Russell Stuart
Originally born in Rhodesia now Zimbabwe , I have traveled through most of southern africa.radicalruss
Ten years ago I left my then home in south africa to travel the world but after 2 months , got stuck in the beautiful island of Guernsey in the channel islands.I have since then traveled to canada , done France and Spain on motorbikes , been to Finland on my way to Lithuania, been to Holland , Bulgaria , Ireland and am about to embark on a round the world trip east to west.
Travel Blog Posts
December 18th 2009
13/11/09 Woke early and went off to my favourite wifi restaurant where I had some lovely Lao coffee then back to my guesthouse to fetch my stuff and then off to the airport. It is always interesting to see how technology has helped to speed things up in the first world and how we are so impatient when it takes 15min to check one person in as they don’t have a biometric scanner!! Welcome to the third world but at least there are a few people employed instead of just one. Had a good flight that left early and got in on the Friday with enough time to get a bus into the mayhem of Asian rush hour traffic and it took two hours to do the 27km from the airport to the old part of ... read more
December 18th 2009
31/10/09 On arrival at the border where the train stopped we quickly got a tuk tuk to a place where we could arrange some visas for Rachel and Andy and also arranged a private taxi to Vientane. At the border post Rach and Andy were required to fill out some additional forms and so I opted to wait for them to finish before I headed through and only found out that the visa that I had was not stamped and I had to que for some extra time while they quickly walked though the line , again no good deed goed unpunished. The taxi was a lovely Mitsubishi and after a short and uneventful trip that should have cost a lot less than we paid but we were dropped off very close to the city and ... read more
Thailand is where the family is!
Published: December 18th 2009Asia » Thailand » South-West Thailand » Ranong
December 18th 2009
12/10/09 On arrival at in Thailand it is strange to think that this is third world with a lovely state of the art airport and a system that is regulated and ordered. Met Varun again and we headed to Bangkok to where I had booked my accommodation at Kaohsan road which turns out that booking is not necessary as there is plenty of accommodation at lots of prices as well as less than I paid. The hotel was again not amazing but the aircon worked very well in fact I had to turn it off it was like a meat locker and I felt like a side of beef! Went for a sleep so I could refresh before heading out to see the sights with Varun who has been here before and knows where everything is. ... read more
October 23rd 2009
27/09/09 Woke after not enough sleep again and headed off to Narita at 830 am and only just had enough time to get to the airport and make my flight at 1230pm. The flight was all the better for the fact that it was on a boeing and it was not nearly full with me having four seats to myself which allowed me to catch some decent sleep on the 8 hr flight to Delhi. On arrival I was met with temperatures of 34 degrees C and quite a high humidity. The pickup had my name spelt wrong so I missed them and only got the right guy after I had realised that my new name was Mr Russell Start I had no problem finding the taxi. The drive to the hotel took over an hour ... read more
October 5th 2009
21/09/09 I stepped off the plane after a good flight where the aircraft used was a rather old one with no TVs on the headrests , so I decided to sleep instead. The humidity was the first thing that made me realise that I had arrived in another country and with Australia having so many Japanese travellers except for the writing you would not have felt out of place. Our bags came out very quickly and I headed off to the tourist information where I had been told I would be able to sort out all my tours and accommodation, I was wrong , the tourist info was only able to sort out accom that they delt with and all they could say about tours was that I should go to the closest travel agency downstairs ... read more
September 26th 2009
29/08/09 After a lovely flight where I watched star trek and some family guy episodes I finally arrived in Sydney after being there last 12 years and boy has it changed. The first thing I noticed was that I did not hear an Australian accent for two days and the next thing was that the prices to do anything were exhorbitant. I called my hostel to be told that the booking was changed to another hostel and I now had to pay for the bus that was originally free and when I arrived at the new hostel there were lots of other things like internet and breakfast that were also not included like in the other hostel but I guess that is something you have to deal with. 30/08/09 Met with Angela who had been in ... read more
August 28th 2009
3/8/09 Arrived in Auckland at 445 am after not much sleep on the plane partly due to turbulence and this stupid women behind me keeping on getting up by using the headrest of my chair as leverage. Came through the Bio hazard area that checks that you are not bringing in anything that might affect NZ’S ecosystem and handed over my soon to be lovely avocado if seems I’m not the correct type of importer cos you can get Avos in the local market at They were however not interested in taking the large collection of shell necklaces people kept giving me when left a pacific island, oh well.! Out into the arrivals hall lo be greeted by a clean and friendly New Zealand. Spent the next few hours at the tourist info who could not ... read more
August 3rd 2009
10 /07/09 After a day of checking out accommodation and moving around we are now ready to explore the island and are going on a tour of two thirds of the island, and even though the senery is lovely I get the feeling that the info that the guide is giving us is not all that accurate. However a couple on the group turned out to be the couple who sat behind me on the flight and they had written in their diary that they were sat behind a person who obviously had a problem! Once I had explained that the chair was broken, they modified the entry! At lunch I chose to go to another part of thequarry where the Moai were carved and wasrewarded with some lovely pictures of a less populararea that most ... read more
August 3rd 2009
06 /07/09 After much searching I found a nice hostel in Santiago But first I had to go and get my (hopefully) repaired camera at 7 am because my check in to go to Chile. I left it till? So then went but guess what, even though I was promised, there was no one around so back to my hostel who phoned a mobile and after getting my bags and negotiating a deal to the airport ‘headed back of see if mg camera was repaired. It Was, praise be to God now I could get on with two cameras and a reduction of budget by $200. Lesson learnt cameras not made for water should be kept dry! Left to Santiago via Iquique and was amazed at how beaurocracy and rules can cause a whole plane to ... read more
Patience learnt at the Amazon and Pampas
Published: July 5th 2009South America » Bolivia » Beni Department » Rurrenabaque
July 5th 2009
26/6/09 Today we woke up at 4 am to catch our taxi to the airport for our flight at 615 am. So got up and headed out for our drive with Mr Speedy Gonzalves who has the same habit of only turning only once he is in the corner whilst speeding unnecessarily. After some small amount of berating, he magically learnt how to drive and the rest of the trip was uneventful. Once at the airport the fun startled as we soon saw that the only flight for Amazonas was leaving at 730 am not 615. The real fun however was still begin when we were informed that because there had been a cancellation the day before, our flight was changed lo 1150 am which I immediately refused to accept. The person at the counter had ... read more
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