Looking Back on my Year of Travel - From Bali to Melbourne, Boracay to the Greek Islands, London to New York City

Sunset in Seminyak, Bali

On my 24^th birthday last year I was standing on a beach in Seminyak, Bali when I made the monumental decision to move to London. It was something that I’ve always dreamed about – travelling around Europe, working overseas and making the most out of life. It was finally time to get out of my comfort zone and actually do it!

The London dream is shared by thousands of twentysomething girls. So I admit I don’t feel like I’m unique, as I am but just another girl working in Central London catching the Tube each day. Yet I still feel a sense of accomplishment. Sometimes I feel like pinching myself – that I actually moved all the way across the world with nothing but a 12 kilogram backpack!

A Western Australian sunset at Cottesloe Beach

A Melbournian start to 2010

Soaking my feet in Torquay, Victoria

I started the year in Melbourne, devouring a book about living and working in the UK whilst enjoying balmy summer evenings. I went jogging with my brother in the Royal Botanical Gardens, walked along the beach in St Kilda and spent quality time with my best friend drinking cocktails in secret laneway bars and having high tea.

A Filipino Getaway

Boracay's White Beach

Pagsanjan Falls

In April I embarked on, and survived, a group holiday to the Philippines. I was astounded by the beauty of Boracay – the white beaches with sand so fine that it’s used for day spa treatments, the fresh value for money seafood and crazy beach bars. Most of all, I was humbled by the generosity of my friends and their family in Manila.

Once my UK work visa came through and I quit my job there was no looking back! 

A European summer

Falling in love with Santorini

Octopus handing to dry in Paros

I’ve always wanted to ‘summer in Europe’. Landing in sticky, hot Athens the weather didn’t disappoint my travel buddy Kassie and I. We sailed around the Greek Islands, enjoying beautiful sunsets in Santorini and even hiked up the volcano. On the Amalfi coast we ate spoonfuls of gelato every day and then ventured to Rome to be immersed in history in the hidden churches discovering Michelangelo in the unlikeliest places. Paris meant plenty of macarons, an escape to Disneyland before we relaxed in Nice and gambled some Euros in Monaco. 

Sacre Coeur in Paris

Capri, Italy

Then I sailed the Dalmatian Coast of Croatia on a 7 day cruise. The scenery in Croatia is simply stunning – untouched national parks, pristine beaches and imposing mountains. My biggest feat was climbing to the top of a 16^th Century pirate fortress!

London -  a home away from home?

Serpentine bridge in Hyde Park

In London the holiday was officially over. I needed to get a flat and a job asap. In four weeks I traipsed all over London looking at 10 flats, meeting with recruiters and interviewing for jobs. How would you describe yourself in one word? Exhausted!

Time escapes you when you’re endlessly hunting and by sheer chance I ended up living in a hostel run by nuns. Despite the weekday lock out by 11pm it was the best experience of my life! It’s here where I met my ‘London family’. Having a support network is the most important thing you need when you arrive in a big city. Even though you never know who’s going to stay in London as the hellos and goodbyes are always constant, my friends ground me when the grey skies and cold causes bouts of homesickness.

Weekends away in the UK

It's exciting to be able to escape London for the weekend. I visited Edinburgh and was charmed by the amazing B&B we stayed at and then also drove around Inverness in one day! In Bath, I channeled Elizabeth Bennett and went to the thermae spa, browsed the charming Christmas markets and enjoyed eating a cinnamon butter Sally Lunn bun.

View from Edinburgh Castle

Bath Abbey at nightfall

I’m ending this year on a high in NYC with my brother Ryan – I survived my first blizzard and am looking forward to seeing the ball drop. 

This year has been a tough, challenging, emotional roller coaster. Travelling is always about big highs and lows. My biggest high this year is waking up every day in a new city, feeling like my next adventure in 2011 is just around the corner. 

Wanderlust Wednesday - The Christmas Tree at Somerset House

On the search for the most beautiful Christmas tree in London I discovered the Tiffany themed tree at Somerset House. It sparkles day or night with its signature blue baubles and silver decorations. Ice skaters glide around the rink in its stylish shadow. 

How to Host a Cross Cultural Christmas Dinner

When it's cold outside, having friends over for dinner warms up your spirits instantly. My friends in London speak a mix of Italian, Spanish and English. Hosting a festive dinner party with them involves eating new foods, having discussions with big hand gestures and learning new vocabulary.

My main tip for hosting a dinner party is to be flexible. You can’t plan for everything – for guests to be on time when there’s snow outside and for all dishes to be perfect. The unexpected fun and frivolity is the best sort though!

Have a starter with lots of oozing cheese and bread

For starters we enjoyed caramelized red onion, olive, sundried tomato and brie tarts. This was also accompanied by baked camembert cheese stuffed with garlic and fresh thyme and drizzled with olive oil. Ciabatta bread was on hand to mop up the cheese.

Learn to make an impromptu dish – Le Con Tomate

Maria showed me a very easy Spanish tomato and bread dish which I incorrectly called bruschetta. On a piece of ciabatta grab a tomato sliced in half and squeeze it onto the bread. Rub it against the bread so all the juice soaks in. Add a sprinkle of salt and olive oil. You can top this up with more cheese or ham if you like too.

Make your oven work overtime

Before dinner the oven was pumping out Christmas cookies right before it finished off roasting the main course - a whopping 3.3 kg roast pork! The crackle was crisp and crunched nicely in your mouth it was perfectly roasted by Lorraine.

We also devoured Chiara’s Italian ragu – she makes her own special tomato sauce.

Improve your food vocabulary in Spanish and Italian

Did you know that salad is called ensalada in Spanish and insalata in Italian?

Have a hands on dessert like fondue

For the seriously decadent finale we had not one, not two, but three separate desserts. I made a sticky date pudding with Baileys dessert sauce and a cheesecake from Tesco. The cheesecake was surprisingly good!

Fondue is fun - dipping strawberries and grapes into chocolate feels naughty but oh so nice! Since there’s fruit involved you feel somewhat healthy even if there's 300g of melted chocolate to get through. The only thing left to do was to wash it all down with mulled wine and cider.

It’s not a Christmas party without crackers!

Bad jokes and hats are mandatory for a Christmas celebration, no matter where you’re from!

In Search of Jane - Pieces of Jane Austen in London

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Jane Austen fan must visit Bath when living in England. Jane lived in Bath from 1801-1806 and it was the setting for her novels Northanger Abbey and Persuasion. I’m heading to Bath tomorrow and am very excited.

In the past few months since living here, I’ve come across pieces of Austen in museums around London.

In the National Portrait Gallery one of the only real paintings of Austen is on display. The pencil and watercolour by her sister Cassandra is very small and you have to peer into the glass case to get a good look.

At the British Library, you can see handwritten notes from Austen’s notebook and the place of her creative expression - her wooden writing desk in the Sir John Ritblat Gallery: Treasures of the
British Library: Literary manuscripts and printed books permanent exhibition.

When in London Jane Austen stayed in Covent Garden with her brother at No. 10 Henrietta Street. Today this address is an outdoor clothing store.

Of course it’s terribly cold to be searching for Austen at the moment. Without leaving the warmth of your home, you can see her own account of the 'History of England' penned when she was only 15 in the online collection of the British Library. 

How would Jane Austen cope with this cold London weather?

Secret London Cafes - d'Orange Cafe, Westbourne Grove

I'm searching for cozy cafes in London

It’s hard to find independent cafes in Central London where every street corner has a coffee franchise. I’m making it a goal to discover great London cafes with atmosphere, affordable and quality food and drink with a bit of an edge.

D’Orange café in Westbourne Grove is a charming café with mismatched tables and chairs with a few leather couches and coffee tables for good measure. This unassuming café serves up no fuss fare. It attracts a mixed clientele of tourists, locals on work breaks and the odd model-actress type looking to avoid the paparazzi.

The blackboard menu changes with daily soups, muffins and sandwiches. We went directly for the best value meal which was the English breakfast which also comes with a selection of cereals and toast.

The breakfast covers a full plate with sausages, bacon, scrambled eggs, mushroom and onions, baked beans and potatoes. You can help yourself to toast from the “buffet”. For £5.95 it was good value although any tea or coffee was an additional charge. I had a latte for £2.45 which was quite frothy.

The service is prompt and the waitress was very helpful and accommodating, as when my friend asked to swap her sausages and bacon for porridge she was only charged an extra pound.

On weekends a full brunch buffet is offered, which I have yet to try out. In this frosty London weather, a café with good breakfast and free wifi makes venturing outdoors worthwhile.  

80 Westbourne Grove, Bayswater

W25RT

Cheap Thrills in London - Ice-Skating in Queensway

It may not be as glamourous as ice-skating at Somerset House, at the Natural History Museum or in Hyde Park, but Queens Ice-skating & Bowling is the cheapest place to hit the rink in Central London.

On Monday nights it’s only £6.50 to ice-skate from 8 - 11 pm.  The disco lights and pop music gets you warmed up and doing figure eights in no time.

For beginners, an ice-skating rink can be a daunting place. The urban myth of getting your fingers chopped off if you fall and someone skates over them is highly perpetuated. If you do fall, this is pretty unlikely, mostly you’ll just end up with an icy bottom!

The only thing to be careful of is avoiding the wannabe pro’s that speed skate around the rink like they’re extras from the Mighty Ducks movies. 

For the price alone, it’s lots of good natured fun on a usually quiet Monday evening, without the crowds at the outdoor rinks. 

QUEENS Iceskating & Bowling, 17 Queensway, London W2 

A Winter Wonderland Photolog - Hyde Park, London

Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park is a Christmas sensory overload. The smell of cinnamon wafts through the chilly air - from the Belgian waffles, crepes, mulled wine and other sweets. Santa is everywhere. 

The highlights include: 

• a singing Moose, 
• rides for all ages, 
• an ice-skating rink, 
• a Bavarian village - with currywurst, bretzen and bier, 
• lots of Christmas market stalls including one that sells wooden ties and 
• a VIP white bar with oysters, champagne and a Ferrari

It's completely free to enter and the Christmas cheer will be on everyday until Jan 4th 2011. 

It's also simply too hard to resist having Nutella crepes when you're in Wonderland...

Wanderlust Wednesday - The Kissmas Tree, Covent Garden, London

For an Aussie like me, a Northern Christmas is utterly magical. I dream of a white Christmas, of chestnuts roasting by an open fire, a real wintery holiday. No BBQs, beaches or 40 degree Celcius Christmas days which is generally what it's like back home.

London lights up for Christmas. The streets sparkle with fairy lights. Shop windows have impressive displays. Everything is unashamedly Christmas themed, I've even succumbed to ordering Peppermint Mochas instead of a normal one!

In Covent Garden there is a Kissmas tree. It only lights up when couples kiss under the mistletoe. Even the biggest scrooge breaks into a sappy smile when the tree lights up! 

A Sunday Afternoon Tea in London - Bea's of Bloomsbury

There are some quintessentially British traditions that you have to do in London. Indulging in afternoon tea is one of them. Also known as high tea, afternoon tea is usually served from 2 pm till 5 pm. I like to imagine that the Queen has afternoon tea every day and drinks Twinings.

In my case, afternoon tea is reserved for the weekend when you skip lunch and try not to feel too guilty about eating a lot of sweets.

Bea's of Bloomsbury recently opened a tearoom at One New Change opposite St Paul's Cathedral. The two-level eatery is bright with a warm atmosphere, the antique style chairs and unique interiors create an Alice in Wonderland feeling particularly with the hanging teapot lights and other small touches.

We ordered one afternoon tea set - which comes with savoury baguettes, a proper scone (plain), clotted cream and raspberry jam, a signature cupcakes, petit fours, a mini Valrhona brownie, a mini Belgian Blondie, and a mini meringue and a pot of Jing tea - White jasmine herbal for Chiara. Unfortunately they had run out of petit fours so we compensated with more brownies. 


Rather than being greedy and ordering another afternoon tea, though we did briefly consider this, we opted for the Jam Tea - two plain scones with clotted cream and jam and a pot of Darjeeling Jing tea.

This high tea lady has fallen victim to clotted cream

Rustic looking scones

We look awfully excited and hungry at the same time!

Tea

The Darjeeling was light and refreshing however the teapots were small and we ran out of tea before we finished our last brownie. We ordered a pot of Earl Grey which was just what we needed to cleanse our palette of sugar. The tiny little Jug of milk runs out pretty quickly.

Sweets

The scones were buttery and melted in your mouth with the heavenly clotted cream and runny raspberry jam. I liked the consistency of the jam as it spread easily. The little brownie needed a tad more chocolate in it. However the Belgian Blondie - a moist yellow cake - was divine. The jam-smeared meringue was just the right size and not overtly sweet.

We were a bit disappointed by the velvet cupcake as it had cream, not icing, on the top and in the middle was a giant hole when we sliced it open which was meant to be a layer of chocolate icing. I like solid cupcakes and it didn't taste like a normal red velvet. We ordered the double chocolate cupcake to test another - yet this was incredibly rich. A very wicked cupcake indeed.

Savouries

I've never had baguettes with high  tea as you're usually served finger sandwiches. This was a nice surprise although they weren't cut very evenly - or spread out on the bottom plate. As there were only 3 baguettes, it looked like something was missing on the empty side of the plate! The filling was made up of ham, pesto, salad and cream cheese. The bread was a bit tough but complimented the sweets well.

The verdict - 3.5 out of 5

Service was a bit slow to begin with and we had to flag the waitstaff a few times. For 15 pounds this afternoon tea price is on par with similar sets served at some of London's galleries though cheaper than most hotels. It is a decent serving size though I would've liked to have sampled some of the petit fours. On a second visit I would probably just stick to the tea and scones for 6 pounds. 

We have an agenda of trying out as many afternoon teas as possible in London...so stay tuned.

A typical Saturday night in the heart of London

I don't believe there's such a thing as a typical Saturday night in London. An autumn evening begins with a fair amount of layering up - adding on a coat, scarf and boots before jumping on a rather empty Piccadilly line to Covent Garden.

Drinks at Tuttons
I warmed up with an Espresso Martini at Tuttons. Tuttons is an intimate bar and restaurant in the heart of Covent Garden. Attracting the theatre crowd and patrons of all ages, Tuttons has a standard cocktail menu, although I didn't try the Covent Garden Sunrise, and tempting bar bites. It has a relaxed atmosphere and a busy restaurant area.

After a tipple, we wandered to Leicester Square where the Christmas Fun Fair had begun. Unfortunately my lack of height and ball shooting skills were tested for 2.50GBP and I failed to win any Winnie the Pooh teddy bears.

Tempted by nutella crepes.

But not by the spinning, nausea-inducing ride!