COMMENT
I’ve started to wonder whether Airbnb has become, well, too “mainstream”. Do people no longer respect the trust that underpins the whole deal?
Is it OK to smoke in a no-smoking apartment, to leave rubbish all over the place?
Domain, Fairfax Media, June 2017. Read the full story here
Without getting too salty, losing your ‘virginity’ (cruise virginity that is) is apparently quite the big deal.
Indeed, it’s clear there are two types of people on any cruise. Those who have, and those who have not sailed the high seas.
Those who know the difference between a boat and a ship, for example. Or those who can stroll from starboard to port without a second thought.
Published in Traveller, Fairfax on January 12, 2016. Read the full story here.
Sloth Sanctuary of Costa Rica, Facebook.
By Larissa Ham
Can you fall head over heels at first sight if the object of your affections is considered lazy, dirty and only goes to the toilet once a week?
The answer – clearly written across the charmed faces of our group at the Sloth Sanctuary of Costa Rica – is a most definite YES.
“It’s very easy to fall in love with a sloth,” confirms guide Jeff Rochte, clearly himself smitten with the slow-moving, ever-smiling animals.
Rochte, an American who has lived in Costa Rica for the past nine years, is here to help carry on the legacy started by his grandparents – Alaskan Judy Avey-Arroyo and her late husband, Costa Rican Luis Arroyo.
* Published in Traveller, Fairfax Media. To read the full story, click here.
By Larissa Ham
It’s a wild old day when I meet Australian Sarah Trinler and her Swiss-American husband Scotti in a small surfing town on the south Pacific coast of Costa Rica.
The tropical rain is thundering down, and we’re trading shouts to make ourselves heard. The town’s main, dirt road is turning into a sloshy mud bath.
Powerful things seem to happen in this part of the world – surfboards are snapped in two by unforgiving waves, rivers flood, kaleidoscope-coloured sunsets put on a nightly show and crocodiles swim among stand-up paddle boarders.
By Larissa Ham
Our Cuban salsa instructor demands, ”Look at me like you love me!”, his face just centimetres away on a sweat-soaked Havana morning.
He sashays effortlessly across the tiled floor, an open window providing minimal relief from the heat as salsa beats pour out of an old CD player. ”Moooove your body. One, two, three!”
Leonardo, a former doctor, has swapped his stethoscope for salsa shoes and has landed my amiga and me on day two of our Cuban adventure. Having caught the salsa bug in Melbourne, we’re here to learn from the best but we’re off to a nervy start. ”Move your shoulders!” he says, as we double over with laughter.
In Cuba, the Castro-loving Caribbean island still largely cut off from the world, one thing hasn’t changed – music’s in the blood, and salsa dancing is as natural as walking.
What started out as a way to relax after a hard day’s work has turned into a tourist trap in Laos, writes Larissa Ham.
For a growing number of tech-savvy entrepreneurs, or ‘digital nomads’, making a decent living wherever there’s Wi-Fi has become a happy reality.
