There are underrated towns and cities in New Zealand and then there’s Whanganui. Part of the entire reason for the existence of the Roxborogh Report is to highlight the overlooked and the underrated, but I’m not sure I’ve ever written about a destination quite as misjudged as this city of 45,000 in the western lower…
Is This NZ’s Prettiest Boutique Hotel? – Our Return To Tauranga’s French Country House
My first visit to Tauranga’s French Country House was as a bachelor who was about to have a eureka moment, the second was a year later for the marriage proposal and the third was another couple of years after that with a baby on the way. Now that’s clearly the short version of the story, but…
Cloudy Bay Celebrate The Opening Of ‘The Shed’ In Central Otago: My NZ Herald Article + Top 60 Central Otago & Fiordland Photos
Forgive me. I’m not sure if there’s any other travel writing trip I’ve taken that’s had me apologising to so many people, so let me start by asking your forgiveness from the get-go! Once you read my NZ Herald article and see the photos below it will make sense – this was a very jealous-making little adventure….
For Christchurch: U2’s ‘One’ And Why It Matters About The Word In The Song So Many Get Wrong
There’s a line in U2’s One that people always get wrong: “We’re one but we’re not the same / we get to carry each other…” “Get” being the key word. I remember Bono explaining this some years ago, pointing out that it’s a subtle but significant difference. If “we’ve got to carry each other” rather…
Samantha Gibb On The New Band Of Brothers She’s Producing, Plus Thoughts On Spirits Having Flown’s 40th Anniversary & If There’ll Be Another Gibb Collective Album
Recently I caught up again with Bee Gee offspring Samantha Gibb, the daughter of the late Maurice Gibb, for an extended interview. Our second full interview following on from our conversation in 2017 (that interview – which you can link to here – became the most read post on Roxborogh Report for 2017 and one…
Rolling Stones & Star Wars Sydney Exhibitions – My NZ Herald Article + Top 50 Sydney Photos
“Do you want to go to Sydney to cover a Rolling Stones exhibition and a Star Wars exhibition?” So came the question from my editor and if memory serves me correctly, I gave my first ‘yes’ at “Sydney”, my second ‘yes’ at “Rolling”, and was up to about ‘yes’ number six or seven by the…
New Zealand’s Great Barrier Island – My Let’s Travel Mag Top 30 Photos From This ‘Last Great Wilderness’
Three times the size of New Zealand’s far more famous Waiheke Island, Great Barrier Island is one of the last great wilderness areas of the country’s upper North Island. At 285-square kilometres (compared to Waiheke’s 92-square kilometres) and with a population of just 1000, Great Barrier is widely thought of as New Zealand as New Zealand used to…
12 Months Of NZ Herald Concert Reviews, Including A “Profound” Paul McCartney, An “Extravagant” Queen + Adam Lambert, A “Bonkers” Katy Perry & An “Unexpectedly Poignant” Cher.
12 months ago I started reviewing concerts for the New Zealand Herald. Not every week and not even every month, but on average, every couple of months I’d find myself with pen and notepad at a gig by one of the biggest artists of all time. Tough job but someone has to do it! So,…
Sampling High-Rise Airbnb Luxury In Melbourne… While Dressed As Worzel Gummidge
Who flies all the way to another country for a themed dress-up birthday party and gets the theme wrong? It’s a question I’ll most likely ask myself for the rest of my life, though the answer is easy: me. But how did this travesty happen!? It was my dear friend Georgie’s 30th bash in Melbourne…
Every Bee Gees Album Ranked From 22-1!
“I love them all!” “There’s no such thing as a worst!” All things repeatedly heard from diehard Bee Gees fans whenever the matter comes up of ranking the collected works of the brothers Gibb. With an international career of LP releases spanning the 34 years from 1967 to 2001, the Bee Gees were one of popular music’s…
From Elephants In The Wild To Cricket By The Sea – My Top 60 Sri Lanka Photos
Sri Lanka is one of those those hot travel destinations right now that everyone seems to be talking about. As a cricket fan and lover of the tropics, Sri Lanka had been on my radar for several years, but when my wife said it was at the top of her must-visit list, we decided to…
Singapore’s M Social Hotel – A Robot Who Delivers Direct To Your Room!
I’ve always loved Singapore. With seven years in nearby Kuala Lumpur in the 80s, Singapore has so many of the same smells, sights and sounds that transport me right back to that Southeast Asian childhood. As I recently wrote in my weekly New Zealand Herald ‘Travel Bugs’ column: “I never understood why some people think Singapore…