up along the way. If I'm very honest I also hope that I will be able to achieve something that grabs someones attention enough that they would like me to write, photograph, report, review or document for them so I can continue seeing this beautiful planet for a living (yes I know, another cliché - I'll try to minimise their use in future).

>Insert world into oyster here< - just kidding!

I'm going to start with a few back stories to get a bit of content rolling and to get used to this whole blogging thing. But don't worry, I'll make sure it's all fairly recent exploits and I won't go back farther than 12 months. So keep an eye out for some (hopefully) exciting posts from the UK, Thailand, Australia and Puerto Rico. I'll finish off this first longish post now, and I'll hopefully see you back again soon.

Until the next time - wherever it may be!
Trekking Thomas