I never travel without my Stetson, but the more I wear it the more I realise that no one wears hats any more. When I was a kid everybody wore hats, especially in Texas, but I get off the plane in Dallas now and I'm the only guy with a hat. It's amazing.

I am traveling less in order to be able to write more. I select my travel destinations according to their degree of usefulness to my work.

Just to travel is rather boring, but to travel with a purpose is educational and exciting.

Occasionally I find a travel book that is both illuminating and entertaining, where vivid writing and research replace self-indulgence and sloppy prose.

Don Quixote's 'Delusions' is an excellent read - far better than my own forthcoming travel book, 'Walking Backwards Across Tuscany.'

Travel books are, by and large, boring. They lodge uncomfortably between fact, fiction and autobiography.

Could I say that the reason that I am here today, you know, from the mouth of the State Department itself, is: I should not be allowed to travel because I have struggled for years for the independence of the colonial peoples of Africa.

I'm obsessed with Nicholas Sparks. I've literally read every single book, because every time I travel, at the airport, I always buy a new Nicholas Sparks book.

You do not travel if you are afraid of the unknown, you travel for the unknown, that reveals you with yourself.

My kids started school, so having a strong base in Melbourne has been a key priority. I'm not daunted by the travel. People say, 'It's so far to Australia,' and I say, 'You get on the plane, you eat well, you sleep, you wake up - and you're there.'