Telling people I was visiting Kyiv on holiday became my new favourite thing to do; their mild confusion and surprise grew to be quite enjoyable – ‘Ukraine… really?’. I wasn’t going to Ukraine just because I’d found cheap flights, or because I wanted to ‘check off’ new country, or because it was ‘a bit different’ […]
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Despite grappling with the heavy muggy heat of visiting Italy in mid-summer, my first impression of Venice was a huge surprise to me. Like most, I could appreciate the bucket-list allure of this romantic city of waterways, but I was wary about subjecting myself to the hellish ‘high-season’ crowds I’d be warned about. Previous holidays […]
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Portugal, it’s been too long. Years ago I stayed in Lisbon for a single night, en-route to spend a few days in the Algarve. The Algarve, as impressive as the coastline was, didn’t do enough for me to tempt me back, yet Lisbon left me longing for more. Sure, if I’m honest with myself, I […]
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Okay, so Helsinki is one of the lesser-visited European capital cities, which baffled me; the city seemed to tick a lot of boxes! Fins are known for their sauna culture, moomins, of course, for having more heavy rock bands per capita than anywhere else in the world, and a word in their language ‘kalsarikanni‘ that […]
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Arriving into Stockholm in biblical style downpours was amongst the worst of welcomes we’ve had at the beginning of any trip. We’d also just flown into Stockholm Skavsta, where the use of ‘Stockholm’ in it’s name shouldn’t be relied upon too heavily; the coach transfer on the ‘Flygbussarna’ took nearly as long as our flight […]
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We already know everything we need to know about Luxembourg, right? A tiny tax haven crammed on the cross roads of Germany, Belgium and France. Surely not the first place you’d think about visiting for a bank holiday weekend? Well, sure, probably not. In all truthfulness, I wanted to visit Luxembourg because my unintentional avoidance […]
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Germany’s second largest city Hamburg is like Berlin’s older sister; understatedly cool, modest and confidently sure of herself, but there’s that shared underlying streak of edginess and rebellion that Berlin brazenly flaunts. When I was trying to find a word that describes my trip, ‘unexpected’ seems to best capture my experience. Hamburg was totally unexpected. If you’ve […]
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Adjective – Fairy tale: “having a special and attractive or beautiful quality, like something in a fairy tale“. You’ll rarely find a blog post or piece of travel writing on Brugges that doesn’t shoehorn this term into every paragraph. ‘You’re going to Belgium?’ ‘Oh’ they say, ‘go to Bruges it’s beautiful! Street’s like a fairy tale’ Yup, Well hey, how […]
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What do you do when you find yourself with a surprise week off work? Book a spontaneous few days in Northern Europe, that’s what! In an unexpected twist, over Christmas I found myself accepting a new job in Manchester which in turn saw me gain a nice 10 day gap of unemployment-bliss before I jumped […]
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When I booked my flights to Bucharest it was that week that sits just before Christmas. I was bored and frustrated; I hadn’t managed to secure a December break, and I was panicking slightly that I was teetering on the brink of 2017 and I had nothing to look forward to. Cries first-world-problem tears I’d […]
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“I’m going to Warsaw” was my answer to “so… where’s next for you?”. The revelation of these holiday plans weren’t exactly greeted with squeals of wild wanderlusting, more a slight creasing of the forehead and a somewhat dazed, puzzled look whilst they tried to figure out where Warsaw was or why anyone would want to […]
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Visit Reykjavik’s Sun Voyager Price: Free! The unmistakable sculpture on Reykjavik’s northern coast is a nod to the country’s Viking history. Constructed in 1990, to celebrate the city’s 200th anniversary, this incredible modern art piece jars spectacularly against the backdrop of mount Esja across the harbour and is a great place to meet and relax whilst […]
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I’ll try not to make this blog post sound like a love letter to Iceland, but in all honesty, I left my heart here on my first trip out here in 2014 and uh, I’ve been desperately lovesick ever since. Sometimes you see too much of something and you become immune to it. But Iceland? This […]
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The moment is here! I’d been planning these seven days for months on end; booked the flights as soon as they were released, scored an awesome Airbnb deal by reserving my dates months in advance, firmed up a kick-ass ‘Best of Iceland’ itinerary with whale watching, Geothermal Spas and self-drive tours… Hell, there’s no such […]
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So, who’s been dreaming of their perfect wedding since they could walk? Throwing a white bed sheet over your head in a mock-veil, stealing your mothers’ white heels and lipstick, flashing that gummy Haribo ring you’ve jammed on your left hand and pronouncing the hallway your ‘aisle’ as you totter and trip towards your imaginary ‘Prince […]
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