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CURRENT SWASHBUCKLERS
Brad Diggory
Hi! My name’s Brad and I’m the author of many of the posts you’ll find on this blog. Anything written in first person is from my perspective (how narcissistic of me!). I’m a former performer with a degree in Journalism and Communication currently working as a photographer, and am hoping this blog will allow me to flex some creative muscles.
You’ve no doubt noticed I maintain a pretty poor upload schedule, but I have a lot of articles in my drafts just ready to be uploaded, so please stay tuned.
If you’d like to contact me or see more of my adventures, you can reach me on various social media platforms.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eldiggz/
Email: boutt2journey@hotmail.com
Google Maps Account: Brad Bond James
https://www.instagram.com/p/BViwfz7hFEm
Jemma Pearl
Bonjour! Je m’appelle Jemma Pearl!
*DISCLAIMER: I’m not actually French!*
I’ll be taking a lot of the photos for our upcoming trip. I’m only just getting started, but excited to see how much I will learn during our travels! I have a great love for learning and creative expression, and believe this trip will do wonders for those passions!
Although I’ve taken trips to New Zealand and Japan, this will be the first time I’ve spent more than two weeks overseas and I’m so excited to experience a bohemian travel lifestyle!
If you’d like to contact me or see more of my adventures, you can reach me on various social media platforms.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jem_pearly/
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FORMER SWASHBUCKLERS
Ruby Clark
My name is Ruby Clark and I have been playing around with photography for about a year now. I am very passionate about capturing peoples faces on camera and am excited about travelling the world and trying to capture landscapes for the first time. This will be my first time travelling to Europe, so enjoy my journey of photographic discovery!
If you’d like to contact me or see more of my adventures, you can reach me on various social media platforms.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rubysamclark/
Email: rubysamclark@gmail.com
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TEMPORARY SWASHBUCKLERS
For those daring Swashbucklers who have joined me on my journeys, if only for a few days.
Jeremy Miller & Joe Watkins
Jeremy and Joe are two of my best friends from high school, and we’ve (somehow) managed to stay in touch! I took my first overseas trip with ‘da boiz’ back in 2016 to Japan, China, and Malaysia. We later took a ski trip to New Zealand in 2017, and hopefully have a trip on the horizon!
Joe is ‘off-grid’, social media wise, but Jeremy you can reach on Instagram and Facebook. You can also follow his travels through his social media account “JD’s Travels”.
Blog: https://jdstravels.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jdstravel/
Youtube: JD’s Travels.
Daniel Nelson & Andrew Conway
Two good buddies of mine from my performing days. Dan abandoned us all to go work as a stunt man in Singapore, so naturally, Conway and I used this as an excuse for a holiday. We met up in Hong Kong and spent nearly a week exploring the island, meeting up with some old friends along the way.
You can find both of them on Instagram, along with Dan’s YouTube channel, where he runs a fairly successful vlog about his time in Singapore.
Dan’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/danielnelson/
Conway’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/conway01/
Brit Grey & Brock Dunstan
Brock, Brit and I formed a strong friendship during our time at Village Roadshow based solely on the fact that our names began in Br (#BrBrBrSquad4Ever). After Brock left to work for Shanghai Disney, Brit and I knew we had to visit China and pester him ourselves. We incorporated our visit with a trip to Nepal, which you can read about on Brit’s own blog.
You can find both of them on Instagram, along with Brit and her husbands highly acclaimed creative venture, milk and honey.
Brit’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/britgrey/
Brock’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brock.dunstan/
Monique Dawes
You never quite know how a trip with someones significant other will go: will you be the third wheel, how will you split accommodation, will you get in the middle of the occasional fight? You never know. When Ruby, her partner Monique and I began planning our month long road trip around the UK (which was originally supposed to be a one month trip around South America), I had no idea what to expect. Luckily for us, it turned out to be one of the most amazing trips of my life, bringing the three of us even closer together.
Mon is currently kicking ass as a stunt woman in Beijing. You can follow along with her journey on Instagram!
My Trips
Hopefully at the time you’re reading this, there are a lot of stories posted to this blog. These stories have been accumulated over a long period of time, since as early as 2015, and since then a lot of countries have been visited, and a lot of friendships and relationships been formed.
Since I’m currently the sole writer for this blog, you can have a single voice in your head when reading through the stories, but it might be confusing when it comes to my travel companions and the time frame in which these stories took place. To help you along, I’ve included a comprehensive list of all the holidays I’ve taken over the past few years, and who I took them with, to help you along!
-Brad
2015:
The United States
with
My family
The trip that started it all. I feel like our trip to America was really the one that sparked my thirst for travelling. I’d been on trips before this one (my family did a big Eurotrip in 2009, and we’d taken multiple trips to Fiji since then), but I feel like this particular journey ignited something in me. On this trip, my mother, my brothers and I visited Los Angeles, Anaheim (for Disneyland), Orlando (for Disney World), and then were joined by my father, uncle and aunt for New Orleans, New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, and Lone Pine.
2016:
Singapore
by myself (feat. Daniel and Cassidy)
Japan, China, Malaysia
with
Jeremy and Joe (feat. Rhea)
In August of 2016, I undertook my first solo trip! I noticed one day that I conveniently had a four day weekend and too much money so I decided to book a last minute trip to Singapore. No, I mean it, I booked the ticket at 10pm the day before an 8am flight! I went over to visit my friend Dan who had recently moved over to work for Universal Studios Singapore. I was fortunate that I had friends over there who could help show me around, and provide me with a place to sleep. Overall, I spent one and a half days in Singapore, most of the time was spent catching up with Dan and my other friends Cassidy, Emily, and Ryan, and exploring USS.
My other trip across Asia was a bit more exciting. I’d gone on a 3 week ‘lads trip’ with my best friends Jeremy and Joe to Japan, and China! This was our first major holiday without our families. During our trip, we visited Tokyo (including Tokyo DisneyLand!), Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Hiroshima, and then popped over to Shanghai to see our friend Rhea who had just started working for Shanghai Disneyland, and then to Beijing. On our way home, we did a day layover in Malaysia to see the Patronis Towers and pretty much nothing else.
2017:
Hong Kong, Macau
with
Andy and Dan (feat. Julie, and Meg)
England, Iceland, Norway, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, Monaco, Belgium, Luxembourg, Singapore
with
Ruby (feat. my Uncle Gary, Korbie, Julie, and Dan)
New Zealand
with
Jeremy and Joe
Fiji
with
My family
Ahhh 2017: the year I did not stop moving. In 2017, I took a lot of trips, and visited a LOOOOT of countries. I calculated that I spent over 3 sporadic months travelling that year. It started with a week trip to Hong Kong with my two friends Andy and Dan (you remember him!) We visited our friends Meg and Julie during this time who were working at Hong Kong Disneyland. I did a day trip out to Macau by myself one afternoon because Dan and Andy wanted to go home and take a nap… I probably would’ve preferred to nap myself, in hindsight.
In May, I took my biggest trip yet with one of my best friends Ruby. Over 2 months, we explored much of Europe, starting in London, then heading to Iceland, taking a roadtrip across Norway from Oslo to Gieranger, then heading to Amsterdam, Prague, Berlin, before flying to Italy and exploring Rome, Naples and the Amalfi Coast, Milan and Venice. We then flew to Madrid and Barcelona, and then over to France to visit Paris, Nice, Cannes, and Monaco. At this point, me and Ruby parted ways and I was joined by my friend Julie (the Julie from Hong Kong!) who accompanied on my trip to Brussels, Bruges, and Luxembourg. On my flight home, I did a day layover in Singapore and was shown round by none other than Dan!
In August, just one month after getting back from my Europe trip, Joe, Jeremy, and I took a ski trip to New Zealand, exploring Auckland as well as Lake Taupo. We’d only spent one week in New Zealand, but we had a great time bonding and vegging out.
In December, I’d taken my fourth trip to Fiji. This was a lot different to the other trips I’d taken this year as we spent most of our time on the Outrigger resort, taking in the sun and eating too much food. We’d done a day trip out to Suva to explore the nearby city, something I’d never done in the past, and spent a day in the local village building the foundations for a school.
2018:
Nepal, China
with
Brittany and Brock (feat. Meg)
England, Scotland, Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Poland, Sweden, Denmark
with
Ruby and Monique (feat. Uncle Gary)
Singapore
with
Jeremy and Vanessa (feat. Alex)
In May, me and my friend Brit took a trip over to Shanghai to visit our friend Brock at Shanghai Disneyland. After spending two days in China, we all flew out to Nepal together to explore the city of Kathmandu and relax in the peaceful town of Pokhara. Brock had to fly back to Shanghai after a few days, but Brit and I made the most of our layover back home and spent a few days in Chengdu exploring and visiting the local panda bases.
After coming back from our trip, taking a spontaneous one day holiday to Sydney with Jeremy, and going back to work for 2 days, I was off again! This time, I was taking a journey to the United Kingdom with Ruby and her girlfriend Monique. On this trip, we took a car and roadtripped around all of England, Scotland, the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland, stopping only to fly to Krakow and Warsaw. From there, me and the girls parted ways and I flew to Sweden to meet my Uncle Gary. We’d explored his old home of Helsingborg and took a day trip into Copenhagen.
My final trip was quite unexpected. For my birthday, Jeremy had bought me tickets to see Chance the Rapper live… only catch was, he was playing in Singapore. Without much notice, I booked some time off and was quickly flying off to see Chance in August. I was accompanied on this trip by Jeremy and his girlfriend Vanessa as well as our friend Alex.
Modern Swashbucklers 