Judging by the number of times I’ve been ill in Iceland, I can only conclude they spray you with the Pathogen of the Month as you walk through passport control at Kef. This year it was only a cold, albeit of the variety that stuck around for eight weeks. I’ve had worse and more aggressive … More When travel goes wrong: the trip to Iceland I didn’t enjoy
Since I’m walking the Laugavegur trail in July, it’s time to talk about the time I sampled it. In the summer of 2012 I did a day trip to Landmannalaugar. Just long enough to visit the hot spring and then run across the floodplain to see what else this little oasis had to offer. I … More Walking the Grænagil-Laugavegur loop
In 2015 I went to Svalbard because it was cheaper and logistically easier to go to the High Arctic than northern mainland Norway. Obviously. It was November. Svalbard in November has twenty-four hour darkness and it’s cold. Very cold. This is a huge frozen archipelago where the polar bear reigns supreme. On my first full … More I nearly died on a dog sled
Last month I went to Paris! I’ve already covered the Eiffel Tower and today I’m going up the Arc de Triomphe. I first went up there when I was fourteen. I have photos and in case there’s any doubt, the photos are in an album with captions like “roofs from Arc”. But I don’t remember … More On top of the Arc de Triomphe
Earlier today I was writing a blog about why I didn’t enjoy my last trip to Iceland and lamenting all the exciting things I could have been doing and blogging about… and realised I haven’t actually blogged about my recent trip to Paris. It was a long weekend – first thing Friday to Sunday evening … More I went up the Eiffel Tower… in the dark!
I didn’t mean to go to Paris the other day but work colleagues were trying to plan travel to a supplier presentation in north-central France the week before. Paris being the only international hub within three hours, calls of “there’s a flight for this much but it’s at that time” and “the train goes at … More How I learned to love Paris
I’ve climbed a few mountains in my time. Small ones, easy ones, sometimes only halfway up and always slowly. Sir Edmund Hillary I am not. Climbing Laki was entirely unlike any mountain I’ve ever climbed before. Laki is a volcano. That’s not what makes it unusual. Actually, it’s not “a volcano” in the traditional sense. … More The day I climbed Iceland’s deadliest volcano
A week after I wrote a vague, floaty post about having no specific goals or sights to see in Rīga, here I am telling you ten things to see! 1) City Park & Bastion Hill City Park is a bit of tree-lined greenery just at the north-east limit of the Old Town. It’s peaceful, it’s … More 10 things to see in Rīga
This is the last of the Year Abroad stories – I’ve more or less reached the end of what I can remember well enough to write about. But I saved this one for the winter because it’s seasonally appropriate and it’s one of my favourite memories of my year learning French in western Switzerland. I … More Shrieking on the slopes at Chaumont
I really enjoyed Latvia – more than a couple of other trips I’ve done this year & yet, apart from the Krimulda post (I found Latvian Silent Hill!) I freeze over every time I try to write about it. Why? I don’t know. Specifically, I’m trying to tell you about Rīga Old Town. It’s a … More I can’t write about Latvia
I Am A Polar Bear 