I rode into town on the golden light of the sea. The boat skimmed across the surf with ease as the setting sun threw its arms out wide. Amber rays embraced fishermen, caressed pleasure boats, and caused harp bridges to glitter on the rugged Mediterranean rocks. Then the city walls of Dubrovnik’s Old Town stopped the […]
Galicia, Spain: The Salty Northern Sea Coast Of course, every coast is salty. But northwest Spain’s Galician coastline seems the saltiest of all: its landscape licked into shape by the churning, whirling waves, its cuisine at one with the sea and its architecture, history and general attitude shaped by the way that surf reaches the […]
The Loire Valley, France A red diamond sits atop a yellow poste, blazing the word tabac. A bread baskets lands on a red-chequered tablecloth, heralding the arrival of unruly lettuce and thick purple jam. This is France, in all her school textbook glory, throwing symbols like memories into the gym skirt recesses of my mind. Schooldays France […]
By Abi King | Unusual Things To Do
Let me tell you a little about Riga first – but if you haven’t time for that today, you can jump straight down to the list below for 7 of the best things to do in Riga. HOW IT BEGAN A man waited, then spoke. “If you look this way, at the glittering chandelier and […]
Austria’s Lakes I don’t know why I’d never thought of this before. I’d admired lakes from afar, softly framed by frozen snow. I’d seen them blur past windows and windscreens and snapped them from cobbled lanes and cloistered churches. But until this summer’s sojourn through Austria by bicycle, I’d never thought of them as the best […]
By Abi King | Make Me Think
The Stories the Stones Tell in Menorca No, not the Rolling Stones. The still stones. The ones that, by all accounts, should be gathering moss as they stand and wait in one place (and since we’re delving into history today, did you know that the whole “rolling stone” phrase didn’t start with Bob Dylan but […]
I’ve rounded up seven of the best things to do in Jordan for you, all tried and tested by me. Yes, I know I usually wax lyrical, bringing you poetry, interviews, dreams and more but I also know you’re busy. So here’s a shortcut to all that lyrical stuff, all nicely packaged up. Go live, […]
City Flavours Everywhere has them, I suppose. The naughty but nice hot streetside foods that define a city, to my tastebuds at least. In London, it’s roast chestnuts, steam smoking into the winter sky while amber embers blaze. In New York, it’s bagels, my first plaited bread sticks studded with cubic salt. Singapore surprised with the […]
The Dead Sea, Jordan Let’s face it, the Dead Sea has a depressing name. It also fizzes the synapses by sounding too much like Red Sea. Red Sea, Dead Sea. Red Sea. Dead Sea. Completely easy enough to tell apart until the in-the-moment talking about them both when white panic sets in. A similar thing happens […]
One of the best things about the characters in the Maltese language is that the words make every glance at the map feel like an adventure ripped straight from the pages of TinTin or Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. There’s the Tal-Qaċċa hill, It Tumbata and the bay at Qbajjar. And then there are […]
By Abi King | Make Me Think
Visiting China For the First Time The spine of the dragon curved and clawed away from me. Taut, terraced and terrifyingly green, its breath hooked into my lungs and tore at my throat. But I would not, I could not, let this path defeat me. After all, I’d done it before. We first met ten […]
Halong Bay showcases the dual nature of travel today: the absolute thrill of finding an icon (in this case, the hazy outline of those towering limestone peaks) and the dismay that everybody and his dog found it first and that the overwhelming tourist machinery will crush the magic spell. The arrival on the departure pier […]
Aswan For over two thousand years people have stood where I’m standing now. And yet they haven’t. The Puzzle of the Philae Temple in Aswan For although these honeyed flagstones brought Philae Temple to life back in the Greco-Roman days (around 370 BC,) come the time of flared trousers, big hair and D-I-S-C-O, people moved […]
By Abi King | Small Luxury Hotels
The Cour des Loges Hotel Review As hotels go, the Cour des Loges didn’t need a “something extra” to help it stand out. The open courtyard with renaissance-style arches made a suitably resplendent first impression. So, too, did the cryptic entrance corridor from the cobbled corners of old town Vieux Lyon, the rooftop garden, velvet […]
Kakadu. The sound is soft yet distinctive, like a bird call that rolls and unfolds across the willows and the reeds, the waters, the low and
A surprise find in the Roman Colosseum...
Warsaw. I've always thought it's a shame about the name. Krakow, the first city in Poland I visited, sounds intriguing and edgy, a cracking
“Are you ready?” asks Christopher, a guide from the nearby village of Wieliczka. He’s cloaked in a long charcoal jacket and blowing on
I’m writing this as the breeze plays with the straps of my bag and the white sails of the Sydney Opera House glow
Dust rose from the ground as the horse thundered past and the sun began its ablutions. It painted pinks and pomegranates, amber, pistachio, charcoal
Usually, I manage to find something beautiful, something that moves me wherever I go. But last night, in Petra, that didn’t happen.
In the scorching cauldron of Andalucia, the Sierra Nevada mountains rise up to tickle the skies and gather enough snow to cover the peaks for
Everything’s still, save for a breeze so slight it’s invisible until it reaches the window and makes the curtains sigh. I hear railway sounds
Life sometimes reinforces our inadequacies in a brutal, confrontational way. Soon, I'll be introducing you to Norbert Niederkofler, an imaginative,
Venice has a tempestuous love affair with the world. Millions of adoring fans visit La Serenissima each year, lured by the sirens of the Adriatic.
Speeding along the tarmac road, I wonder how long it’s been since I last took a normal breath. The road drops...
Everyone talks in whispers, the omnipresent classical music giving the atmosphere of a reverential mass, or perhaps a mix between a library,
