A pastel dawn heralded our day of departure from our tiny village of Crowdy Head on the Mid North Coast of New South Wales to our nearest township of Taree where we would catch the Grafton XPT express train to Sydney for our flight to Shanghai the next morning.

On a typical autumn day our village is bathed in brilliant winter sunshine. Freed of the summer sea salt haze, the clarity of the island vista is stunning; beaches, sea and surrounding mountains strikingly painted in pure white, lapis blue and dark emerald green. It is a glorious time of the year.

This morning was different; moody, almost wistful. A lilac sky played host to combed cotton clouds. In the north-eastern sky ominous storm clouds rolled up over the Pacific Ocean's steel grey horizon.

In the soft melancholy morning I reflected on the two years that had passed since our last overseas trip. It had been a truly horrible time. If Queen Elizabeth II had described her year of 1992 as an Annus Horribilus, then we had experienced - if there was such a word - a "Bi-Annus Horribilus".

We arrived home from our wonderful trip to China, Pakistan and India in July 2012 (refer Travelpod publication "Restless Lands: Frontiers of Pakistan and Northern India") to family sickness, followed by a tragic family crisis with unnecessary heartache, unhealed wounds and for me a psychological melt down.

In late April 2013 and only weeks before we were due to fly out on an overseas trip to China, Kazakhstan, Tunisia and Morocco, my husband Alan was diagnosed with aggressive bladder cancer, resulting in radical surgery to remove his bladder, prostate and lower lymph nodes. A false or "neo-bladder" was miraculously constructed from a portion of his small intestine by his skilful surgeon Dr Philip Bergersen of Chatswood, NSW. It was a huge but thankfully successful operation, lasting some ten and a half hours.

To our acute disappointment we had no option other than to cancel all our overseas travel, making the shock of Alan's diagnosis even more achingly miserable.

At the time of Alan's surgery, my mother June was in the same ward and was diagnosed with secondary cancers in the peritoneal area around her stomach. The cancer was not treatable and the prognosis was not good. Shortly after Alan's eldest daughter Miranda was diagnosed with throat cancer and his brother Michael was found to be suffering from emphysyma and cancer of the larynx.

Following intensive chemotherapy, Alan suffered an almost fatal, massive bowel haemorrhage. After some 32 blood transfusions, it was an absolute miracle he survived. But the trauma left him weak and with significant heart abnormalities for a considerable time.

We began to wonder if the nightmare would ever end. Would we ever get off the medical treadmill? To date we had been very fortunate people, with few medical issues for us or our families. Suddenly we were totally out of control. And even two of our beloved beautiful Siamese cats died.

"Just a speed bump in our lives" was the way Alan looked at it. And he is right. He always is. And slowly but surely he recovered into full health again. There was no looking back and this day we were heading off on our much anticipated trip to China, Sicily, Tunisia, Morocco and home via Rome and Shanghai.

I wondered how Alan's newly made bladder would survive our overseas trip. He was obviously thinking the same thing but neither of us discussed it openly. Could it inflate with the aircraft air pressure? I had heard of women's breast implants enlarging and moving due to lowered air pressure. And what would happen if Alan needed to catheterise himself? Neo-bladders think they are still intestines for some time and continue to produce mucous which can result in blockage of the urethra. We were armed with a bag full of catheters just in case, but the thought of inserting a sandy catheter in the middle of the Sahara Desert didn't bear thinking about....

I shook my head of these thoughts, we farewelled the garden and said goodbye to our lovely cats. A live in housekeeper would look after them for the time we were away but it is always sad leaving them. Or indeed leaving our beloved Crowdy Head. This trip was no different from any other. Again we asked ourselves "Why are we leaving this bit of paradise?".

For our past three overseas trips, we had travelled to what could well be described as "challenging destinations" such as Pakistan, Iran and Central Asia. We had originally planned to include Algeria and Pakistan to this trip. Last year however our Algerian travel agent had cancelled all tours in the Sahara due to terrorists targeting westerners. Similarly, the Australian Department of Australian Foreign Affairs & Trade (DFAT) had placed a "Do Not Travel" warning on our intended Pakistan destinations of Swat and Peshawar, meaning that if we did embark on our travels there, then all our travel insurance would be void. More chillingly, DFAT strongly advised all travellers to Pakistan to take out Kidnapping Insurance! Just for interest we would strongly advise readers to investigate. There are only two insurance companies in the world that are happy to provide this service. Travellers must guarantee they have a minimum of $US 1 million per person in their bank account and must provide a very detailed itinerary of their intended travels. We joked that these companies must be run by terrorists who would have a very useful summary of where they could kidnap us and what they could demand as ransom!

All jokes aside, we had foolishly risked our travel insurance when we travelled to Indian Kashmir last year (read: "Umm, who knew about Kashmir being a No Go destination?"). Furthermore, we had travelled to Pakistan on three occasions before and although we had surprisingly fallen in love with this beautiful and much maligned country, perhaps we had used up enough of our "Nine Lives"?

We had also planned to visit Kazakhstan last year as it was one of the few Central Asian countries we had not yet visited. On reflection however our proposed tour looked onerous with two 21 hours train trips and to Alan's horror a lengthy mountain trip by horse. And so sadly, these three exotic countries were "canned" for our 2014 travels.

Our coming trip to China, Sicily, Tunisia and Morocco now looked "wussy" but we reminded ourselves - as did our exhausted friends - that a more relaxed "holiday" would be just what we needed after such a trying two years. At least I could console myself that I did not have to endure the usual three weeks of sleepless nights as I worried about what are widely held to be extremely dangerous destinations.

We often talk about the places to which we chose to travel. Perhaps as some people have suggested, we are addicted to danger? Yes, these countries are undeniably more dangerous than other destinations but they have all been extraordinarily interesting. It is a real dilemma for us as nearly all the places we would like to visit are, to put it mildly - on the dangerous side. In fact Alan has seriously thought about travelling to Dagestan and one night in Islamabad, he had organised for us to travel to Afghanistan with a media party who were interviewing the Taliban! I was not sure about this trip. Perhaps it would it be "a bit too boring".....?

Anyway, as I firmly reminded myself, we were deeply inspired by early 1900's German painter Auguste Macke's evocative paintings "Market in Tunis" and "Market in Algiers" to visit northern Africa (refer Introduction to Travelogue). We were in search of new deserts in an exotic Arab world, new African cities and the wonderful light Macke captured in his paintings. And last but not least - an elusive white eyed donkey.... Too late now for last minute doubts.

Seats No 1 and 2 in B Carriage on the Grafton XPT must be some of the best seats on the train. Being at the front of the First Class carriage, there are no seats in front, there is plenty of leg room, a small table is provided and best of all the seats have a full window to take advantage of the very lovely vistas the train travels through on its five hour winding journey to Sydney.

Our trip was relaxed, arriving at Sydney Central Station in the late afternoon. The train trip to the Sydney International Airport was a different experience. The privately run rail line is ridiculously expensive ($17.20 per person one way for the 13 minute trip), is difficult to find at central Station, the trains have no luggage facilities for travellers and worse still, passengers and commuters have to share the heavily congested train carriages. It is certainly not a great advertisement for Australian tourism.

Our short but unpleasant trip was no different from those we had experienced before. The ticket queue took forever and our train carriage was absolutely jam packed with passengers. To our disgust, most of the standing room which is the only space for luggage, was taken up by several bicycles.

Our evening however was most enjoyable. The Sydney International Airport Hotel, while being no world beater in hotels, is extremely convenient. The hotel is only five minutes by shuttle bus from the airport, rooms are comfortable and the St George Rowing Club on Broken Bay is only a five minute walk and provides good quality club style food.

That first evening of our travels is always very exciting. The club is located right on the International Airport flight path which sort of adds to the thrill of our coming travels. The homely club with its faithful patrons together with other travellers overnighting at local hotels makes for a most warm and pleasant atmosphere. Financial Planner Warren Hodgson and his wife and friends were heading off to Shanghai. It was their first trip to China and they were immensely excited. It was good fun to meet them and share some of our experiences we have enjoyed in the ten or so years we have been travelling to and through China.

Our enthusiasm for our coming trip was buzzing and an early comfortable night completed a pretty nice start to our travels.