Travel, life and bad puns.
Witty travel writing by Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Potter (E.A.P) — adventures around the world, observations from London, and the occasional pun too far.
The Galapagos then the Gallop Home
Of all the heritable traits that I possess which will endow my offspring with fitness to survive their environment, an admirable pair of boobies is not one of them. Fortunately I’ve other assets to make up for this: I ca…
Because I Got High
I’ve travelled in Cusco & Quito / Both cities are really quite neat-o / But they’re so frickin’ high / That I’m not going to lie: / Each night I got bugger all sleep-o At 3,400m above sea level, Cusco is higher than any…
Nothing Can Machu, Picchu
Yep, it’s a stinker of a pun. But if Tinie Tempah can get away with ‘Tell JK I’m still Rowling’, I can damn well get away with this. We’re now only two weeks from the end of our trip and my literary reserves might be run…
Llama Bothering & Potato Rustling in Darkest Peru
On the Avianca flight from San José in Costa Rica to Lima I watched Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. It was in English, un-subtitled, but heavily overdubbed for profanity, of which – as you probably know – ther…
The Big Easy
Donald Trump: that’s what I don’t think of when I look at this picture. In a world that’s been hijacked by a jowly dictator who sports the Tumbleweed of Doom on his head and has actual shit-for-brains, the spare simplici…
Costa Rica-CA-CA-CA
Forgive me, Father: it’s been 12 days since my last confessional blog post. In this time, the Knights have bounced around Costa Rica like tow-headed pinballs and I’ve been a bit slack on the old documentation front. Imag…
Affluenza in Guatemala
“Her palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy There’s vomit on her sweater already, hotel spaghetti She’s nervous, but on the surface she looks calm and ready to drop bombs” You know you’re in trouble when Eminem lyr…
Boca Bonkers in Buenos Aires
Being an ‘umble country gal, I wasn’t what you’d call ‘well-travelled’ before this trip, particularly in the Hemisphere where the water goes counter-clockwise, and it’s fair to say my mental image of certain places was m…
The Shape of Water
You say ‘Iguassu’, I say ‘Iguazú’, or even ‘Iguaçu’: whichever way you spell it, these are some epic falls. We arrived on The Big Trip: Day 121 (or it could be 122, I think I’ve slightly lost count), transferring via Bue…
Drama in Atacama
Home schooling is going ever so well. I seized upon our imminent arrival in the Atacama Desert to share with the kids a little piece of my extensive knowledge of geography, all tucked away in the old memory bank from whe…
Patagonia: More Than Just Cagoules
We arrived at Tierra Patagonia at sunset, an architected sweep of beechwood and glass rising like an eyelid out of the brush on the edge of the Torres del Paine National Park. It’d been a long day of car-plane-car plus…
Vistoso Valparaíso!
I started trying to explain to my kids how the International Date Line worked about a month ago and by the time we boarded the plane in Auckland, bound for Santiago, I still hadn’t even vaguely covered it. “Yeah, so, the…
Big Fish Love
White settlers and sailors dubbed Russell, in the very north of North Island, ‘the Hell Hole of the Pacific’ because it’s where all the brawling, boozing and bonking went on in the early days of colonial New Zealand’s hi…
A Doubtful Sound over Doubtful Sound
When James Cook approached the South West Coast of New Zealand’s South Island in 1770, he took one look at the great humps of rock blocking his path and stroked his big old sailor’s chinny chin. “Hmmmm, bit bloody risky,…
Kings of Queenstown
I had a dream last night that I was in the audience for ‘Hamilton’ in London. I was so excited: all dressed up, fizzing with anticipation… and it was a massive, crushing disappointment. There was a stage at each end of t…
Kiwi Cute & Shaun the Sheep
What’s brown and hairy and better if you don’t squeeze it too tightly? In Hawke’s Bay, we got up close to both types of kiwi: the area is the fruit basket of New Zealand, covered with orchards growing peaches, grapes, fi…
Sulphur, So Good
No self-respecting traveller would pass up the opportunity to set foot on a permanently erupting volcano. And so it is that we find ourselves in another chopper heading out across The Bay of Plenty (meaning: Full of Fish…
On Party Business
Imagine the scene: I’m writing this while taking out manky old hair extensions with a pair of pliers, smoking a vape filled with milk-flavoured nicotine fluid and watching ‘The Battle of the Five Armies’ on Netflix (neve…
My Worm Hole Hell
As I age I’ve noticed two things: 1) I’m knackered (constantly) 2) I’m scared of stuff. The knackered bit is because I was daft enough to think four kids was a nice round number (‘2’ is nice and round … even ‘3’ has love…
Pōwhiri to the People
We had absolutely no idea what was coming. “I think it’s basically a walk in the woods” we told Ed, who was whining about having to get pants on and actually do something. “But it’s raining!” he whined, pantlessly. We’d…
A Cheeky Waiheke Christmas
Imagine a place where the sun shines on plump vines, where every hill crest reveals a new view more perfect than the last, where the barley grass sways in the sunset and every third building is a tasting shed imploring y…
Monsters of Rock
Day 62 of our Big Trip is a travel day from Wolgan Valley, back to Sydney airport, then out to Ayer’s Rock in the sweaty centre of the country. Just your usual 0430 alarm plus eight hours travelling, no stress at all for…
G’Day Oz, G’Bye Marbles
I once saw a clip on YouTube of a man trying to get a massive spider off his kitchen ceiling with a broom. Jab-jabbing away, he was, at the megafauna. It was so big, if it’d dropped, it would’ve covered his entire head.…
Smashed Crabs & Casinos: The Bits That Got Away
In the 1980s, when a movie director realized that their hero had to cover a large period of time where they got fit in jail/got loved up-got married-got sick-got dead/became a black belt in karate/learned the merengue, t…
Going Toto in Kyoto
I know, I know: my punning is out of control. I’m the Joyce Grenfell of Puns. We arrived in Kyoto after a reviving couple of nights in Miyajima but still with the after-effects of what can only be described as a relentle…
Me-a Love-a Miyajima
We arrived at night, feeling a bit raw after Hiroshima. We set our expectations to Marianas Trench-Level, knowing we were staying in another ryokan (posts passim ). All in all, we were tired, wistful, rinsed. And yet… th…
Hiroshima
I grew up putting the accent on the second syllable of Hiroshima, so it sounded like a short sharp exhalation or sneeze, with a short ‘i’ sound. It’s actually said with the accent on the third syllable, drawing out the i…
Ryokan’t
I’ve been musing an unusual amount recently about which Superpower will be the first to field a Robot Army and I think it’s got something to do with a run of nights staying in ryokans . They’re ‘traditional Japanese gues…
Tokyo Love Story 😍
The first time I came to Tokyo was in 2004: I was the presenter of a programme on BBC Three called 'Celebdaq'. We were a weekly live show that spoofed formats like 'Working Lunch' or 'The Money Programme' by faux-serious…
India/Japan – a Tale of Two Crazies
So we flew from the permanent dusk of Delhi, with air so polluted you could chew it, to Tokyo. We landed in the Land of the Rising Sun at 8am, with said sun that icy winter white that hurts your retinas and the air…. mmm…
To Die For Udaipur (Oh What a Heavenly Way to Die)
There are great places and great hotels: sometimes they gloriously coincide. Udaipur is such a place. Devi Garh, our first hotel stop, is an Escher drawing from a fairytale made real: a twisty-turn-y warren of a palace o…
Jai-PUR!
There was only really ever one title for this post. Jai-PUR! must be said like Jai HO! from Slumdog Millionaire. My cultural reference points are a bit luddite, I’m sorry, but once I’d thought of it, I couldn’t say Jai-P…
A Pack of Camels
One of the curiosities of tourism is the belief that, at some point during the trip, white people should be put on decorated animals in order to achieve maximum value out of the experience of NOT BEING AT HOME. Camels ar…
Coming Home to Mother India (& She’s Put the Kettle On)
Knowing India a little, I’m expecting drama pretty much from the minute we land. Good drama, though – everyday theatre & minuscule tragedies: costumes, drapes, makeup, lights, colours, the periodic crash of badly secured…
The Bhutan Clan
This is the land of cheese, chillies, chanting and – on our final day – choppers. There are two of them in Bhutan and the one we got was brand spanking new and totally awesome. John had been asking to see pictures of hel…
Ga-Ga for Gangtey
It’s fairly hellish to get to, but Gangtey is an unfeasibly lovely place. It’s 3500m above sea level and the air’s very thin but so clear, it’s like having a lung bath. The village perches on the side of a wide, flat val…
Logic, Meet Divine Wisdom
Where I grew up, it really wasn’t ok to be seen as a ‘smart-arse’ (or, in fact, ‘smart’ full stop). It meant you thought too much of yourself , getting ideas above your station – that you thought you were better than eve…
When Eddie Met the King’s Sheep
Eddie loves his ‘Beebies’: sheep soft toys which are a pair of plush pyjama cases originally bought by Nana for the girls but unused and then adopted by Ed when he was still in a cot. They’re identical but he swears one…
Phantastic Phalluses and Where to Find Them
Day 9 – Thimpu to Punakha I don’t know about you but I always find that one of the best ways to shake off a thick head from 5 too many mojitos the night before is to strap into an imported Japanese minibus with 4 high-sp…
Om Mani Padme Hum (‘You ok, hun?’)
Or: The One in Which Crapital redeems itself. And where I try to be a bit less snarky and cynical but fail quite early on… This fine, sunny morning we went to the Memorial Chorten in Thimpu, a temple built in blah blah b…
Thin Times in Thimpu
It’s not a fait accompli that a country’s capital will properly reflect the glory of the whole. To wit: Canada is lovely but Ottawa is apparently UGERLY. Even closer to home, Brussels is by far and away the least attract…
Check Out This Sexy Monk House
Until now, Bhutan has revealed it’s treasures shyly, like a reluctant courtesan playing chasey chasey after a few too many saké sours. But today was the day we did Taktsang Monastery. It’s the one that pops up in all tho…
John Atlas Zoolander
You’re witnessing the birth of something, in the picture above: like the capturing of the birth of a star through the Hubble Telescope, this lens has crystallised the moment John John Knight first bent his face round his…
Schlong, Dzong, Fondue – Why Bhutan Ain’t What it Seems
Bhutan is a country that creeps into your soul in slippers, unlike India’s hobnailed tap dancer. Our first day here was weird; flying in over the Himalayas, we passed Everest and I was all ginned up for a kind of mini-Ti…
Delhi-cious
The first time I landed in Delhi, I was 19 and my only experience of India, truthfully, was the Indian restaurant in Bridlington, which – in 1995 – I’d only recently started to frequent with my extremely (relatively) cos…
The Storm Before the Calm
Nothing becomes a place like the leaving of it. This was Hampstead Heath at its twinkly best, right before a sheet of Saharan sand settled, turning the sky terracotta, apricot, peach. A storm without and a mild turbulenc…
LUCKSHUREH HERTELS
Read the title of this post aloud. Congratulations: you can now speak ‘Hull’. For some reason I can’t even think of the word ‘luxury’ without it being in a Yorkshire accent. This indicates what my definition of ‘high-rol…
Day 29 – Jungle V.I.P. (Very Impatient Photographer)
So this is meant to be Dry Season in Borneo. I guess they mean Dry like NOT UNDERWATER because, sheesh, are we regretting not packing waterproof shoes!* It’s that whole Glastonbury vibe except here I’m generally to be fo…
Day 28 – Borneo Slippy
Jungle. Two full days of travel to get here, including four flights. Now I know why Attenborough’s got a gravelly voice. You can bet our National Treasure didn’t spend his first afternoon in the jungle getting a pedicure…
Goodbye Indonesia (& Things I Will Not Do Again)
This hill is lovely isn’ it? Really hilly. Perfect hill-shape. And look! A little twisty path. And I’ve eaten so much and basically sat around on deck looking very dissimilar to Rihanna on her super yacht and it’s about…
Komodo Village – These Guys are NAILS
The jetty into Kampung Komodo House on Stilts Dude with some tender Dragon-bait RED HEADSCARF: RISKY Dragon-proofing Try and climb up here, Lizard-Loser It’s Adam Street Kids playing football in village yard Dragon Snack…
Day 23 – Here Be Dragons
So guess what: Komodo is famous for it’s dragons. I know, don’t say I don’t know how to shock you. Next I’ll be telling you that the Tower in Pisa ‘aint straight. For someone that only got 3 three episodes into Game of T…
Panic on the Straits of Komodo (and how you need a frozen cucumber on standby)
Pull up a chair, enjoy these happy family snaps of more innocent times, while I tell tales of blood-curdling terror. “Once upon a time (screen goes wibbly)… …It all started so well. We ran around Mischief excitedly when…
Day 18 – DO Go Chasing Waterfalls
So Day 2, Moyo Island dawns with a ‘BLIM BLIM BLIM BLIM BLIM BLIM BLIM BLIM’ from my iPhone that’s charging on my ‘Jungle Tent’ bedside table. It’s great having an itinerary ‘n’ all, but there’s about 800% more alarm cal…
Octo-MISSY
So the most exciting sea-life-related event in Moyo Island’s recent history* and I walk straight past it without nary a second glance. It happened on our first evening, as we were walking to the sunset fishing trip that…
Day 17 – Deer, John
Two seaplanes in a week seems excessive, but someone’s got to do it. Leaving the Obama-Pad in Ubud is a wrench but it helps that it’s pissing it down. Central Bali is damper than a squid’s knickers and we’re quite glad o…
Day 16 – The Trots
Eddie’s had them, I haven’t. The Trots are a definite feature of holidays taken in places where the water supply gets used for just about everything except drinking. Happily, Mr Ed firmed up after 24 hours of what was, a…
Day 15 – Bali. Hi!
Last time me and Adam came here it was 2001, before 9-11, before the Paddy’s Bar bomb. To say it was a more innocent time massively underestimates the situation. We were a young couple having larks. I listened to The Str…
Day 13 – Sea Plane! Sea Plane. (Der der der der der der!)
It may be unlucky for some but for me, Day 13 brings another flight that didn’t end in a ball of flames (as I think each one will at the point of takeoff). It’s not that I’m plane-phobic; I just ponder my imminent demise…
Day 12 – Adam Peaks Adam’s Peak (or, The Pilgrim’s Prowess)
So we’ve reached a dozen days of excessive eating and drinking. Most days, there were at least 2 curries and latterly, I’ve slipped in High Tea between lunch and dinner (sandwiches, pastries, cakes, scones, jam, cream) a…
Day 11 – Tea-tering on the Edge of Euphoria
If you’ve learnt anything about me by now, it’s that I leave no pun unturned. And so it is that we wake up to 0715 ‘Bed Tea’ at the Norwood plantation bungalow that’s been turned into a 6-room boutique hotel by a company…
Day 10, PM – There’s Tea in Them Thaar Hills
So many times it’s occurred to me that Sri Lanka is my parents’ ideal entry point to the wider world of no-resort non-cruise holidays. It’s India with all the nasty taken out: no sprawling slums, begging lepers, festerin…
Day 10, AM – Toothache (too much Kandy) & Crazy Tree
Just when I thought it was safe… one final temple. This is the big one, but also the one I liked the least: The Temple of the Tooth. It’s the biggest and most important temple in Sri Lanka. Why? It apparently houses Budd…
Day 9 – I Want Kandy: Temple Run, Exorcist Slime & Crap Spiders
I’ve chosen Beauty Alice as the image for today because she’s always been fascinated by sweets and candy, despite not eating a lot of them herself. All her drawings are of candy shops or sweet factories and yet when pres…
Day 8 – More Damn Buddhas in Dambulla (+ Zee’s Garden & Kandy)
Just when you think you’ve seen every Buddha in Sri Lanka, you come upon the BUDDHA BASE, SIDDARTHA CENTRAL, OM SWEET OM. Dambulla is the largest and best-preserved cave temple complex in Sri Lanka and the rock itself ri…
Day 7 – Dance, Monkey Boy, Dance
Day 7 was another day of rest. I know, right? Makes us look like LAZY PAMPERED RICH TOURISTS rather than the titans of exploration that we are. Anyhow, it was probably one of the best days (shhh, don’t tell Buddha) as we…
Day 6 – Wolfgang Amadeus Monkey-Expert
Today is Polonnaruwa day and the first few hours are spent teaching the children how to spell it. After that bracing bit of dawn home-schooling (hello Mr James! Mrs Hecht!) we set off early doors for a nice museum contai…
Day 5 – Picnic at Buzzing Rock
I promised you sexy rocks and, boy, did I deliver?! This is Sigiriya Lion Rock and it’s one of only 3 in the world of it’s kind, the others being Ayers Rock and … I forget. Anyway, I didn’t believe that bit of the spiel…
Day 4 – Buddha-y (Biscuit) Base
That might look like a word pun shoehorned into a blog post title with utter disregard for whether it works but it’s not. This is because Day 4 was a trip to Anuradhapura, the capital city of Ancient Sri Lanka. And it wa…
Day 3 – Easy Street, Ulagalla
Cazenove & Loyd – travel agents to the stars* – put together our itinerary and on Day 3, they built in a day of rest and, lo! It was taken. We dossed around the pool, rode horses, swung swings and myself and Adam ate cur…
Day 2 – Controversial Elephants
Firstly – I promised the truth. Here is the truth: trying to blog with shitty hotel wifi is arm-gnawingly frustrating. Ok, that’s all I’ll say on the matter. Except that – OMG it’s impossible. I’ve spent two days trying…
Day 1 – Did you See BeeBees?
The bickering started at Heathrow. Actually, it started on the way to Heathrow, a low hum that I’ve largely learned to tune out but which occasionally breaks through the insouciance and reminds me that I’ve got 4 kids wh…
What the bloody hell are we doing?
The two reactions we get when we tell people we’re going round the world are: wow! and WOW! But when we tell them we’re taking all 4 kids, we get another reaction into the mix: OH. Really? Wow. That’s because even travel…
This is a post about Travel
When I first travelled – really travelled, not from Driffield to Bridlington by car – I realised a profound truth: the further from home you go, the more clearly you can see how naive you are. I genuinely thought India w…
Let’s pretend we’re one of those Instagram families.
So… here we are. The Knights have decided to travel and that’s why I’m writing a blog, after avoiding it like the plague for 5 years. This blog is essentially a way of keeping in touch with mum and dad and my friends (yo…