By the time Tony co-founded Lonely Planet Publications in 1973, he already had the travel bug. And ever since, travel and discovery have been at the heart of his life and career.
The boring, too often repeated, questions I field all the time are ‘what’s your favourite place – followed by what’s the most dangerous thing that’s ever happened to you – and then where do you never want to go to again.’ Recently I’ve been hearing from friends who have decided they’re going to look after the world and not fly anywhere anymore. A bit late I generally feel, if you’d made that resolution decades ago, before you had been absolutely everywhere, I would treat that decision with much more respect. For the moment I’m going to continue travelling and continue to feel guilty about it.
But where am I not going back to:
RUSSIA – for certain, as long as they’re buddying up with North Korea and the USA to attack Ukraine. And as long as Putin continues to kill innocent people. There have been untold numbers of Ukrainian deaths of course, but also there were 27 Australians amongst the 298 innocent passengers and crew on Malaysia Airlines MH17 which Putin’s boys shot down in 2014. Or there’s the death in 2018 in Salisbury, England of another innocent bystander, killed by a totally shambolic assassination attempt by more of Putin’s silly boys. Click here for more on Russian ineptitude when it comes to Salisbury Cathedral.
◄ Of course I have been to Russia several times, here I am with the locomotive of the Trans-Siberian Express in 2013. I’ve been to Ukraine a couple of times as well.
SAUDI ARABIA – so many reasons I never want to go there anymore, whether it’s murdering journalists (Jamal Kashoggi in Istanbul) or check the New York Times for the report on Saudis murdering East African domestic workers. Or on my own travels to Somaliland in 2022 I encountered cheetahs saved from being shipped to Saudi Arabia to be kept as pets, and then killed when they grew too large. Who knew Somaliland had cheetahs? Who would be so stupid to think they might make good pets? Saudi Arabia? No thank you.
▲ I did have a very interesting time when I travelled around Saudi Arabia in 2002, here I am with Saeed Juman, a terrific guide who showed me around Najran right down in the south of the kingdom, just across the border from Yemen.
BALI – sorry Bali, there are so many good things about that Indonesian island and I’ve just had a great travel writers reunion trip there, but until they sort out the ridiculous traffic I never want to go back. Unless there’s a very good reason to drag me there. Bali has great places to stay, wonderful art and dance, terrific food, great shopping if that’s your thing, but no way I ever want to spend another two hours of my life travelling between the Kuta beach strip and Ubud.
▲ In 1999, when clearly I was younger and fitter, I joined in with Balinese farmers to plant rice seedlings as part of the research into Rice Trails, the book about the story of the world’s most important food which I worked on with photographer Richard I’Anson.
USA – I was sort of ticking off states until I’d been to all 50, last year I added Missouri and South Carolina to my checklist, the year before Montana, leaving only three states to go: Alabama, Kansas and Mississippi. But right now with the orange one (AKA Liz Trump, or even Donald Trump to some people) and his associated scoundrels running the place I really don’t want to go there anymore. Despite having spent nearly 10 years of my life living in the USA (Midwest, East Coast, West Coast) and despite having many American friends, I’m currently happy to leave the USA at the bottom of my dance card. As long as Trumpistan is shoulder to shoulder with Russia and North Korea in causing chaos in the world, quite apart from crazy tariffs – sorry, but no thanks.
▲ In December 2025, my last trip to the USA, I roadtripped from Kansas City to St Louis in the state of Missouri, stopping at the St Paul Lutheran Church cemetery in Emma, near Concordia, to look for the graves of German settlers, pro-United States (ie Unionist) and anti-slavery who, as a result, were murdered in a Civil War massacre by a Confederate guerrilla force of ‘bushwackers.’
The boring, too often repeated, questions I field all the time are ‘what’s your favourite place – followed by what’s the most dangerous thing that’s ever happened to you – and then where do you never want to go to again.’ Recently I’ve been hearing from friends who ha...
▲ Liz Trump & Liz Truss All the media has been noting the comparisons. Trump on his knees before the US bond market traders was precisely the same outcome as Britain’s 49-day-prime minister Liz Truss falling out with the UK bond market. I noted the blue plaque ...
The Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards – that’s the state of Victoria in Australia, capital city Melbourne – is ‘the single most valuable literary award in the country’. The winner takes away A$100,000 as the big prize, plus another A$25,000 because they first have t...
I thought I’d added Bali to my ‘not going there again’ list, along with Israel and Saudi Arabia. I’m putting Bali on that list because the traffic is so absurdly intolerable and despite tourist money flooding in for decades the Indonesians have done nothing about it. ...
Far be it from me to be Anti-Woke, although in an all gender toilet in a restaurant in Bali recently an informal poll (somebody else was taking it) there was general agreement that the women would prefer a women’s toilet and the men would prefer a men’s. If there had ...
◄ ▲ There’s something about statues of despots, eventually somebody wants to pull them down. The fictional gold statue of Donald Trump which pops up in the Gaza Trump spoof video looks like a prime candidate for toppling. Doesn’t it look remarkably like ...
Oh dear, they’re dropping dead all around me. First it was Jane Birkin, born 14 December 1946 so six days before me. Died age 76 on 16 July 2023. Then Marianne Faithfull born nine days after me on 29 December 1946 and died age 78 on 30 January 2025. I’ve been fasci...
▲ My 1959 Cadillac on Route 66 I’ll probably never buy another car – unless it’s for doing something, over the years I’ve bought a 1959 Cadillac (to drive across the USA west-east and later east-west 1994). ▲ A 1989 Mitsubishi Lancer to drive from Plymouth (in E...
There’s hardly a better known travel name in the USA than Rick Steves, whether it’s for his travel guidebooks, the European tours he leads or his regular television appearance. So it’s a pleasant surprise to encounter another younger Rick Steves and I contributed a co...
All three forms of transport featured in my 2024 travels and I posted a blog on my my favourite tube stations around the London underground train system. ▲ Trains no longer stop in Marceline, Missouri although lots of visitors come there for the Walt Disney Museum ...
© Tony Wheeler’s Travels 2013