by Ian Cochrane | Apr 18, 2018 | Europe
Broken walls topple, the last defenders with them. Canal bridges, city gates and the cathedral burn. Steel clashes with steel, horses’ hoofs pound stone roads and women drag screaming children, the old and infirm towards the hills and mountains. Columns...
by Ian Cochrane | Jun 15, 2015 | Europe
In the crowded hotel lobby, my daypack zipper sounds conspicuously loud. I poke a hand inside: a woollen vest, an apple and a light rain jacket – nothing more. I rummage about. Still nothing. Everyone looks when I tip the contents out. A single euro coin rolls across...
by Ian Cochrane | Feb 1, 2015 | Oceania
I’m in Tasmania drinking with Dave; a giant of a man with broad shoulders and no neck. He’s lived alone all his adult life, and sits at his normal spot at the bar, in brown flannelette shirt and singlet, jeans and mud-caked Blundy boots. “Changed?...
by Ian Cochrane | Jan 19, 2014 | Europe
Outside the station I squint in late summer sun, a grand entrance clad in grey Finnish granite and guarded by lamp-holding titans: stern-faced stone men far too serious to be the animated rap stars of railway advertising campaigns. At their feet, there’s a kid...
by Ian Cochrane | Aug 5, 2013 | Americas
The sound of our footsteps is muffled by patchwork drifts of snow on a gravel track winding past the bottom of carpark stairs. Surrounding hills are covered in local rhododendron; the air icy, the trees tall, rough barked and bare. Our guide strides ahead – rugged-up...
