The Psychology of Travel

Cities in the wilderness

It was another day of walking and there were very few vehicles; about one truck every hour, none of which even slowed down. Storm clouds approached, the temperature dropped and I was walking up a long, seemingly endless hill. Rain …

My first podcast – what do you think?

Click on the player above to hear chapter 17 from 9 Months in Tibet, read my me. I’ve been posting short chapters from my Tibet book onto this blog, and recently a friend suggested I post a podcast version instead.…

I wanted to weep and scream with joy

The plateau stretched out across vast distances, with each horizon serrated by mountains. It was an uninhabited desert, alive with colours and strange sounds made by the wind, much more inspiring than the rather static photographs one sees in the …

Hitching into Tibet

The road from Khasa was surfaced with gravel and clung to the gorge precariously. Soon it became clear why there was no traffic: as I walked along I could hear boulders crashing down from the forested gorge above, bouncing over …

Explosions on the Tibetan border

I was full of optimism the next morning as I walked through the golden fields outside Kathmandu, enjoying the warm sunshine. It was one of those moments of such complete beauty that I momentarily forgot that I was doing something …