Rain. Annoying isn’t it. This is what the Whitsundays, and in particular, Whitehaven Beach and Hill Inlet, is supposed to look like.

Stunning (Image ©Australian Geographic)

And this is my lasting memory of one of the most beautiful places in the world….

Wet and bleak – more Skeggy than paradise!

Yes, after weeks of unbroken sunshine, the clouds came and dumped a load of rain on us at precisely the moment we were supposed to be taking in one of the best beaches in the world. It didn’t stop us from having fun and making the most of it though, taking part in a UK and Ireland (wet) beach football match against a mostly German opponent. Sadly, they won.

Pass us a brolly!

Thankfully the weather didn’t spoil a brilliant few days, where I took to the seas and sailed around a particularly beautiful area of Australia with some great people. It involved a stop in Airlie Beach, where despite its name, there isn’t actually much sand to go and relax on. Instead, like many places where there’s a risk of crocs and stinger jellyfish on the coast, there’s a huge swimming lagoon where people hang out.

The New Horizon

I didn’t have much time for that, arriving the day before I set sail on the New Horizon, a 30-year-old sailing boat that spends its time taking backpackers and tourists around this islands for snorkelling, partying and sightseeing. I was under strict instructions not to take any bags with zips, mainly because its how bedbugs travel around apparently, and so with a beachbag of clothes and a box of wine (more on that later), I made my way to the marina.

I arrived to find a huge group of girls standing around.

“Hurray, another boy,” I overheard one of them say.

I asked if it was the waiting area for the New Horizon. There were nods and smiles.

“There’s only four boys coming,” said a blonde German girl to my right.

Now, you might think this a bit odd, about to spend three days at sea with a boatload of girls, but I was more than a little worried. With 31 people on the trip, that’s a ratio of almost eight girls to each bloke. I began to have visions of dinnertime chats being dominated by lipstick and makeup tips, which boys they fancy, and shoes.

Welcome aboard!

Thankfully, the girl’s sources were wrong, and slowly but surely another few lads turned up, mostly German, but lads all the same. There were still twice as many females as there were males, but we weren’t complaining, and neither was Brett, the slightly cheeky chappy who would be our host onboard and who turned up with a huge smile.

“They sell seasickness tablets in the shop behind you, and it will get a little bit bumpy out there with this wind,” were some of the key words I picked out in his welcome speech. I invested in a pack.

As we all climbed onboard, handing over our footwear for the next couple of days (‘this is a naked from the ankle down boat’) we were welcomed to the New Horizon on the bow, 31 of us from all around Europe. There was a large group from Germany, some from Switzerland, Holland, a good group from Ireland and one other guy from England.

Andy the captain

The New Horizon is skippered by Andy, a cheery, smiling bloke who looked every bit the salty seadog when he’d hang out of the wheelhouse, looking out to sea and sailing his vessel with pride.

Alex is the cook/anchor attendant/washer upper, a great guy to have a laugh and a chat with around in the kitchen. He’s originally from back home, but has been living and working on boats for years. He clearly loves life at sea.

Then there was Brett, our host come entertainer come alarm clock, who would be the one telling us what we could do, what we couldn’t do and when we need to do them for the duration of the three day trip.

Alex and his sausage

It was Brett who told us where the goon box was onboard. Now, goon, for anyone who doesn’t know, is a huge thing for backpackers in Australia. With a pint of beer costing anything up to $12.50 (just under £8) it leaves young, skint travellers with a problem when it comes to having a bevvy. Thankfully, a box of wine saves the day – known as cask wine, it comes in either ‘fruity’ or ‘dry’.

Its fairly similar to the boxes of wine you get back home, except probably not as nice. It definitely won’t win any international quality wine awards, but it does get you a little tipsy. And when you can pick up 4.4litres of the stuff for $12, thanks to the proximity of Australia’s wine growing regions, it becomes the drink of choice!

Goon it up!

The only problem was, with everyone taking their goon out of the cardboard boxes for the ice box – known as an ‘esky’ down under – it would be a confusing array of silver foil bags without any kind of marking system. Thankfully, it’s a problem the crew of the New Horizon have found a solution to, in the form of multicoloured elastic bands. For the next two nights, my grog was the one with a green and red bands twisted around the nozzle.

The sun goes down

With the sun shining, the calm, crystal clear blue water near the marina slowly gave way to the choppy ocean as we made our way over to the anchorage for the night, waving goodbye to Airlie Beach and mainland Australia. We got to know each other a little better when we hit calmer waters, and watched the sun set over the ocean.

Sunset at sea

The rest of the night was spent playing cards, drinking games, finding out about each others travels and watching sharks circle the boat. Yes, you did read that right. Sharks.

You can imagine the commotion, spotlight shining on the waves in the darkness, when someone shouts ‘shark’ amid a boatload of young people. Suddenly, we were all at the handrails along the side of the boat, watching and waiting.

Shark attack!

Sure enough, appearing like a ghost from the deep, an outline appeared, swooping around in a definite shark-like manner. Its long pointy tail, top fin and rounded head confirmed it. I strained my eyes, trying to spot any markings, and could just about see some dark markings on its fin.

“It’s a black tip reef shark,” said Alex, adding that it wasn’t often the trip would be blessed by the appearance of such a fish.

We watched as the shark circled other fish that had made the mistake of being attracted to the light and noise onboard the vessel. A short time late, another shark appeared, and I’d spend much of the night watching the two of them swooping around together, diving beneath the boat and getting dinner for themselves.

Cloudy arrival in the Whitsundays

The next morning, with a thick head thanks to the goon, there was a rude awakening that, being in the forward-most berth onboard, I’d been warned about. It was just after 5am – the noise was the anchor chain being hauled in and clanging away just centimetres from my head.

My lower bunk at the front of the boat

Just about the last thing anyone needs after a heavy night of goon, but thankfully it didn’t go on for long and we were told to carry on sleeping to avoid a rough bit of sea before arriving at Whitehaven.

The New Horizon can’t get close to the shore – shes’s a pretty big boat – and with no jetty at the Whitsundays National Park, it was a case of jumping in the small boat we’d been towing along and making a few shuttles to the shore. We headed up to the lookout, passing huge webs full of evil-looking spiders, before there was a clearing and a wooden platform. Stretching out for miles in front was the famous view I had seen on television travel programmes and in almost every Australian tourism brochure I have ever looked in.

There’s no doubt Whitehaven is one of the most stunningly beautiful places on Earth, but I was gutted there was no sunshine. For me, this was one of the places I had come to Australia to see, right up there with Ayers Rock. Without the sun shining, however, the brilliant white sand and turquoise blue waters just didn’t glow.

Still beautiful

The sand is famously white because of its high silica content, caused by years of washing by the ocean before being dumped on the sandbanks here. At low tide, you get an amazing view of the sand bars amid the bright blue water, a result of the incredible white sand below. I waited until the sun managed to poke between the clouds for a few seconds before grabbing a photo, but it’s a long way off those picture perfect postcards. Worse still, out to sea, there was a storm brewing.

We made our way down to the soft white sands of the beach, where most people donned stinger suits to protect themselves from jellyfish in the water. Alex told me there was a good chance of seeing some stingrays near the mangroves, so I went with him in search of them. It wasn’t long before a familiar dark outline appeared in front of us, along with a few others. We’d waded out to a family of them, who gradually lifted themselves off from their sandy beds and swam away.

I headed back towards a group from our boat that had set up camp on the beach, and was in the process of setting up some cricket stumps when I heard my name being called. It was Alex and Brandon from my dorm at Gilligans in Cairns!

With Alex and Brandon, mates from Cairns

“How are you buddy,” they said as I threw everything away I was doing to go and meet them.

It turned out they were onboard the Atlantic Clipper, the sister boat to New Horizon, and who were anchored just a short distance from us the previous night. We had just started talking about our respective boats when I caught sight of what was happening a few hundred metres away out on the sandbank.

Dozens of people were running. Fast. And towards us. Behind, a menacing cloud and a sheet of white from the ocean waves to the sky. It was rain – very heavy rain – and it was heading right for us.

The heavens opened

Alex and Brandon scarpered for shelter under a tree with the rest of their boat. Someone handed me a giant blue plastic bag. But it was too late. In an instant, the heavens opened with some of the heaviest rain I’ve known, not only on this trip, but ever before. It absolutely threw it down, and everyone, whether they had been in the water or not, was instantly soaked. I made a hole in the bag so I could see through (and breathe!) and braved my camera to get a few shots of the monsoon-like conditions that had suddenly swallowed us.

With everyone soaked to the bone, there was no point in heading back to the New Horizon. Instead, we carried on regardless – the cricket continued in the storm, people swam in the sea, we found a football and had a kickabout. Paradise might have changed to a winter’s day in Skeggy in an instant, but we were making the most of it. We’d only be here once, and if you can’t remember it for all the right reasons, then you may as well remember it for smashing a six into the sea. Or in our case, hitting the tennis ball so hard, it smashed the end off the plastic cricket bat. Whichever way you look at it, we turned a negative into a positive, and we’ll always remember our visit!

Fun and games jumping off the boat

Strangely, just as we were leaving Whitehaven, the clouds broke and the sun came out. We finished off the day with some snorkelling around the coast, diving off the boat and entertaining some batfish that had come to us for a feed. We sailed past the world-famous celebrity hangout Hayman Island, anchoring not far from its shores, and the goon was out again in the evening, along with yet more drinking games.

Our host Brett explaining where we had been

There was also an outing for my iPhone, after the German contingent alienated most music lovers by hijacking the sound system onboard at about 7pm in the evening to engulf us with a selection of weird European hardcore trance that absolutely nobody out of Germany had any interest in. I, along with a few of the others with better taste in music, agreed something had to be done. My family and friends back home will no doubt have a facepalm moment when

Our map and journey around the islands

I say it was my iPhone selected to make a playlist for the night, and after a few minutes selecting classics such as Scatman John, the Grease megamix and a bit of Aqua (there was a fair share of Oasis, Muse and Florence too!) the boat was rocking along to my DJ’ing for the rest of the night. Thankfully, the German contingent was dancing along too – its fair to say my music taste appeals to all!

Having fun on deck at night!

Despite being away for a few days, the trip was over quicker than you could say ‘landlubber’. After an early morning snorkel and breakfast, we headed back to the mainland with full sail, bouncing our way across the waves. Andy, the skipper, smiled at me when he saw how many people were on the bow as we made our way to the open water.

Early morning snorkelling

“They probably think this is as bad as its going to get…they’re going to get soaked in a few minutes,” he laughed, with a knowing wink.

It was a bit choppy…

Sure enough, as we hit the swell, the New Horizon lurched from one side to the other, throwing water up over the sides and drenching everyone in the process.

Water everywhere!

Even sheltering in the doorways you weren’t safe, with water gushing up over the top of the boat, landing on the roof and cascading down on anyone in the vicinity. Most people found a spot and stayed in it, hanging onto anything they could. Some where just trying to hold onto their stomachs. Thankfully,  I found my spot – it was in the sun, on the deck, and horizontal – catching 40 winks!

My spot on deck!

A couple of hours later, we were sailing into the calmer waters near the harbour, posing for group photos and looking forward to losing our sea legs. I was working out what to do for the afternoon, with another overnight Greyhound booked for the evening. I decided to head back to the hostel where I had stayed before the trip, knock on a few doors and blag a shower in someone’s room before collecting my bags and heading to a café somewhere.

The motley crew onboard the New Horizon!

We gave all the crew members a round of applause and a few cheers as we got back to the mainland. They had done a brilliant job – Brett had kept us all safe and entertained, Andy had steered us on the trip of a lifetime, and Alex had kept us fed with some great meals considering the tiny amount of space he has to work in. The spaghetti bolognaise on the last night was one of the best I’ve had.

I said goodbye to the crew and headed off up the pontoon, where I could see Alex and Brandon who had just left their boat.

“Phil! Where are you heading?” they asked.

I told them I was off to blag a shower in a hostel. They told me they were heading to a luxury apartment in the mountains overlooking the bay.

“How in the world did you manage to afford that?” I asked, slightly envious.

One hell of a luxury apartment!

They told me a friend that Brandon had worked with had managed to get them a good deal for a few nights, and said I should go with them for the afternoon. It was an offer I would have been stupid to turn down, and walked with them up some of the steepest hills Airlie Beach has to offer until we reached a fantastic set of apartments. These were the best of the best in the area – $300 a night jobs, complete with a pool high in the mountains overlooking the stunning scenery.

Living the life!

The boys had landed on their feet. They knew it, I knew it, and in return, I too had shared in their luck. I spent the afternoon chilling by a pool in a setting that millionaires would be happy with, dumped some washing in their utility room, had an amazing shower in one of the best bathrooms I have ever seen and caught up with two good mates on a balcony with one of the most brilliant views in the area.

Alex, a self photo, with Brandon and I in the pool!

Yet again, it was another example of the beauty of travelling. Within the space of an hour, I had gone from trying to scout out a shower in a grotty dorm, to spending an afternoon at one of the most luxurious apartment complexes I have ever seen. It was all thanks to two guys, who a week before I had never met. Now, after meeting in our dorm in Cairns, they had invited me to share the afternoon with them, and dropped me off back at my hostel late in the afternoon to collect my bags. They are both heading south towards Sydney, the same as me, and we hope to meet up again further along the way. But whether we manage that or not, they are already two more people to add to my ever growing friend list from this trip.

Strangers to mates in an instant – and photographs and memories that will last a lifetime.

Taking in the spirit of the Outback

After the adventures in the outback, it was great to have a few days in Alice Springs to have a look around the town before heading further north.

Staying at Neil’s home, my friend from Grimsby, it was easy to get around the town. Neil had to help friends at a music festival they had organised out in the McDonnell ranges for a few days, but before I went out there to meet him, I had the use of his mountain bike to explore the area.

Royal Flying Doctors base in Alice Springs

Thankfully, despite my record with all things bike-like, the wheels and pedals stayed on long enough for me to make it to the home of the Royal Flying Doctor Service in the Alice, a service I only really knew of because of a slightly old programme I used to watch as a kid. I say watch, I remember turning it over a lot of the time.

Mock up of intensive care in the sky

The visitor centre is based in the town, the centre of Australia and hundreds of miles away from any other city – the exact reason why the flying doctors are needed in this country. Having now experienced how vast the outback is, and how frighteningly alone you can feel when stranded somewhere within it, I can’t imagine what it must be like for someone in the remote communities dotted all over the bush to have an accident or fall ill.

That’s where this service comes in, providing aircraft, doctors and medical boxes to those who need it. Covering an area of 7.1million square kilometres, the aircraft land on special runway strips dotted all over the back country, and in emergencies, can even land on the roads. It helps out more than 250,000 patients every year, including a number of tourists. It cost $12 to go into the centre, which is in the middle of being refurbished and, if I’m honest, wasn’t really worth the money. Instead, I thought of it as a donation for a brilliant service. As it says, the inland area contains many lonely graves of people from the days before the flying doctors, who would have lived had they received medical care quickly enough.

Aboriginals sheltering on the Todd River in Alice

I then set off in search of the telegraph station, the site of the first European settlement in the outback. I thought it would be on a hill somewhere, and instead found Anzac Hill, a lookout point where you can see across the city. It was a struggle to bike up the steep incline, but the view was worth it at the top.

Alice Springs from Anzac Hill

From there, you can see how the Alice sprawls out within a valley, the famous Stuart Highway running through it from left to right as it joins the north and south coasts of the continent.

Looking over the Alice towards the Gap

Its named after John Stuart, who led an expedition through Australia in 1861, and ten years later the settlement here started when a repeater station for the overland telegraph line which linked Adelaide, and indeed the country, with Darwin and the rest of the world.

The line opened up the centre of Australia for settlement, and that settlement was now a sprawling city, a place where the indigenous and European populations live side by side. There are undoubtedly divides between both, and its sad to say, but the many Aboriginals that I saw seemed to spend their days endlessly wandering around the streets or sitting under trees in the shade. There is a huge problem with high unemployment, crime and alcohol abuse among the Aboriginal people, and despite vast sums of money from the Australian government being put into projects to help, it doesn’t quite seem to be enough of the right sort of help.

Some people here argue that the indigenous population is not doing enough to help itself, and while there are many that work and earn a living, the general opinion from people I spoke to was that more support was needed. That being said, being shouted at by a group of them while wandering home one night was slightly unnerving, but I laughed it off and made my way past without any problems.

Alice Springs telegraph station

After taking some time to take in the view, I sped back down the hill and on to the telegraph station, some of the oldest houses in the area. Located by the Todd River, which is mostly a dry riverbed, it is next to a permanent waterhole – the Alice Spring.

Alice Spring – the water is visible top left

The settlement was optimistically named Alice Springs after the wife of the former Postmaster General of South Australia, Sir Charles Todd, from whom the Todd River takes its name. Strangely, the water sits around thanks to a base of granite that it can’t seep through, meaning that despite all the heat and dry conditions, there is always life-giving water here.

The point where the overland telegraph line entered the buildings

That’s why it was picked as a main repeater site for the Australian Overland Telegraph Line, the first communications link from the south of the continent, linking through to Java, Singapore and on to Europe. Teams of workers, led by Todd, took more than 30,000 wrought iron poles, insulators, batteries, wire and other equipment, shipped in from England, and linked the northern and southern coasts. The poles were placed 80 metres apart for the entire 3,200km link, and in some of the worst conditions, but it allowed the development of the nation.

Supermoon from Anzac Hill memorial site

As I was cycling back to Neil’s house, I noticed the moon appeared brighter and larger than normal. It turns out it was a so called ‘supermoon’, a phenomenon where it appears 30 per cent larger and brighter when the point it is closest to Earth coincides with a full moon. I took the opportunity to further practise with the manual settings on my camera, getting some fairly decent results considering it’s a simple compact job. A decent tripod would have helped matters further!

Supermoon over Alice Springs

My last day in Alice wasn’t actually spent in the city, but about an hour and a half away in the MacDonnell ranges, at a music festival called Wide Open Space. Its an annual outback festival, celebrating music, the arts and desert culture, and my friend Neil’s housemate was one of the organisers.

Music in the outback

It was one of Neil’s friends, Emma, who gave me a lift out to the bush and to the dusty bowl that was home to stages, funky festival goers, bands and beer. Emma is a cross-media reporter for the ABC in Alice Springs, a very similar job to mine back home, and the journey soon passed as we swapped tales and stories from journalism on opposite sides of the globe. We were so engrossed in talk about each others jobs, that Emma briefly ended up missing a turn, much to our amusement.

Festival spirit

My mate Neil enjoying the festival

The long dusty roads led us to some incredible scenery, and there was a great atmosphere at the site. It was very much a small-scale Glastonbury, with a very friendly and relaxed feel about the place. There was an underlying beat from the stage, everyone was chilled out, and the sun was beating down through clouds of dust being kicked up by dozens of dancing feet in the main arena.

The festival and campsite – in a Wide Open Space

As the festival was ongoing, I decided to climb up to the top of one of the ridges overlooking the campsite.

A tricky climb!

I knew the sun would be setting shortly, and it was my last chance to see one of the stunning sunsets in the outback, where the sky passes through such a vivid rainbow of colours before darkness falls.

It was a tough hike, clambering up the deep red rocks which would often slip under your feet, and pulling myself up through a gulley. There were plenty of other festival-goers around with the same idea, and we were helping each other with the tough bits. At one point, someone from the top started shouting for us to bring up some wood. Most of us had our hands full making sure we didn’t have a painful fall to the bottom, and so politely laughed off the request.

View and campfire from the top

At the top, however, we could see why – a few people had set up camp, complete with a camp fire, right on the top of the mountain. And what a spectacular view they had – the ranges stretching as far as the eye could see, people dancing below, music still heard as clear as if you were down by the stage. The beauty of being in the middle of nowhere – in a wide open space, to steal the name of the festival – is the complete silence and isolation. Somehow it seems to help the acoustics.

Soon the sun began to sink from the sky, turning a deep yellow, then orange and red, casting a glow and the red centre desert and mountains around me. The flicker of the campfire to my right grew ever more noticeable as the 30 or so people that were alongside me found a rocky seat and watched the natural spectacle.

Spotted this shot as the sun went down.

Many sat in silence and watched, others meditated, others cheered and hugged friends. As the sun disappeared over distant mountains, it was one of those moments when you realise just how quickly it sets. With the last sliver of light gone, everyone turned around into the opposite direction, watched, and waited.

The moon rises over the ranges

Within minutes of the sun disappearing in the west, over in the east, a giant moon began to slowly rise above the mountains. It prompted cheers and wolf howls from many of those stood alongside me.

“It looks like a giant baby’s head,” shouted one bloke, clearly having had a few too many Coopers ales.

As the moon rose higher in the sky, another set of cheers came from a larger crowd of people stood on the top of a smaller hill near the stage, as it became visible from their vantage point. Then, 20 minutes later, another set of cheers from everyone else down on ground level. It was a great couple of hours, taking in the atmosphere, admiring the view and trying to savour the experience.

The next problem was how I’d left it far to late to return back to the ground, and like a few others, had the tricky task of making my way down a mountainside in darkness. Thankfully, the moon was bright and my iPhone torch app once again paid dividends, lighting the way just enough so I knew where to put my feet.

Darkness falls

I was going to stay the night at the festival, but with it winding down and the bar shut, Emma offered me a lift back to Alice Springs. I was also thinking of making the train I was booked on north to Darwin the following day when I said goodbye to Neil, knowing it might be the last time I see him for a while. There was no guarantee he could make it back in time before my train leaves, as he was helping his housemate with packing away everything the following day. But we had met up again, and that’s what mattered – a friendship rekindled, and one I know we’ll keep up. He’s hoping to be back home in the UK for a few weeks in the next year or so, and so I hereby keep my promise to him of dinner and a night out on me when he returns.

After a week of staying at his house, borrowing his car, getting it stranded and repaired in one of the most remote parts of the world, a cracking bacon bun and coffee when I returned and fantastic memories of the outback, it’s the least I could do. We’d had a great time catching up, and it was brilliant to find him so happy with his life in the Alice. I’m sure it won’t be another 12 or 13 years before we meet again, and who knows, maybe one day I’ll find myself in the red centre once again.

For now, its back on the rails north and to Darwin, courtesy of The Ghan.

*To see more on the Wide Open Space festival, visit the website at www.wideopenspace.net.au

I’m in mourning. I’ve lost an old, dear friend of mine.

It’s a friend I have known for ten years, a friend who has been everywhere with me, that has walked with me on every continent (apart from South America!). A friend that brought comfort and support, one that I could rely on and trust never to let me down. A friend I just could not bare to replace.

I have lost a beloved Cod Flop.

MISSING: Last seen near Ayers Rock – the other one of these!

Now, most will read this and wonder what on earth I am gibbering on about. There are some who will roll their eyes and think ‘about time’. There are a few who will no doubt share a little bit of sadness with me at the passing of such a special friend. There are one or two who will read this with a knowing nod at my loss.

Those one or two will be the people I met at Camp America, in the Catskill Mountains of New York back in the summer of 2002, the likes of Steve Rose, Steve Reynolds, Lynne, Katrina, Peter, Mike and Chris, who, lovingly, christened me Cod Head thanks to my Grimsby roots.

I celebrated my 21^st birthday at Camp Nashopa, and in July that year a few of them clubbed together to buy me something special for my landmark birthday. Aside from vast quantities of alcohol when I became a legal drinker for the second time in my life (its 21 in the States!) I was handed a present. They had splashed out on me, and handed over a pair of blue flip flops. All $1.50-worth of Walmart flip flops.

These, however, were not just any old flip flops. These had a picture on them – a picture of a fish.

Well, it was the skeleton of a fish to be precise, but it was a fish all the same. And from that day forward, we were all in agreement that they shall be named the Cod Flops.

And that was the start of a beautiful relationship, a relationship I am sure even some of those who helped buy me that beloved gift are unaware of, and that’s one of the reasons why I’m writing this!

Back then, I promised I would wear them for the summer, partly as they were a bit of a novelty joke gift, but partly because they were so incredibly comfortable. We went to the American countryside with the kids together, ran the go-cart activity together, had a special trip to New York City together. We even went as far as Boston and Atlantic City together, with my new friends not even as much as nipping my feet, let alone give me any blisters.

It was the start of something special, and I couldn’t just leave them behind. I packed them into my bag, and they came home with me, as something to show the parents of ‘what the lads got me for my birthday’ before being thrown away or forgotten about.

Except, it didn’t stop there.

With no other flip flops so comfy, I began to wear them at home. Then they were packed into my bag when I made a return trip to the States the following year, returning to the summer camp to see friends for a few days, and enabling my Cod Flops to feel at home for a while.

Cod flops in Spain, taken by my ex Leanne as a joke about my big feet

Then there were holidays – to Turkey, to a week with the lads in Greece, to Spain and the Canary Islands. We began to venture further afield, travelling to the Gulf with the Grimsby Telegraph and spending a week onboard HMS Grimsby as we sailed from Abu Dhabi in the UAE to Muscat in Oman in 2003.

With my cod flops in Sierra Leone, on a work trip with Comic Relief in 2007

We were together on my first trip to Hong Kong, Australia and Singapore a few years later. I changed jobs, and the Cod Flops continued with me to Africa, visiting Sierra Leone when I was sent to film the work of Comic Relief projects in the war-torn country, even coming with me and flying with the RAF to Cyprus when we filmed the Tornado fighter jets returning home from Iraq.

My Cod-Flops met people in my life, spending time with best friends and travel friends, a couple of ex-girlfriends who would roll their eyes as they see the tatty, ill-fitting footwear going on yet another journey. We had more holidays – to the Caribbean, to Egypt, to Prague and countless trips to Madrid to see best mate Dan and wife Denise. I learned to ski, and the cod-flops made their first adventures up mountains with me – just to wear around the hotel of course, but they went out in the snow from time to time too.

Cod flops protected my feet from the salty bottom of the Dead Sea in 2009

We were inseparable while I was away, and last year they made it to Thailand, Australia and Connecticut in America on my three-week trip around the world, a trip that helped me decide to make this very journey. They had circumnavigated the globe with me once, and with wear and tear beginning to take its toll, I had decided this would be their swansong, a chance to go out with a bang, a trip that I could show them the world and say ‘thankyou for being there’.

And I looked after them well – when all their flip flop friends were being washed ashore, abandoned or lost by their owners in a drunken haze at Thailand’s Full Moon parties, my trusty Cod Flops were still firmly held on my feet. When the little rubber toe holder pulled through from the bottom of the blue foam base on a walk in Cambodia, it wasn’t a snap, just a temporary, repairable blow-out, as always. They kept my feet dry and away from nasties on the dirty trans-Siberian train conveniences, and in the countless squat toilets across Asia.

But this trip did begin to take its toll on my weary friends. I began to feel sharp stones underfoot as the fish-painted base began to wear thin. In Thailand, a bit of broken glass stuck right through and cut the big toe on my right foot, leaving a half-inch gash in Coddy. The edges began to bend up and around my feet, and they still, even to this day, made my feet blue every time I wore them as some sort of paint or dye rubbed off. Yet I always forgave them.

I did, however, almost buy a new pair of flip-flops in Thailand, as the Havianas were just £2 a pair in Bangkok. I told myself that if I had to retire the Cod Flops early, I would write a post about them, to give them a send off and let the world know how much they meant to me, and how much I would miss them. An obituary like no other.

But their time wasn’t up – as long as I could walk in them, they would be my companions. They would make it to the end of my journey, and I would take them home, back to Grimsby and Hull, where they would have eternal rest in a wardrobe or a loft, a treasured momento of times past rather than being thrown out and forgotten.

And so, in our latest adventure together, we set off for Uluru, Ayers Rock, one of the most famous sights in the world. A walk around in the Red Centre of Australia, the sacred deep red sands being a first for me and my Cod Flops. I set off from Alice Springs, trying to drive my friend Neil’s 4×4 in them. It wasn’t working, so I swapped them for my North Face walkers and threw them into the back of the car.

And that, my friends, was the last time I ever wore my Cod Flops.

Arriving back into Alice at 1am, it was dark and cool. I unpacked the car as best as I could, and grabbed my Cod Flops. Except, there was only one- my right one. I looked under the seats, in the back, around the front. Nothing. The other one must be in my bag. I’ll have a better look in the morning.

Morning came. Everything came out of the car. Still no left Cod Flop. I searched my bag, frantically looking through every compartment. I even checked my cool bag. I texted my friends to see if it had been put in their bag by mistake. Nothing.

I removed the back seat from Neil’s car once again, to check my lost friend hadn’t somehow been wedged underneath. It hadn’t.

The Cod Flop has gone. Lost. Misplaced. Run away. Departed.

I was struck by a strange mild panic over an inanimate object. I feel like I have betrayed them, telling myself how I should have looked after them better on the journey. How I should have placed them nicely in my bag, rather than slinging them over my shoulder into a rear passenger footwell. It was my fault. All my fault.

I thought of how Tom Hanks must have felt when he saw his beloved Wilson, his volleyball friend, drifting away from him in Castaway. Friends for so long, a part of his life, yet a relationship that when he lost him from his raft and drifted away on the tide, resulted in tears and that famous cry of Wiiiiilllllllllssssoooooooooonnnn.

And they were only together for four years.

Wilson.

Ten years together, bought for me by good mates in great times gone by. We’ve shared laughs, been out for beers, met a few girls, stubbed toes and hit a few rocks during our relationship, but we’ve seen the world and walked thousands of miles together. But now our time, and our journey together, has come to an end.

My left Cod Flop must have known the end was night. It wasn’t bothered about New Zealand or Fiji, or returning back to the streets of Hull. It didn’t care for the accolade of travelling all the way around the world. Pah – it had already done that last year.

No, for my left Cod Flop, the red centre of Australia, the middle of one of the most vast, inhospitable desert areas on Earth, home to the majestic Uluru and Olgas, and just about as far away as you can get from Grimsby or their birthplace in New York, was the place where my long-term close friend decided to continue its adventure.

Holding cod flops in Lanzarote, 2009

It’s the place that Coddy decided was so stunningly beautiful, it wanted to stay. A place where it hopped from the car to see out its days, its travels never ending, and living for eternity in a place so far away from my home, but a place that will now forever be its. A place where I can think back to in a few months time, while I’m out at the crack of dawn filming on Grimsby Fish Market, safe in the knowledge that Cod Flop is still out there, in the middle of Australia, still having the journey of a lifetime. A place that I was just the middleman, the person chosen to deliver Coddy to its final destination, where it will see incredible sunsets and sunrises, watch as the deep red sands blow across the plains, and wave to countless thousands of people like me, from all over the world, driving by to look at one of the planet’s greatest sights.

I don’t know where my left Cod Flop fell out of the car in the outback, but it must have been somewhere near Ayers Rock when we stopped. While I am sad it has gone, and that I won’t ever have the pair of them to look at or wear ever again, in a way its only brought more romance to the tail of its remaining flippy.

I will keep my right Cod Flop, and take it onward and home with me, every day and every mile getting further and further from them being the pair of friends I have grown to love. I promise to look after it, to treasure it, and for it to have a special place in my house when I return. A place where I can see it, look at it and feel it, every gouge and mark, bend and scrape being part of the story together, and every time I will remember the good times we shared around the globe.

One of my last photos with cod flops, on the Great Ocean Road, February 2012

Who would have known that a pair of cheap flip flops, bought as a joke for a 21^st birthday years back, would have such an amazing story of travel and adventure behind them. And for that reason, it’s quite fitting that it chose such an incredible part of the world to leave me, a place I may never visit again, but somewhere that I will always look at on a map and remember the special part of me that remains there.

Walk in Peace, Cod Flops. My feet will miss you. I will miss you. You’ll Never Walk Alone.

Finding a path to Ayers Rock

“Its all sorted, the fuels going back in and it starts every time”

They were the words we’d wanted to hear, albeit not too loudly with our slightly fuzzy heads.

It was 11am, the time we were supposed to be getting the car back to my mate Neil almost 500km away in Alice Springs. Instead, we were finishing up breakfast at the Ayers Rock Resort backpackers lodge near Uluru having been stranded overnight thanks to a worn out fuel pump on the Mitsubishi Pajero Neil had lent me.

We’d actually managed to make the most of a bad situation, although it cost a fair bit in beer. Having checked in at the lodge, we headed straight to the bar to drown our sorrows after a day in the outback we were better off forgetting. We are still pretty sure it was laughing at the Sorry book, letters from people plagued with bad luck after stealing rocks and sand from the sacred Uluru, that saw us copping our own major dose of bad luck by conking out right next to Ayers Rock.

A little reminder of our big problem…

Helping us drown our sorrows was Kurt, the mechanic who came to rescue us, and whose garage is the only one for some 500km or so. He came along to the pub with another mechanic from his garage, and spent some time talking and joking with us. It was a busy night – there were a number of tours staying at the place, so it was lively too. Kurt told us how his daughter was a supermodel, even appearing in issues of Vogue, and that his dad was someone who invented the famous road trains, the two or three trailer-long lorries that run up and down the country on the Stuart Highway. He also told us how breaking down in the outback could have been a lot worse – on a rough track some 300km away, he could still be the man called to fetch the stranded tourists, at a cost of more than $4 a kilometre! That’s the equivalent of around £750 before there’s any work done. Painful – and quite a bit more than a tow from the M1!

We actually did pretty well at turning a negative into a positive, with a great night all round. Dan and Laura treated me to drinks in return for stumping up the cash for the tow, and there were a fair number of tours staying at the resort, so it turned into a lively and entertaining evening.

It was a rude awakening the following morning, however, when despite being in a male dorm, someone, clearly on a dawn tour to Ayers Rock, decided it would be a great idea to start drying his hair with a hairdryer. Now, there are certain protocols to follow when it comes to backpacker dorm etiquette – mainly centred around not waking other people up. Both Dan and I woke up with the same reaction, firstly one of thinking it was a mixed sex dorm and wondering ‘what on earth do you think you’re doing at this ungodly hour making all that noise, go to the bathroom’, quickly followed by ‘you’re a bloke, what on earth do you think you’re doing with a hairdryer in a backpack’.

Kurt the mechanic, and our repaired rocket, as he called it

It was just before midday before Kurt picked us up and handed over the key to Neils car. Thankfully, it started like a dream, its V6 engine purring away, a sound we had been longing to hear just 24 hours before. It had come at a cost though – in the form of a bill for over $1,000 for the repairs. Neil had given me his credit card details, which was promptly dented. I still feel bad, although as Kurt said, the fuel pump had been on its way out and would have still happened even if Neil had come along on the trip with us.

Really sorry Neil…

For me, however, it felt like taking the school pet home for a weekend – it was always a nice thing to do, and great to have a little hammy running around for a few days, but there was always that risk that it would die on you, leaving you with the prospect of having to go back to lessons with a dead hamster carcass in a margarine tub. Never a good thing.

Thankfully, our loaned pet had been brought back to life by Kurt and his team, and before we left he proudly showed us a copy of Vogue magazine, complete with pages of full-page spreads showing his beautiful daughter modelling thousands of pounds worth of dresses. We all shook hands with him and he wished us well for our journey. He might have just made a pretty penny out of our bad luck, but he was a thoroughly nice bloke.

Dan and Laura on the walk around the base

Back on the road, we headed back to Uluru to finish off the day we had started before our bad luck hit. We went up to The Rock for the first time to see it close up, its surface a mass of layered sandstone with an incredible colour. It almost has the same colour and appearance of rusting metal, with millions of patches of rock peeling away in the scorching desert heat.

One of the sandblasted caves

Around the base are some amazing curved caves, blasted away by the forces of wind and sand being shot against the rock for thousands of years. Inside many of them, Aboriginal artworks still remain from the historical owners of the site, who to this day still regard the rock as one of their most sacred sites.

We found a watering hole at the base of Uluru – the rock becomes a mass of cascading waterfalls during the occasional rainstorm that passes through – and for many years, animals and humans have relied on it to survive. Below the surface, tadpoles thrive, a fantastic example of how life can begin despite the harsh, hot conditions this area is permanently subjected to.

The one thing I will say is that there is no shortage of flies in the area. The whole of the red centre is plagued by the things, but whereas normally you can bat them away, they are particularly persistent in this part of the world. Everywhere you see people, you see hands and arms being wafted around near a face. Its jokingly known as the Aussie Wave, and I was particularly good at it by the end of the morning. You do get used to the little blighters going into your nose, mouth and ears a little after a while, but its still a bit grim.

Flies. Buzz off.

With one last look at Ayers Rock from a viewing area, we climbed back in the car and made our way towards the Stuart Highway, where we’d find a turnoff north to Kings Canyon, another site of incredible beauty that is a must-see while in the area.

A last photo of us at Ayers Rock

The Rock disappears into the distance in the wing mirror

Before we reached the turnoff, we passed the man we’d seen walking and pulling a cart on the way to Uluru. We looked at each other in the car – even since we saw him two days ago, he’d walked miles. I was intrigued, and my journalist head went into action.

“I’m turning round to speak to him,” I told Dan and Laura, who were both as interested to find out his story.

Making a large turn in the middle of the desert highway, I doubled back and slowed down beside him.

“How far are you walking?” I shouted out of the lowered window.

At first he looked a little unsure of us, but in broken English I was sure I heard ‘to Europe’.

A combination of flies trying to attack me, trying to keep a lookout for cars and my general interest in this walking man meant it was much safer to pull off the road, so I went ahead of him and pulled onto the dusty run-off.

With Masahito Yoshida , who is walking around the world

I could see that the man was smiling, well tanned and sporting a hat. His bright green t-shirt was teeming with flies as he lifted his metal handlebar above his head and freed himself from his interesting life on wheels.

“I’m walking around the world, around our planet,” he said.

Masahito’s life in a cart

Suddenly, I knew this man wasn’t messing around. I looked at the wheels of his cart – they were bald. Stickers from across Europe and Canada were plastered all over it, beneath a tent and basic food supplies. I looked at his shoes, but they were surprisingly new.

“I’m from Japan,” he tells us.

“I have been walking for three years, through Europe, Canada and now through Australia. I want to see Ayers Rock,” he continues, with remarkable frankness.

We’re captivated. Before us is a real-life Forrest Gump, a man who turned his back on life at home and went for a walk. And just kept walking.

He handed me a card with his website blog address. His name is Masahito Yoshida, 30 years old, the same as me, but on an incredible journey of human endurance and achievement. He then asks if he can take our picture- our picture. Somehow, it felt strange meeting someone doing something so incredible, yet he was so happy to meet us.

He pulled out an expensive-looking digital SLR camera and says he’s taking photographs of the amazing people he meets on the journey, the people he says he would never had met had he not taken up his epic walk.

Masahito left his home in Japan in 2008 with the hope of changing his life. More than 22,400km and four continents later, we found him in the middle of his 4,200km walk to Darwin from Melbourne.

He has already walked from Shanghai in China, through through Asia and Europe, ending in Lisbon. In Bulgaria, while travelling through the mountains, he suffered frostbite that left him in hospital for eight days. In Russia he was punched in the face, in the Ukraine his rickshaw was stolen before being recovered by police, and in Canada he had to escape the advances of a hungry grizzly bear that sniffed out a sausage in his tent.

From Australia he will fly to Singapore and walk back to Shanghai, hoping to be back home by the end of the year. It really is an incredible story. One man, one planet, and his own thoughts while he walks around it for four years. A man who set out to cross the paths of other travellers, and while my journey will never come anywhere close to his feat, for just a few minutes I felt privileged that our paths had crossed.

I feel that more people should know about Masahito’s story – he hopes to release a book when he completes it, including photographs of all the people and places he’s come across. How on earth he manages to pluck up the willpower to wake up every morning and set off on yet another mammoth walk really is beyond me.

We asked if he needed any food or water, but he politely declined.

“Is there a supermarket at Ayers Rock,” he simply asked us.

Continuing his trek into the horizon

We told him there was, exchanged all of our details for his records, shook hands and he smiled as once again he lifted his cart handlebar over his head and walked off towards the horizon. I watched and admired him – its not everyday you meet someone who is walking around the world, and now we had been part of his story, just as much as he is part of ours. You can follow him and his journey at http://alkinist2.blog135.fc2.com/

Back in the car, Masahito’s story had reinvigorated our love of the journey. Alice Springs may have been more than 500km away still, but we were loving life on the road in the outback. The only problem now was that of time – it was late afternoon before we arrived at Kings Canyon, and we watched as the sun set over the deep red ridges.

The moon rises over Kings Canyon

We carried on to the Kings Canyon resort to get some fuel for the homeward leg of the trip. At $2.23+ a litre, its not cheap, so we filled the tank to three quarters and brushed off the advice from the attendant that we shouldn’t be driving through the outback after dark.

Kings Canyon

It was a fact that had been drilled into me in advice throughout backpacking guides and books, but I knew Neil needed the car in the morning. I rang him for advice.

“The only thing to be careful of is the wildlife. Kangaroos tend to get confused, and instead of jumping out of the way, they jump at you,” he said.

“Go steady and be on the lookout for all the creatures and you’ll be fine.”

What he didn’t realise was that I was taking a 200km dirt track back to Alice, a common road in the outback, but one that needed a lot of care during the day, let alone at night. In the pitch black night, with nothing around for miles, I turned the spotlights and full beam on and kept to a steady 80km/hr. It wasn’t long before we saw the first bit of wildlife on the road – dingoes. Then there was a camel. Then a family of kangaroos, all jumping around the road in no particular order, and not making much of an effort to get out of the way. Further along there were wild horses and cattle.

Emergency noodles for tea – sneaking into a campsite to use facilities!

Looking out for random Australian wildlife was only part of the task. Badly corrugated dust roads, potholes, sudden dips and sharp bends through mountains meant my driving ability was put to the test. Having never driven a 4×4 properly before, I quickly became accustomed to it.

After four more hours on the road, I noticed a problem. The fuel gauge had dropped to a quarter, and we were still some 120km away from Alice Springs. The map said there was a petrol station on the way. There was – but it was closed.

Noodle and leftovers time!

With 90km left to go, the petrol gauge was dropping ever lower. I dropped the car into two wheel drive mode, with a theory it would use less fuel, turned off all the air conditioning, and drove with my foot as light as a feather on the accelerator. I decided not to worry Dan and Laura too much about it, but then I had to break my silence.

“Guys, I’m a bit worried we’re not going to make it back,” I said.

“We really can’t have any more bad luck,” said Laura, telling us to think positive.

Thankfully we spotted this little Roo and his friends in time!

We continued past kilometre markers – 80km, 70km, 60km…by now the needle was about to hit the bottom. Any downhill stretch of road I coasted down, knowing it was taking us that little bit further to the Alice. We still had no phone coverage, no way of ringing for help if we became stranded, and we’d only passed six cars in the entire night of driving. And worst of all, I’d have to tell Neil of yet another calamity if the worst came to the worst.

50km, 40km, 30km…the distance markers continue passing at nervewrackingly slow intervals, made worse by how I was keeping speed down to conserve fuel.

“I’ve done a few 10k runs,” said Dan.

“I could run it from here if I had to,” he said, mentally preparing himself for a midnight jog for a Jerry can.

Suddenly, a red light appeared on the horizon – a radio mast in Alice Springs. We knew we were nearly back. Street lights began to appear, and then houses and other cars. We were running on vapours, but somehow, and against the odds if I’m honest, I’d managed to limp the gas-guzzling machine and its occupants back to safety, and a welcome drink at the fuel pump.

After three days, 1,414 kilometres of hard driving, a dodgy fuel pump and numerous bits of bad luck, we had made it back. The red centre and Ayers Rock were among the sights I was most looking forward to seeing, and they did not disappoint. A brilliant few days that we will all remember, not just for the magnificent views, but for the experiences we had all shared together. It might have been daunting to break down in the outback, stranding us hundreds of kilometres from base, or worried us that we’d run out of fuel, but we had got through it. And, on top of all that,  we met a man who was walking around the world.

Now, you don’t get that on the tour

Neil and his car…