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- Jun 7, 2006
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Back in pre-history when I did a lengthy DONEx every year and stitched into it a variety of free-range and organised tour activities, I had booked in 2019 back-to-back Intrepid and Peregrine (both Intrepid Group companies) tours: Romania-Moldova-Ukraine 
and Azerbaijan-Georgia-Armenia as a component of my planned 2020 DONEx that was to have kicked off in late April and run for 12 weeks – with a finishing flourish roaming the Kamchatka Peninsula in far eastern Russia .
Well, of course that 16th successive annual DONEx didn’t happen, and many of those tours are unlikely to ever run again in their original form in my lifetime…
At the time, I could have taken a refund or a credit of 110% on the two Intrepid Group tours. Pffft, thinks me, this Covid thing will soon pass; I’ll take the lazy 110% credit…
By late 2021, I’m thinking I should use the credit just to clear it away, but I couldn’t see any likelihood of getting overseas to reliably do so for some time. I decided to see what was on offer in the Intrepid Group portfolio within Australia that was worth taking as an organised thing, in anticipation of state border restrictions coming down in 2022. A way of using the credit and lubricating the return-to-travel wheels at the same time.
I settled on a 12-day Brisbane to Daintree tour:
That didn’t use all the credit, but an East Arnhem Land tour, localised around Gove and kicking off from there two days after this one ended, with the benefit of a direct flight CNS-GOV to join it, had me tacking that on and only needing to pony up a few more $$.
Righto, if I’m in Gove, why not take advantage of a direct GOV-DRW flight to carry on to DRW and take The Ghan to ADL, the fly ADL-PER to complete the loop? Done.
OK, all sorted – until two weeks ago when the East Arnhem Land tour was cancelled because of Covid-related issues. I was given the option of a refund or credit. I took the refund to fully clear everything.
The upshot is that I’ll now fly CNS-xBNE-PER to go back home for a week before flying PER-DRW to pick up The Ghan trip.
I’ve travelled in the Qld coast region many times for work and leisure but have not been to a few notable spots such as Fraser Island, the Whitsundays and Daintree. It seemed like as pleasant and relaxing a package as I could find in their Australian offerings that used my credits, especially in the north as winter approaches.
But… - will it stop raining in sunny Qld?
So, with that, it’s plonking into 1A on the bird PER-BNE Monday morning for a couple of days to first catch up with a good mate, the identity of whom some could guess
, and to meet up with @TheRealTMA for the first time to partake of some scraps on Thursday night, before kicking back into the tour on Friday.
The wheels are creaking back into motion. This is the start of a decent flurry of domestic travel coming up through the rest of this year.
I’m letting any international travel wait. My penchant for a wide-ranging DONEx is not so easily satisfied with the current shambolic state of OneWorld; in any event, at present I don’t have any absolutely burning or currently feasible bucket-list overseas things to do.
Yee-haa - time to roll…!
and Azerbaijan-Georgia-Armenia as a component of my planned 2020 DONEx that was to have kicked off in late April and run for 12 weeks – with a finishing flourish roaming the Kamchatka Peninsula in far eastern Russia .Well, of course that 16th successive annual DONEx didn’t happen, and many of those tours are unlikely to ever run again in their original form in my lifetime…
At the time, I could have taken a refund or a credit of 110% on the two Intrepid Group tours. Pffft, thinks me, this Covid thing will soon pass; I’ll take the lazy 110% credit…
By late 2021, I’m thinking I should use the credit just to clear it away, but I couldn’t see any likelihood of getting overseas to reliably do so for some time. I decided to see what was on offer in the Intrepid Group portfolio within Australia that was worth taking as an organised thing, in anticipation of state border restrictions coming down in 2022. A way of using the credit and lubricating the return-to-travel wheels at the same time.
I settled on a 12-day Brisbane to Daintree tour:
That didn’t use all the credit, but an East Arnhem Land tour, localised around Gove and kicking off from there two days after this one ended, with the benefit of a direct flight CNS-GOV to join it, had me tacking that on and only needing to pony up a few more $$.
Righto, if I’m in Gove, why not take advantage of a direct GOV-DRW flight to carry on to DRW and take The Ghan to ADL, the fly ADL-PER to complete the loop? Done.
OK, all sorted – until two weeks ago when the East Arnhem Land tour was cancelled because of Covid-related issues. I was given the option of a refund or credit. I took the refund to fully clear everything.
The upshot is that I’ll now fly CNS-xBNE-PER to go back home for a week before flying PER-DRW to pick up The Ghan trip.
I’ve travelled in the Qld coast region many times for work and leisure but have not been to a few notable spots such as Fraser Island, the Whitsundays and Daintree. It seemed like as pleasant and relaxing a package as I could find in their Australian offerings that used my credits, especially in the north as winter approaches.
But… - will it stop raining in sunny Qld?
So, with that, it’s plonking into 1A on the bird PER-BNE Monday morning for a couple of days to first catch up with a good mate, the identity of whom some could guess
, and to meet up with @TheRealTMA for the first time to partake of some scraps on Thursday night, before kicking back into the tour on Friday.The wheels are creaking back into motion. This is the start of a decent flurry of domestic travel coming up through the rest of this year.
I’m letting any international travel wait. My penchant for a wide-ranging DONEx is not so easily satisfied with the current shambolic state of OneWorld; in any event, at present I don’t have any absolutely burning or currently feasible bucket-list overseas things to do.
Yee-haa - time to roll…!
