Once in a very long time you come across a book that is far, far more than the ink, the glue and the paper, a book that seeps into your blood.

For me, a journey to Damascus is an amazing hunt from beginning to end, a slice through layers of history in search of treasure.

Buy a house in a foreign country and, it seems, that anything which can go wrong usually does.

Once in a very long time you come across a book that is far, far more than the ink, the glue and the paper, a book that seeps into your blood.

Usually, there is nothing more pleasing that returning to a place where you have endured hardship.

Spend sixteen weeks in the jungle and you being to question your own sanity, especially when you are the one goading everyone else ahead.

A journey, I reflected, is of no merit unless it has tested you.