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.
One of the pleasures of my travels these days is often encountering projects our foundation – Planet Wheeler – or in my Lonely Planet days the Lonely Planet Foundation – has been involved with. In April in Nairobi, Kenya I visited the amazing Food4Education project ru...
▲ I visited Albania in 2006 and wrote about it in my now-well-out-of-date book Bad Lands. I trekked back to Albania in September 2024, accompanied this time by an international group of friends. Wow, things have changed. In Skanderberg Square in the centre of the cap...
I’ve been reading tourism related books of late, starting with Paige McClanahan’s very interesting book The New Tourist. I talked at length with Paige when she was working on the book, so Maureen and I feature in the intro chapter, along with Rick Steves, Mark Ellingh...
My travels in Nigeria included time as a typical tourist – particularly in Lagos and Kano – even though tourists are very few and far between in Africa’s largest country in terms of population. Nigeria already has more than 200 million people and it appears to be head...
I spend a lot of time riding the tube, the London subway system, when I’m in London. I’ve got familiar lines – the Piccadilly Line (I’m not an enthusiast), the District Line (much better), the Victoria Line, the Jubilee Line. ▲ And familiar stations, starting wit...
With a group of friends Maureen and I spent a few days in Cornwall, the ever popular – with tourists – south-west corner of the United Kingdom. A long time ago we made the trek to Lands End, the very furthermost end of England, and we’ve made a couple of other trips t...
Last year I spent several days walking the first 50-plus miles – 90km – of the Thames Path, the 184 miles (294km) route along the River Thames from its source to the Thames Barrage, east of London. That walk took me from the source to the university town of Oxford. ...
Most of my recent Nigerian travels were with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) although I did see a fair amount on the road – or in the air. I noted in my recent post on South Sudan that I was visiting places where the western government travel advisories were essentiall...
Having started my African travels in Nairobi I continued north to Lake Turkana in Kenya and then crossed in to South Sudan, mainly spending my time in the Boma and Bandingilo National Parks. Next stop Nigeria, Africa’s biggest country in terms of population, but certa...
My visit to South Sudan featured a fascinating visit to ‘Lucy,’ the gigantic Jonglei Canal excavator, and unfortunately did not include a stop at the Imperial Airways Shambe flying boat base from the 1930s. I only saw that from the air, I would like to have had a look...
© Tony Wheeler’s Travels 2013