Category Archives: Uncategorized

We were going on holiday, with plan to head north out of Canberra’s winter cold to the far north of Queensland, to FNQ, and then work our way south, stopping at places of interest, finding places to chill and relax, … Continue reading →

We had been as far north as Cooktown, and were driving back south along the edge of the outback, listening to an eclectic mixture of North African pop, Mexican baroque,  Bob Dylan and blues music. On the way we passed … Continue reading →

Geeky idea time – I was reading Hugh Thomson’s The White Rock about his travels in what were the Inca lands in Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador, and in it he makes the comment that the Inca Empire wasn’t really an … Continue reading →

Yesterday, Saturday, was midwinter’s day here in Canberra. In times past I used to wish everyone a happy Inca new year on this day, really because I felt we ought to make more of mid winter here in the southern … Continue reading →

Last night J and I went to the Canberra Theatre to see Bell Shakespeare’s production of Henry V, and damn good it was too. Henry V is a huge sprawling play, with changes of scene, comedic interludes and the rest, … Continue reading →

Last Sunday was cold, windy and brilliantly clear, so we took ourselves off to look at Cooma cottage, the onetime home of the explorer Hamilton Hume, who, along with Hovell found the route south to Victoria, broadly taking the route … Continue reading →

Well, that’s certainly a title. Long term readers of this blog will know that I’ve been doing a lot reading about the British colonial experience in Asia, including the literature of the time. Inevitably this segues into reading about the … Continue reading →

I’ve written previously about the possible Portuguese landing on the coast of Northern Australia during the age of European discovery. The initial evidence was fairly circumstantial, but at the same time there were reports that a cannon of possibly Portuguese … Continue reading →

A group of scientists have recently analysed some mouse remains on Madeira and shown them to come from (a) some time in the tenth century and (b) the mitochondrial DNA of the mice suggests a Scandanavian origin rather than a … Continue reading →

Back in 2009 we spent the best part of six weeks in Europe. Of course we tried to cram too much in but in the middle of the trip we did spend a relaxing few days in Monpazier doing not … Continue reading →