So, the guests had just left our Airbnb rental and I went in to check the place. I like to do this as soon as the guests have gone for several reasons. One of them, and probably the least sensible, is to check the fridge to see if they’ve left any goodies. And...
All over the world, there are mysterious caves. And many of them are open to visitors these days. They are truly fascinating and have been used for many purposes. Some date back for thousands of years. The Chislehurst caves are also available to visit and have a...
Sol Kerzner came from a hotel background. His family started and ran a chain of hotels so when as a young man, Sol graduated from his Johannesburg university he joined the company and eventually ran the entire shebang. The hotel chain became the richest and most...
There are plenty of bars that claim Ernest Hemingway as a once-upon-a-time customer. But I’ll bet that the claim of El Floridita , the bar in Havana, has a pretty good reason. In fact, the Nobel Prize winner is still there drinking at the bar – in the form...
You’d think so wouldn’t you? A shower is a shower is a shower, right? When you’re travelling the world, no. The trouble is, that like loos and food and driving, every country tends to think it’s got it right. Let’s take the USA as an...
So you didn’t know that there’s an annual world happiness report? There is, and this year’s results have just been announced and the big news is that the USA has slipped a few places yet again. In fact, it only just makes the top twenty. Scandinavia...
Probably the most well-known method of crossing the River Mersey comes from a 1960s pop song – from the early days of Merseybeat. Continued to fame as a theme sung by football crowds, it is of course Ferry Cross the Mersey. Ferries have been used to cross the...
At time of writing there are over two million properties listed on Airbnb. So it’s safe to assume that a lot of people stayed in Airbnb rentals last night, will tonight and will tomorrow night. And I suspect that 99.99% of them had a trouble-free and wonderful...
Just look at that photograph. It doesn’t get much more idyllic than that, does it? I live in Fort Lauderdale, often described by people marketing the place as the ‘Venice of America’ and as you might expect, Giethoorn gets the ‘Venice’...
I’m trying to remember when I last wore a watch. An old-fashioned analogue two-hands-and-a-dial watch like the one above. I remember that I’d just arrived at a gite in France (I’m thinking it was in the mid nineteen eighties) and removing the watch...
