Days not Homeless: 6 Years, 14 Days ...and loving every second of this alpine adventure!
Toubkal in the Winter
Still recovering from a frostbitten toe and finger the probability of us actually making it to the top of North Africa was looking slim, made worse by the fact that from Marrakesh the Atlas Mountains looked totally white. This wasn't the sign I was looking for in the...
Low key in Essaouira
Prior to arriving in Morocco a month sounded like plenty of time, a time that was unfortunately already cut in half. Being alone for the first two weeks I only got to spend time in the populated Marrakesh and Fes areas so when Andrea arrived it was time to spread our...
The Local City of Fes
Whilst Marrakesh is known for its massive influx of tourists the city of Fes would turn out to be far lower key, a good thing as spending the past four nights in the blue city of Chefchaouen was all about narrow streets full of Asians and their selfie sticks! No need...
An Easy Bunch
Even being stuck in Chacos sandals with only 9 1/2 toes wasn't enough of a deterrent in tagging three more pathetically easy highpoints! Although heading out of south Florida towards Kentucky was the right direction they all still required significant detours; a waste...
5 Nights in Lebanon
Home to 2000 year old trees, Middle Eastern food, Muslims, Christians and Hezbollah Lebanon would turn out to wow us in many ways. Unlike a few years ago when we were in Jordan looking at relatively expensive flights to Lebanon this occasion looked more likely. Rome...
Rome with Rick
Being in Rome and Vatican City for my first, Andrea's second time, was one of our best travel experiences in Europe. Immensely rich in history the city provided us endless sightseeing opportunities, walking tours, people watching, and some of Europes best tasting...
Italian Riviera
Not sure that I'd even heard of Portofino on the Italian Riviera until it was mentioned in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, the classic 1988 comedy starring Michael Caine and Steve Martin. Still, it was a place that someday I'd visit. Andrea and I had just hiked in...
The Price of Success
If everything goes well on summit day then tagging the worlds loftiest mountain is a huge deal, no matter what you hear otherwise. It comes with immense satisfaction, an emotional rollercoaster ride, and the realization that with enough desire anything is possible....
29,035 ft
"Huge congrats to this guy for completing the Seven Summits with his ascent of Everest on the 22nd! I first met Wayne on Aconcagua in 2003 and we climbed together on Everest in 2005 turning back below the south Summit with the Gibbon boys. 14 years on, he again put...
Everest Pt 3: Climb
UPDATE 4: Sitting watching Free Solo in our heated dining tent, hands sweating once again, was a welcome distraction from the snow swirling outside. Everest basecamp weather is fickle at best, the mornings so far being bright and sunny, sometimes annoyingly hot,...
JMT: Beyond Muir Trail Ranch
With the likes of Forester, Glen and Pinchot passes behind us we assumed that the second half of the John Muir Trail would be plain sailing - wrongly assumed that is! The entire 220 plus miles are continuously up and down. In fact, for us the most difficult and...
JMT: 111 Miles until Resupply
Typically time flew by and before we knew it we were sitting having Chinese, excellent Chinese at that, in Lone Pine, California the evening before our big departure. Going Broke, our SUV, was patiently waiting for us at Mammoth Airport and all we had with us was what...
John Muir Trail Preparation
It wasn't until our short time spent in Yosemite National Park a couple of years ago, then hearing from a friend how amazing a hike the 220 mile John Muir Trail actually is that we started thinking that this sounded right up our alley. The seed was set, the biggest...
West of the Badlands
Continuing on from an out-of-the-way Iowa our route took a very direct west towards the Dakotas. We had driven this same road 3 years earlier and had been close to the places we were now revisiting for our state highpoint goal - just wish this had been on the agenda...
En route to Lake Superior
An early exit from the Tour Divide bike race allowed us to take a non-direct route from Kentucky to our month long housesitting job in Bozeman, Montana. It would also enable Andrea to complete her quest to visit all fifty states, an achievement that took almost 44...
55,000 Feet of Up
Sitting here writing this I'm still kicking myself for not currently being part of the Tour Divide 2017 mountain bike ride! Then I look down at the swelling and feel the tingling in the fingers on my right hand. Then I stand up and feel the grating along the achilles...
Highpoints; the Next Batch
Continuing on from a successful Spring hike to the summit of Colorado's Mt Elbert we went back and forth between either Utah or Arizona as the next highpoint. Utah's Kings Peak, it turned out had a much better approach from the north and would have ended up being a 5...
At Last a Proper Mountain
Since banging out four of the Northeastern Highpoints almost a year ago the desire had returned to knock off a few more. Hip resurfacing surgery and other travel plans stood in the way for ten months bringing us to now. Once again the decision to head out west was an...
Tour Aotearoa – South Island
Jumping onto the earlier ferry at 2.45pm was the way to go as now I docked in daylight and could enjoy the early evening hours as I pedaled towards Havelock. As usual, a couple of nice hills were in between Picton and the recommended Smith Farms campsite where I...
Tour Aotearoa – North Island
Am I up for a 3000km cycle ride, could my ass handle it, is my lightweight carbon hardtail mountain bike too light for the extra load, do I have everything I need - all questions I was asking myself whilst in England sorting out my late dads estate. I was definitely...
Tour Aotearoa Facebook Updates
February 16th - Kerikeri, NZ All set for a 6am Sunday departure from Cape Reinga to Bluff. A little over 3000km from the top of New Zealand to the bottom!TA Pre DepartureFebruary 20th - Cape Reinga Lighthouse, NZ The beginning at Cape Reinga a little over 48 hours...
Rediscovering Great Britain
We find more and more that when speaking with fellow travelers the response when asking about which country they've seen the most of, their home country is never top of the list. I've probably seen more of my adopted country than I have of my home land. Due to...
Essential Items Only
Stuff, junk, clutter and crap accumulated over the years has made us the happiest of people. Did I just say that? Over the past four years we've found that living without mountains of stuff is far less stressful, far cheaper, and allows us to be wherever we want,...
Hong Kong Layover
Flying to the end of the world for the second time this year was always going to be a drawn out affair, made even worse by departing England instead of the US. Flight prices seemed lower than flying from the US which surprised me, so much in fact that I allowed my dad...
One Goes Global to Denmark
Unexpected, traveling alone, and little time for preparation, Denmark wasn't on the agenda. I needed to get to England for personal reasons and only being a week out flights were not looking cheap, especially when traveling with a mountain bike. I had to be creative...
Birmingham Hip Resurfacing or Bust
With a good amount of trepidation we headed north towards Madison, Wisconsin, on this occasion for my second bout of hip surgery. My decision to go ahead with further surgery was prompted by the rapid decline of my right hip - hiking was resulting in more and more...
Lobsters and Potatoes, or Fish and Chips
An island of coastline and roads, Prince Edward Island was our final stop on this leg of our Canadian tour. Neither of us had any real reason for heading over to Canada's smallest Province, other than to see what the capital of Charlottetown has to offer. Due to where...
The Land of 120,000 Moose
PENDING... Dates June 29th – July 11th 2016 I think that with trial and error both my photography and website design are getting progressively better so hopefully these newer, better quality images will inspire you to get out there and travel. Click HERE to see more...
Saint-Pierre & Miquelon by Fatbike
Had it not been for the Century Travelers Club neither of us would have heard of this little slice of France in the northern Atlantic. Listed under the North American countries/ territories heading this turned out to be the last of our places to visit within that...
Cape Breton Island
Home of the Cabot driving trail and ferry departure point to the province of Newfoundland, Cape Breton Island is renowned for its Celtic influence, art scene, and amazing coastline. It was here we got to camp at one of our top ten all time campsites at Meat Cove, be...
