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.
I’ve recorded several podcasts, interviews, conversations recently.
At London Business School Maureen and I recorded Journeys, a conversation with Rajesh Chandy the Professor of Entrepreneurship in the Developing World at the Wheeler Institute. People seemed to enjoy it, someone suggested that we ‘looked like two teenagers our to start an exciting adventure,’ not business like at all.
With Tyrel Cameron Eskelson I talked on his Interlocutor podcast about my travel life, starting in Pakistan when I was a small child right up to travel in recent weeks and for the rest of 2025.
In the 24 hours since Nepal was hit by a huge earthquake I’ve been waiting for news from various friends who either live there or have Nepal connections. Over the years I’ve added up more than six months of my life in Nepal – lots of days on lots of trekking routes in...
Three mornings a week in Melbourne I ride about 6km along this cycle path to the gym. Yesterday I came past this point on my way to the gym, but when I came back after my 30 minute session someone had parked right in the middle of the path.
Tim Low’s popular book Where Song Began tells the story of Australia’s big, noisy, aggressive and colourful birds. ‘And how they changed the world’ according to the sub-title. I’m no bird expert or even real bird enthusiast, but they do intrigue me and I do regularly ...
Moving Maps It’s nice to be ahead of the curve sometimes. I spoke at a Future of Travel conference in Spain for The Economist last week and one of the questions I posed was ‘why can’t those air maps I spend so much time looking at work better, give us more informatio...
On my final day on the Routeburn Track in New Zealand I encountered a number of southern robins or bush robins. They look just like the English robin red breast, except they’re bigger and more robust looking and sport yellow breast feathers instead of red ones. The En...
Just before starting out on the Routeburn Track I saw a warning about shoe failure, make sure your walking shoes are in good shape. Well I thought mine were, I’ve got a few pairs of walking shoes and the ones I chose for my New Zealand walk had done some hard miles ov...
I don’t have the best of luck with New Zealand walking. Walking in Nepal the weather has always been beautiful for me. In England I’ve had some miserable days between the sunny ones. In New Zealand they always seem to turn the rain on when I arrive. ▲ The final ste...
I finally got around to reading Robert Macfarlane’s much acclaimed (and best selling) walking account – the ‘Book of the Year’ for many critics. Much of the The Old Ways follows the old routes of Britain, including offshore routes both by boat and on foot. That includ...
Four books which have caught my attention, although I’ve only read reviews. Plus one movie, which I have seen. • Chasing the Scream, the First & Last Days of the War on Drugs by Johann Hari, a summation of why this is another war – like the War on Terror – whic...
There’s lots of Australian attention focussed on the fate of two would-be drug importers caught in Bali and possibly facing death in front of a firing squad very soon. A bunch of facts and figures: • The ‘Bali 9’ had 8.3kg of heroin between them and apart from the ...
© Tony Wheeler’s Travels 2013