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.
Melbourne has a new subway line – the Metro Tunnel – running through five new stations and currently having a soft opening, before the schedule launches full tilt on 1 February 2026. The new Parkville Station will probably be the most useful new station, since it’s at the University of Melbourne which badly needed a handy Metro station.
▲ The Town Hall Station
The two new central city stations might look slightly redundant since the Town Hall Station is only a couple of hundred metres from Flinders St Station and the State Library Station is right beside the Melbourne Central Station. In fact you might find it easier to enter the State Library Station from Melbourne Central rather than from its own entrance. The Metro Tunnel line, however, runs in a different direction than the other lines through Flinders St and Melbourne Central.
Unfortunately to use the new line you still need the horrible old Myki Card. Transport Victoria have announced that they are introducing ‘tap and go’ technology to Melbourne. Tomorrow? No, they are testing it in 2026 and at some point in the future you’ll actually be able to use it. But didn’t they start testing it in 2023 at some stations? Well yes they did, but clearly three years of testing wasn’t enough, there’s more testing to be rolled out in 2026
◄ My hated Myki Card
Hasn’t anybody asked them about this before? Well yes, for one person I asked Transport Victoria why we couldn’t use contactless cards in Melbourne when London introduced the technology in 2014. So that’s 10 years ago.
And I did get an answer, ‘we’re working on it and hope to introduce it soon.’ Which in Melbourne seems to be in 10 years time. So for over 10 years I’ve been able to use my Australian ANZ credit card to pay for public transport in London, England. But not in Melbourne, Australia. Absurd isn’t it?
Once upon a time Melbourne was a regular ‘most liveable city in the world’ title holder. How could you be a ‘most liveable city’ and at the same time operate the world’s most-visitor-unfriendly-travel-card? I suggested that in 2013 and 13 years later my opinion hasn’t changed. Never mind, the new Metro Tunnel Line reportedly took lots of lessons from London’s very popular Elizabeth Line. In London I often use the Elizabeth Line even if it means travelling a bit further because it’s so fast and convenient. Perhaps Melbourne can also learn from London how to get rid of the Myki Card.
▲ The Elizabeth Line at Bond St.in London
Since it opened in 2022 the Elizabeth Line quickly became the busiest railway line in the UK although technically it’s not part of the London Underground network. It runs out to Heathrow Airport – but so does the Piccadilly Line – and even further to Reading. It’s popular and has won architectural awards as well as being so busy. Check my August 2024 posting about riding the London Tube.
My Brazil visit concluded with five days in São Paulo, the biggest city in Brazil and with a population of around 20 million one of the biggest in the world. It was a working visit so I didn’t get much chance to look around, but I was surprised that it was a much easi...
The original capital of Portugal’s Brazil colony, until it was shifted to Rio in 1763, colonial Salvador was a glittering city of wealthy mansions and gold-leafed churches. It’s still a dazzling city although today it’s a crumbling and ragged glory. It reminded me of ...
▲ On the Cacimba do Padre beach with brown boobies perching on a rock Sitting at a beach café, sipping a caipirinha, watching the sun set and trying not to be distracted by the girls on the beach in their fio dental, dental floss bikinis. Well someone’s got to d...
I thought I’d read quite enough about the January 2009 US Airways flight which ended up in the Hudson River in New York, but I was given a copy of this book and couldn’t put it down. William Langewiesche has written widely on aviation topics (amongst other things). H...
I’m not a bird watcher – I’ve never kept lists of birds I’ve seen or set off on trips where spotting birds is the most important part of the journey. Nevertheless there are lots of places I’ve been (Ethiopia, Kenya, Mongolia, Costa Rica and the Falkland Islands for st...
No country in South-East Asia is as cut off from the outside world as Burma. It’s a combination of the country’s own deliberate isolation and international sanctions. As a result this is the only country in the region where McDonalds has yet to arrive. Nor will you fi...
▲ Road to Mandalay My recent Burma travels took me from Bagan to Mandalay, with assorted stops along the way, on the Road to Mandalay. The riverboat started life on the Rhine in Europe before being shifted to Burma by the Orient Express company in 1995. ▲ B...
My Burma trip included a return visit to Mandalay, my first visit was 36 years ago in 1974! Despite many changes over the years – Mandalay is regularly cited as the city where Chinese economic influence is most evident – it’s still an extraordinarily Buddhist city and...
▲ Tony at Pindaya North of Burma’s Inle Lake and Heho, the Shan State airport town, Pindaya makes a good escape from the tourist crowds (as much as Burma ever gets tourist crowds) and hustle of Inle Lake. It’s a good centre for walks into the surrounding hills, ...
Trekking is becoming increasingly popular in Burma. The far north of the country borders the Himalayan region of Tibet, the country’s highest mountain tops anything in the European alps, so presumably one day there could even be Himalayan trekking in Burma. Meanwhile ...
© Tony Wheeler’s Travels 2013