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Neonauts

Curated by Ben Bland.

This big-small world of ours is full of ideas for living more productive, meaningful, healthy and ethical lives – follow our journey, exploring the world in search of them.

15/06/2023

FINAL POST FROM OUR TRAVELS!
Sunset on Lake Malawi

More than one year. One year of calling nowhere home. And everywhere. Of movement and surprise, and wonder and bittersweet isolation. Constant displacement gave us a contradictory sense of presence, in our immediate location, in ourselves, in our human community and our mother planet.

We watched the sun set and rise on three continents. From beaches, forests, cities and mountains. From the land, sea and air. I'll leave you with this sunset, over the Lake of Stars. And I will bid you love and beauty in your onward adventures through life, wherever you go. Maybe I'll see you there.

13/06/2023

Lake of Stars, Lake Malawi

Our last treat at the end of over a year of travel was a weekend on the island paradise of where we watched the sun set, and my old friend Orion rise, over the mirror-still waters of a lake the size of a sea.

The photo hardly does it justice but I wanted to provide evidence of the stars' reflection in the water – something I've only seen clearly a few times in my life, when all the conditions were right. I guess that's why they call it "Lake of Stars".

12/06/2023

Beach monkeys at dawn, Lake Malawi

One last trip to "the lake". A lake twice the size of my home country.

Life has always blossomed on the edges between different environments. The shore of Lake Malawi is alive. We watched monkeys play in the sand, and local women bring their washing down to the water's edge. I doubt much has changed about that dawn routine in a very long time.

11/06/2023

Zomba Plateau, Malawi

Cloud forest, pines, grasslands, mountain slopes, subsistence farms... Zomba is a little world of its own. With each passing kilometer of our hike we could have been in South America, New Zealand or Eastern Europe. But we weren't. We were in Africa. And there's something magical about that, which is hard to articulate.

Africa, our ancestral home. Realm of giant beasts. Conflicted, welcoming, lush, ravaged. I dunno. Just Africa.

08/06/2023

The last tree in a stripped land,
Zomba Plateau, Malawi

Hiking the trails of the steep-sided and flat-topped plateau that stands over the Zomba region, we saw the stark difference between the few, small remaining patches of forest and the broad swathes of land denuded for charcoal and lumber. We heard the difference too: one was a riot of bird and insect life, the other just sounded like the wind.

Only 8% of Malawians are on the power grid, and still many those who are can't afford to use much electricity. So trees are taken from the land and burned in order for people to feed themselves. It's not an easy problem.

This lone tree stood on the edge of the plateau surrounded by fallen neighbours. Artistically, this isn't much of a photo, but its subject gripped my heart.

07/06/2023

Zomba Plateau, Malawi

And so to our final stop – a return to where we began our travels a year earlier: "the warm heart of Africa", Malawi.

Three months of living and working in a country at the opposite end of the socioeconomic ladder. And yet, so much is familiar. Like beauty.

And in Zomba we found plenty of beauty. With our base as the heavenly we explored the lush rainforest and high plateau towering over the Zomba region.

06/06/2023

A final sunset on our travels

Sort of...

We ended almost a year of travel back in beautiful Thailand, to one piece sunset after another. But it would be another three months before we returned home. More on that in future posts.

Those last few days of complete freedom were almost too pleasant. Lazing under palms, splashing in warm water, and eating a cacophony of flavours – we almost missed the discomfort of the rougher parts of the trip.

Almost. But not quite.

05/06/2023

Aspects of Bangkok

And at last, one final stop before... Well, before another few months in Africa but no longer free to travel as we please. To end this long phase of constant motion back in Bangkok, a city of pure motion, was perfect. We planned for weeks over what we were going to eat on the street each day, and filled ourselves with Bangkok's offerings every moment we could.

04/06/2023

The Wife and the water, Thailand

I have so far rarely included us in photos in this feed but here's a set of my Number 1, in and around her favourite – and I'm inclined to wonder if it's her natural – environment: the sea.

02/06/2023

Guess what... More sunsets
.. And sunrises, in this set. All from beaches on Thai islands.

Damn! Thailand has it all. A world-beating blend of nature and culture. From deserted, palm-fringed beaches to steamy cities, all infused with a smiling, decorative society and – dare I say it? – the tastiest food in the known universe.

Kop khun krap, Thailand!

01/06/2023

Sunset from Sunset Bar, Yao Noi, Thailand

I guess the last few days of our travels will be full of sunset images, because you look for them more when you know you will soon be far from the tropics.

Yao Noi is one of the least spoiled islands in the breathtaking archipelago around western Thailand. And it was about a fifteen second walk from our charming little rickety cabin to the best bar on the island. This is the view from the bar.

26/05/2023

Sunsets over seas, SE Asia

I wish I hadn't been so shy. I wish I had just run over the sand to the little boy's mum and showed her the picture I got with her son silhouetted against the falling sun in Phuket, Thailand. You never get those opportunities back.

So he shall remain anonymous, and unaware.

Same for the wee lad who walked along the sea wall in Mui Ne, Vietnam, nonchalantly teasing the sea to engulf him with every wave it threw against the concrete, yet somehow always walking away dry.

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