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Hydrotherapy and Arthritis; The potent benefits of warm water exercise

Hydrotherapy And now for something a little bit different!  It is true that travelling has shown me some incredible ocean, pool and waterfront locations around the planet. Some balmy and warm and some icy and freezing, but that comes with the snow chaser territory I guess ;)  Let's talk for a moment about warm water.... These snow and other adventures have taken me from the sulphur hot springs and hot tubs of the Canadian Rockies to naked bathing in Hokkaido's Japanese Onsen and once diving into the crystal azure waterfalls and underground limestone cenote cavern's of Mexico's Yukutan Peninsula.  I've worked in Bath, Somerset in the spiritual home of hydrotherapy with its Roman bathing rituals and travelled to the travertine terraces or "cotton castle" mineral compositions in Turkey's  Pamukkale or ancient Hierapolis (Holy City).  Similar areas have been drawing the sick, injured and inquisitive to their thermal properties since the time of cl...
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Eco-Tourism in Laos; A Top 10 family-friendly guide to Luang Prabang

When I first looked into travelling to Laos it was as adventurous newlyweds backpacking home to Australia from Europe through SEA.  Less socially conscious and sustainably-minded, I'd heard great things and it was all about the gibbons and tree-top zip lining experience on the border near Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. We'd start here and plan a trip down the Mekong Delta and then spend lazy days in a haze of cocktails floating in a rubber tube out of Vientiane. We never made it. A long story about stolen passports, Portuguese police stations, embassy visits, emergency documents, missing visas, a lot of hassle and a lot of time spent in Nepal and Vietnam and Cambodia instead would mean Laos would have to be another trip altogether.    Jump to 4 years later and as parents of a nearly-two year old the Laos experience we would end up having would be somewhat similar to those earlier travel tantalisations and  entirely different al...

20 flights with an under-2 year old (what were we thinking...?!)

From Laos to Langkawi, Bali and back and multiple domestic trips to Sydney and the Sunshine Coast this mum of one took 20 flights with her 3 to 23 month old. She proceeds to talk in the third person and lists 20 things she learnt about plane travel at the various ages and stages including top tips for travel with a toddler and parenting pitfalls to avoid. ________________________________________________________________________ I will start with a disclaimer justifying the number and nature of flights we took as new parents by blaming my inherent wanderlust and fear or missing out (FOMO) which became amplified by parenthood and this increase in hours spent at home while on maternity leave.  Suddenly the southern sun wasn’t sunny enough nor the water warm enough and I needed to be anywhere and everywhere more tropical, and immediately.  There was also the chronic sleep deprivation contributing to an exponential increase in screen and internet hours (albeit not mumm...

The not-so 'one year working holiday'; Travel memories of Italy to plan for my future ;)

Continuing our epic Euro-travels of 2012/13 we have just celebrated, rather enthusiastically, the 12 month mark of what started out as a fixed 'one year  working holiday'.. enthusiastic, perhaps as it culminated in my throwing in my longstanding job back home and deciding I wasn't ready to go back; not literally nor figuratively, at least not yet anyway! Rather than a whimsical act of defiance after a few too many champagnes, this was more a gradual, somewhat inevitable decision and one that was not taken lightly... but as for so many of the wanderlust inclined, this journey has become so much more than the destination.. and there are only so many self-fulfilling prophecies I can google and then filter photos of on instagram to make me realise what I knew all along.. that if you are in love with cities you've never been and with people you've never met (as well as your new husband who wasn't going home either ;) then in the end you will only regret the chances ...

Andalusian Archways; Summer started in Seville

I first fell in love with ceramic mosaics and started a habit out of photographing doorways and archways on a trip to Morocco 6 years ago; a fascination with what i now have come to know as being synonymous with the Andalusian area of Southern Spain.  The Moorish architecture in these parts describes the berber-islamic influence of Northern Africa across parts of Spain and Portugal dating back to medieval times when the Moors were dominant across the Iberian territory also into France and as far as Italy.  The style of an inward-focussed Riad; where the rooms open into an internal atrium space and often into internal courtyards, and fountain-filled gardens, lends itself to beautiful characteristic elements of horseshoe arches, domes and decorative tile work that would become the focus of my photographic exploration.                                       ...