Inside the Travel Lab

Ouchijuku Village, Japan For some reason, these photos look calm. Yet in reality, a blizzard raged and the muted glow of the snow-plough’s headlights provided just enough light to let me capture this scene: fragile, snow-cloaked candles beneath an otherwise relentless black sky. Sleet assaulted our eyes, abraded our cheeks and hounded our cameras, while [...]

The steam rising out of the drain cover caught my attention first. It was a cold, vengefully cold mid-winter morning in Hungary as I paced along the tarmac, limbs mechanical yet numb, face frozen, eyes rimmed with weather-induced tears.

Everyone was…

This Photo Friday, I bring you Croatia’s Capital at its warm and wintry best. Check out more about the #ironroute over here and watch this space for the words…They’re on their way…

Time, this week, played tricks on me. An illusion: disappearing, twisting, sliding and slipping away… This photo, from the kamakura matsuri or igloo festival in Tohoku, Japan last year, just seemed to fit for this week’s Photo Friday. The region had just recovered from one of the harshest winters on record – and yet none [...]

Apparently, it’s bad form to write about sunsets. And even to take photos of them. And even to start sentences with “and” – but right now…

Usually, I manage to find something beautiful, something that moves me wherever I go. But last night, in Petra, that didn’t happen.

Close your eyes and feel the sticky weight of the sunshine, its humidity heavy on your skin while sonnets of spice and a chorus of cardamon compete with cloves, cumin and chopped coriander on the streets of Little India…

A number of things are wrong. To begin with, I’m standing in a field surrounded by darkness, my mind pulling the duvet covers back over its head and mumbling into its pillow. Second, I’m…

Two days ago, I heard some bad news. The sort that starts with a phonecall, moves on to pacing, morphs into more…

When I first caught the expression of this monkey, poised and watchful, I imagined to myself he might be wearing an expression of prayer, of solemnity, of reverance.

How wrong I was…