A new building site has recently been established close to my home. I feared it would be another housing development which would put yet more strain on our local roads and services. On this occasion the construction work has turned out to the redevelopment of a hospital but this is just a very small light at the end of an enormously long tunnel. Continue reading
Category Archives: Discussion
Writing a Holiday Journal
My father recently found a holiday journal that my late mother had written several years ago. Seeing my mother’s work reminded me that there was a time when a diary and a photo album were the only ways to document your travels. The entries truly spoke of my mother’s great love of her favourite destination, Switzerland, and I realised that our modern ways of recording our travels can be a poor substitute for a well written journal. Continue reading
Why Is The UK The Promised Land?
I always look forward to my travels with great glee. I can never wait to get away in order to enjoy beautiful scenery and a better climate. Furthermore my travels offer a welcome break from traffic jams and queuing for everything wherever I go. Whilst I am always dreaming of an escape, however, it appears that much of the rest of the world dreams of nothing but getting into the UK. Continue reading
Does Four in a Room work?
Many of the best prices for holidays that you see advertised are based on four people sharing a room. I have to say that such a level of overcrowding had never appealed to me despite the fact that I love a bargain and so I was shocked to find myself agreeing to such a trip. It was my friend’s birthday and he wanted to spend four days at Disneyland Paris. None of us had money to burn and so we opted for the cheapest deal and I was left wondering if we were facing disaster. Continue reading
Hiring a Car? – What a minefield!
If you are an independent traveller or you would like to be, one of the issues that jumps up to bite you is car hire. OK you are not going to expect it to be cheap. Nobody is going to gift you a car but that doesn’t excuse the morass of extra charges and complications that you are invariably presented with when you try to book. The press are happy to slate Ryanair on an almost daily basis for their lack of transparency but in my experience that airline has got nothing on car hire firms when it comes to causing confusion. Continue reading
When A Hotel Bargain Isn’t Such a Great Deal
There are some lucky people for whom money is no object when they travel. They can afford to book the most luxurious hotel at their chosen destination without having to worry. For the rest of us the situation is a little more complicated. Most of us have some sort of budget to accommodate and with limited funds any savings we make can help finance another trip. Accommodation is one of the most costly elements of any holiday and so we are all looking for a great deal but the cheapest hotel is not always the best value. Continue reading
Value for Money on the Pistes
Skiing holidays don’t come cheap wherever you go and some of the top resorts are totally beyond the pockets of many travellers. There are, however, ways of mitigating the expense and you can even ski on some of the top pistes without paying their extortionate charges. So how do you save money on your winter break? Continue reading
A Nightmare Hike
Sometimes things don’t go entirely according to plan when you are hiking in the mountains. I have learnt to my cost that it pays to be prepared for all eventualities and one thing you should always do is check the weather forecast which is exactly what I didn’t do when a hike turned into a nightmare. What started as a pleasant walk in the sunshine to one of my favourite beauty spots quickly descended into a highly unpleasant experience. Continue reading
Wandering Off Track
The new Discovery channel programme Bear Grylls: Escape From Hell tells the stories of those who have been lost in dangerous territory and survived. You would think that these would be tales of intrepid daring do and would feature mainly people who live life on the edge but most of the stories are actually about normal people doing relatively normal things. These are ordinary folk who have found themselves lost whilst out trekking or skiing not explorers in search of remote civilisations. The more I watch, the more it has hit home how easy it is to find yourself in trouble on even a comparatively mundane trip. Continue reading
I need a Holiday but Can I afford the time?
We all love our vacations and these breaks form the highlight of most people’s year. We spend a great deal of time planning them which is part of the fun and they provide us with something to look forward to for the rest of the year. In these harsh economic times, however, it is tempting to make savings by cancelling the annual trip and if you are under pressure with your work it can feel frivolous to go away. I firmly believe that our breaks should never be missed and that they actually play an important role in helping us cope with our busy lives. Continue reading