Pexioria 6th November 2009    ‘You pronounce it ‘Pessy-aw-ria’’, Bill told me, as we drove through the village of Pexioria on the way from Toulouse Airport to Domaine St. Raymond, where the Gastro …

I knew I was going to see many totem poles on our Canada/Alaska trip, and, when I saw the Haida totem pole in the Pitt Rivers Museum, in Oxford, I set out to find out more. First, to the ‘fount of …

Freeport: 21st March 2015 All right, so it’s a ‘free port’ … but surely they could have thought of a more imaginative name for it? It was certainly a contrast to Miami, though; fr…

Guilin: 20th May 2014 We made a couple of calls on the way to the airport to catch our flight to Shanghai. First, we went to the Pearl Museum, where they told us about the cultivation of freshwater…

Banff: 18th May, 2016 At Banff, we left the train. The ‘original’ Banff is a fishing port to the north of Aberdeen … and a greater contrast between two places of the same name is difficult to imagi…

I have Su-lin to thank for the excellent article and mouth-watering recipe for croquetas de jamòn at Tamarind and Thyme. It wasn’t exactly an introduction; I already knew of these crispy, cr…

We heard of some friends who’d done a road and ferry trip along the entire length of the Outer Hebrides, and did a little research to determine whether it was affordable and do-able for us. And, I …

Åndalsnes: 26th March 2013. We took the motor coach up to Bjorli; there was a train ride up there on offer, too, but I’m only allowed one train ride per trip. Both the coach and the train stop on t…

Fujairah: 9th February 2011 On the way to our next stop, the guide explained about the male dress of the area. If they didn’t wear Western clothes, the usual garb was a loose, buttoned robe called …

I haven’t been posting as much as usual lately, mainly because a house move and some medical issues got in the way. But, I did find a minute (that’s all it took!) to edit the slight video I took of…

Rio de Janeiro: 28th January, 2017. The first question we asked on waking up in our hotel was ‘Can you see Jesus?’ Which sounds like a question from the Jehovah’s Witnesses on you…

Beijing: 6th May 2014. Some guidebooks say the Tiananmen Gate leads to the Forbidden City. It doesn’t really; it actually leads to the gate that leads to the Forbidden City. Nevertheless, it was to…

Beerwah: 12th and 14th August, 2010. When we returned to Brisbane, we were joined by Garry, another of Lorraine’s brothers, and Joanne, his wife, who had come up from Sydney for a few days. We agre…

Seydisfjordur: 21st June 2019.   We’ve finally arrived in Iceland, and moored at Seydisfjordur. It’s been a herring port, and a WWII naval base, but there are now few obvious signs of these. Now, i…

Trains in Germany are noted for their punctuality. When I travelled on the EuroCity train from Cologne to Innsbruck, I was most impressed when we arrived only six minutes behind schedule … and they…

We often see sausages advertised as ‘The Great British Banger’, which seems to me to be somewhat arrogant, because the sausage is by no means peculiar to Britain. However, we produce some pretty ta…

With a morning to kill in Madrid, it was really too nice a day to spend on museums and art galleries. So, I went to the Casa de Campo, a green open space to the west of the city. There’s a cable ca…

Most Australian wildlife is either nocturnal, reclusive or both. If your time is limited, the best way to see as much as possible is to visit a wildlife reserve; there’s usually at least one within…

Darwin: 18th April 2012. Finally, we boarded the Ghan at Darwin. The rail terminal is some distance from the city … maybe they wanted it somewhere near the railway tracks? But, a coach had been lai…

When I blogged about the Ullswater steamer cruise, a lot of people asked why I didn’t write about ‘my own boats’. I presume they meant the boats which cruise on Windermere. They’re not ’mine’; th…

Arundel Castle: 25th July 2018 The Earl, for whom the Earl’s Garden is named was the 14th Earl of Arundel, Thomas Howard. He lived in the 17th Century, and was known as the ‘Collector Earl’. It mig…

Xi’an: 9th May 2014.   We were promised a ‘dumpling supper’, and that’s exactly what we got. Dumplings, more dumplings and still more dumplings! But, not the balls of suet we put in our stew at hom…

As most people are aware, there’s lots more things to do with cheese than just make sandwiches. Many diners like to round off a nice meal with a selection from the cheese-board. On our last night a…

Someone once said that everyone should live within walking distance of some green space. I’m not sure whether that actually happens, but I do know I’ve never lived far from somewhere that isn’t tar…

Coober Pedy: 24th April 2012 If you like quirky and off-beat, you’ll love Coober Pedy. It’s famous, of course, for the opals mined here, and everywhere, there’s evidence of the mining … including w…

Juneau: 9th May 2016 We ate breakfast with one eye on our plates and the other out to sea, looking for whales, as we sailed down the Tracy Arm into Juneau. ‘What we should do’ said a fellow passeng…

Hahndorf: 30th March 2012. High in the Adelaide Hills, Hahndorf has always had the reputation of being ‘more German than Germany’. Which isn’t really surprising, as it was founded by German settl…

I just happened to come across this picture, which I took at the Royal Armouries in Leeds a couple of years back. However, on our upcoming visit to India, we probably won’t be riding any elephants,…

Just about everywhere you go in Peru, you’ll find a stall selling knitwear. It’s good quality stuff, too, usually handmade, from alpaca wool, and dyed in bright colours. The item that most visitors…

Ushuaia: 9th February 2017 As usual, we round off our visit to Ushuaia with a slide show. As our ship prepared to leave the port, a pod of dolphins approached. Are they really dolphins? someone ask…

Elwy Valley: 24th September 2014. Before we leave Denbigh behind, I must pay tribute to Robert, the driver of our coach. The lane up to the castle is narrow, with unyielding stone walls on each sid…

Algarve: 8th September 2020 The object of the Jeep safari was to show there’s more to the Algarve than just beaches, bars and golf courses. Although it was a little crowded in the jeep, and i…

This is a Tale. There was such a person as King Alfred; Wessex, Ethandun and the Danelaw actually existed and there is a large linear earthwork to the North of the Vale of Pewsey called the Wansdyk…

Puerto Madryn: 5th February 2017 Puerto Madryn was first established in the late 19th Century, not by the Spanish or Portuguese, but by Welsh settlers. There are still considerable Welsh-speaking e…

Montville: 26th July 2010 We stopped for lunch in Montville, a pleasant hill town. Here is the Sambuca Cafe, which claims to be ‘home to the Famous Montville Pie’. This, I had to try!…

If you compare a map of Britain’s railway system with a similar map dated from, say, the 1930s, you’ll notice a vast difference. It was once said (probably inaccurately!) that nobody in England liv…

I was going to defer my posts and video about the Mary Valley Heritage Railway because I heard they had been affected by the floods in January. That wasn’t quite true; they had, of course, shut dow…

Our first walk into Whitby brought us out by a quayside. To it was moored … the Endeavour or, to give it its full title, His Majesty’s Bark Endeavour. Not the ‘original’, of course; that’s at the b…

Skutustadagigar: 22nd June 2019. Skutustadagigar was another place where I thought I might have trouble with the spelling, so, as I usually do in such cases, I photographed the sign, to ensure I go…

Port el Kantaoui 19th June 2008 On our last evening in Tunisia, we went to what they called an ‘Alzahra Evening’ at Kalla Kbira. ‘Where’s Kalla Kbira, then? And, what’s an Alzahra Evening?’ ‘Says h…

Pexioria 6th November 2009    ‘You pronounce it ‘Pessy-aw-ria’’, Bill told me, as we drove through the village of Pexioria on the way from Toulouse Airport to Domaine St. Raymond, where the Gastro …

‘Some people dance in the rain. Others just get wet’ (Bob Marley) There is a story about a salesman who went to a very dry country with a load of barbecues, and told potential customers: ‘When you …

Maastricht: 13th July 2010 We had dinner in the pavement restaurant of the Hotel de la Bourse, which is set slightly apart from the others in the Markt. We chose it not because the excellent food i…

When we first saw it, we thought it was a piece of junk … a redundant marker buoy or something, cast on the foreshore of Vancouver’s False Creek. But, as we got closer, we realised it was a Sculptu…

We went to Lotherton Hall to see the Kite Festival. Unfortunately, because of negligible winds, the kites didn’t perform very well. But, the other attractions, including Wildlife World, compe…