An unabashed tourist and her family explore the world one holiday at a time.
England’s Lake District is well-known for its beautiful countryside scenery. This is where the Romantic poet Wordsworth wandered lonely as a cloud and where Beatrix Potter dreamed up stories that still delight children of all ages. And it’s also where Gareth and I decided to break our journey from Cardiff in Wales to Aviemore in Scotland. We stayed in a...
We spent Christmas 2012 in Caerphilly, visiting Gareth’s family who we only get to see once every two years or so. Gareth’s brother wanted some male bonding time and, having just recovered from a nearly debilitating flu picked up in a Finnish sauna, I decided to spend the day on my own wandering the streets of Cardiff. I love Cardiff....
What do you do when you unexpectedly bump into Tom Cruise? Why, you try to out-smile him and then brag to all your friends that you’re a little bit taller than he, is of course. Even though celebrity culture baffles me I would have loved to have met the real Tom Cruise, but sadly this was only a wax replica...
221B Baker Street The quaint Victorian home is littered with interesting paraphernalia, violins, dusty books, classical portraits, oriental coffee tables, stuffed birds and pinned butterflies, thermometers, glass bottles containing weird concoctions and all manner of bric-a-brac. An intricately patterned Persian carpet clashes horribly with the yellow and pink wallpaper, while a cosy fire roars in the hearth. On a small...
In December 2012, Gareth and I visited the Finnish arctic circle in the hopes of catching a glimpse of the aurora borealis, or northern lights as they are more commonly known. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to see the lights, with the possible exception of a greenish glow in the distance glimpsed only by myself while out walking in the wilderness....
A trip to Lapland is not complete without a ride on a reindeer sleigh. During our recent visit to Finland, Gareth and I had yet another chance to explore the extraordinary landscape of the Arctic Circle through this traditional means of transportation. Our friendly Ylläs Adventures guides dropped us off at the Sami homestead of a reindeer herder and after a brief...
After months and months of planning and counting the days, the time has finally come – we’re leaving on our Aurora 2012 trip tomorrow evening! Gareth and I are incredibly excited, especially since it has been more than a year that we last set foot abroad and we are starting to show withdrawal symptoms! Here is what is on our...
While Gareth and I are off to Finland and the UK for Christmas, my mother will be enjoying one of the many Mediterranean Cruises on offer that time of year. She loves cruising so much that she makes a point of going at least once a year (this year she will be going twice!). I’ve often asked her what it...
According to the clever guys at NASA, we are currently experiencing a peak in an 11-year sunspot cycle, which among other things will bring more auroras than has been seen in a long time. Apparently this Solar Max is due in the 2012/2013 northern hemisphere winter period. And so… Gareth and I are heading over to the Arctic Circle to...
