Where I've Been

I should probably explain where I've been…

A few months ago my husband and I packed up our life in Sydney and left, and I didn't say anything about it here, which in hindsight is a strange thing to simply not mention. But I was in the middle of it, and writing about it while it was still happening felt like the wrong order of things.

So I don't live in Sydney anymore. We put the whole thing into four suitcases and took an extremely long way round to somewhere new, and rather than skipping ahead to the end I'd like to walk you through it properly.

The long way had a two-day stopover in Abu Dhabi in it, and weeks driving through Albania with no particular plan, and a border crossing into North Macedonia, and Montenegro, and a four day trek through the Albanian Alps that I am still thinking about. There's the Dolomites, hut to hut. There's a villa in Tuscany where we got to celebrate with everyone we love in one place. And then Rome.

And then somewhere I'll tell you about when we get there.

I didn't post any of it while it was happening. I've said before that some places and moments deserve to just be lived, and I meant that, although the other half of the truth is that the last few months were a lot and I didn't have much left over for creating things.

So here's the plan. Over the next while I want to take you through the whole thing, one leg at a time, starting with two very quiet days in Abu Dhabi. Not a highlight reel. More the actual shape of it, including the parts that were hard or dull or didn't photograph well.

By the end you'll know where I landed, and hopefully why it took me so long to get there.

It's good to be back. Thank you for still being around.

Next up

The first leg was two days in Abu Dhabi, which we only did because Etihad was handing out free hotel nights, and which turned out to be one of the strangest and quietest stretches of the whole trip.