From Ireland - Oz. European Adventures Cut Short.
By Adam Hudson
As 2019 drew to a close, my girlfriend Suzanne and I decided to act on a long-standing desire to travel and resolved to spend the first half of 2020 on the road. We bought and converted a van, formalised our desired destinations and routes and made the decision to step back from our respective careers for 6 months in order to see the world. Sadly for me, this meant a premature departure from working at Block 9 Architects – an unfortunate trade-off for pursuing a lifelong dream that Suzanne and I shared and often spoke about.
Our first destination was Australia at the turn of the new year. With family and plenty of friends to visit, Melbourne was our first port of call and proved to be a fantastic two weeks. It is clear why the capital of Victoria is such a desirable city to live in with its fantastic bars, restaurants, beaches, vibrancy and lifestyle in general.
We moved on to spend a week in Tasmania and continued to enjoy the culinary delights and sights that Australia has to offer before flying to Sydney. Arriving inadvertently on Australia day, we were delighted to stumble across an incredible fireworks display over Sydney Harbour which made our first sighting of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge all the more spectacular.
The last leg of our Australian adventure took place in the tropical setting of Port Douglas, Queensland. Our first month of travel concluded with a snorkel trip in the Great Barrier Reef. This proved to be a once in a lifetime experience complete with the sightings of sizeable lemon sharks and countless other coral and sea creatures.
After a brief return home, we set off in our converted Berlingo in what was to be the main focus of our travels – a four-month road trip around Europe, starting in France and ending in the far-reaches of the Balkans in our makeshift campervan. This particular part of the trip was a dream of ours for a long time. Little did we know, it would be cut regrettably short by the effects of Covid-19 which were starting to devastate parts of Italy as we set-out on the ferry in early February.
The first month of travel in France was to take place on various organic farms with a global community known as WWOOFing (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms). After two interesting weeks on a dairy farm in Brittany, we drove south to Cognac to continue our journey only to realise that our travels would sadly be coming to an untimely close. As Europe was gripped by the Coronavirus, it became clear that we would have to return home and our Europe trip culminated in a panic-ridden drive up the motorway to catch a ferry back to our hometown of Cork, Ireland.
Hugely disappointing as this may be, Suzanne and I are mindful of how Covid-19 has been so devastating to so many people and communities around the world and feel very lucky that so far our extended families and loved ones have not been directly affected by the pandemic.
Suzanne enjoying lunch in our converted Berlingo!
