Travel
Look beyond ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ in The Hague
What a fate it is to be hung next to the most famous painting in a gallery. To be overlooked,…
Diary
During our annual odyssey around the Scottish Highlands, I read Tears of the Rajas, Ferdinand Mount’s eloquent indictment of imperial…
Diary
‘Devon, Devon, Devon/ Where it rains six days out of seven.’ Nothing beats a British seaside holiday. And north Devon…
Dublin
What a delight it is to toy with a wooden newspaper-holder rather than a smartphone, tucked away in the cosy…
Antigua
‘Tourism, tourism and tourism,’ said my Antiguan cab driver, when I asked what the country’s main industries were. Still, it’s…
Your problems solved
Q. How can you tactfully tell someone that the large skin tag or blob they have grown in the centre…
Hamburg
‘What was it like growing up in Liverpool?’ a journalist asked John Lennon. ‘I didn’t grow up in Liverpool,’ he…
Diary
My Cambodian daughter and her husband have just got married again. Wedding One was a Buddhist affair in our drawing…
Oporto
‘When he’s away, the thing he misses about Porto is the tripe.’ I was talking to Eduarda Sandeman, wife of…
A twinge of fear, and a glimpse of a harsher world
I celebrated Eid in a sandy bay in Sri Lanka, watching from the warm, shallow sea as gaggles of local…
Glasgow
A wet walk in a Glaswegian graveyard might not be your idea of fun, but then you might not have…
Florence
The British have always been in love with Florence. First visits cannot disappoint. One friend recalls being herded around as…
Trattoria tour
The Gatto Nero — or ‘Black Cat’ — is in Burano, a tiny island in the Venetian lagoon. It is…
French Notebook
An overnight stop on the Ile de Ré taken between the St Malo ferry and the Quercy, where we always…
North Cornwall
In a documentary filmed at the end of his life, Sir John Betjeman, who lived in the village of Trebetherick…
Don’t abandon Tunisia!
It needs – and deserves – British visitors more than ever
Flanders
Usually, one of the first indications that you’ve entered a bilingual country is that the road signs are in two…
Into the blue
Jenny Balfour Paul is an indigo dye expert. She has written two books on the subject, and lectures around the…
Country house opera
I stole a blanket last night. Rather a nice one, in fact. I feel bad about it, of course, but…
Barometer
Steam privatisation Cunard celebrated its 175th birthday by sailing three liners down the Mersey. The formation of the Cunard Line…
St Moritz
Here’s a tip: when travelling to St Moritz, it’s best not to mention the name of your final destination to…
Calling all British tourists – Ukraine needs you!
Kiev ‘What the hell’s going to happen to your poor country?’ I ask the man in the flea market not…
Antwerp
Napoleon didn’t think much of Antwerp. ‘Scarcely a European city at all,’ he scoffed. If only he could see it…
Marseille
If you haven’t been lost in Marseille then you can’t have been there. As Alexandre Dumas wrote, this is a…
Møn
The sky over the island of Møn, which is at the bottom right of Denmark, was cobalt and the whitewashed…
