wanderings & wonderings
the creative world of jacqueline le sueur ... inspirational writing, art and photography
Who am I?
a wanderer
Born in England to parents that came from Jersey in the Channel Islands, I first took to the skies when I was just six weeks old and throughout my childhood I flitted back and forth between the island and the mainland by air or sea. Without realising it at the time this was when my love of travel was born!
With ever itchy feet I have lived and worked in Africa and Asia for two decades. Along the way my wanderings have taken me to almost 50 countries on 5 continents. Trains, planes and buses have carried me many miles around this beautiful planet of ours however my favourite mode of travel is my bicycle. There is nothing to beat heading off on a bike with all you need to survive in a couple of panniers, riding without a map, without a time limit and with no destination other than to follow the road stretching out in front of you. Now that my health precludes cycling I follow my feet as far as I am able in search of wonderment and delight - usually found on my doorstep. Literally!.
In my travelling days I could often be found peering into dark alleys, eating in little food stalls, bartering at dawn in markets, chatting to locals, attending any ceremony I can find, making offerings in a temple or simply sitting and observing life. These memories bring me so much joy.
As a child I day-dreamed endlessly, my head always in the clouds. Once I began travelling I became a 'wonderer' if you will, endlessly inspired and amazed by the world around me. I began to keep journals, sometimes daily, sometimes just random ramblings and it was to these I turned when I took a couple of years off, rented a little house in Bali and started to pen stories about my wanderings. These stories grew in number and turned into 'Wanderings & Wonderings - Whispers From The Ricefields', a regular column on travel and positive thinking that ran in Bali’s widest-read English language newspaper for two years.
During this same period I was also a Contributing Editor of SpaAsia magazine – a lifestyle, wellness and spa magazine based in Asia/Pacific with international distribution. Articles, spanning all aspects of health and wellness, were published here as well as in the international media, in print and digitally. Writing also extends into my consultancy work where I have been developing and delivering training courses in the hospitality arena around the world for more than twenty years. As a volunteer I have walked, researched, photographed, written and published almost 30 walks for the National Trust.
In 2006 ‘Gone Fishing’ was shortlisted in the BBC Wildlife Magazine Travel Writing Competition. In 2007 ‘Under The Cover of Darkness’ was shortlisted in the same competition. ‘The Land That Time Forgot’ was a runner up in the Singapore Sun Festival’s international writing competition in 2008. ‘Ancient Ancestral Autopilot’ won the Story Slam at an International Business Narrative Conference held in Singapore in 2010 and in 2011 ‘The Magic of Darkness’ won a short story competition run by the National Trust in England. 'Whispers From The Rice Fields. Wonderings & Wanderings From Bali' was published in June 2020 as an E-book & paperback - available here.
I am never without a means to photograph the world around me, and during the pandemic in 2020 I decided to teach myself how to paint - a wonderful ongoing journey of discovery.
Over the years I have walked over many a hill and dale, clambered to the summits of volcanoes and sea kayaked in choppy waters. I was also found cycling to the summits of Alpine passes & hurtling down the other side, and then skiing down the same mountains I rode up in the summer. Now I enjoy my world to the fullest extent my health allows in different ways, less active but no less enjoyable. On my little finger I wear a ring engraved with ‘tutto è possible.’ Anything is possible.