All walks are different but the most interesting ones fall into one of three broad categories. First of all, there are mountain walks, which – to use a musical analogy – are a lot like opera. Full of excitement and drama, they always make you anticipate the next narrative twist along the route in the…
Provence is famous for its pretty villages: their street markets, busy sidewalk cafes and colourfully decorated handicraft shops. Les Baux, however, one of the region’s top destinations, is not like that at all. For one, you will find fewer sidewalk cafes and restaurants, certainly none that would line the high street. You will also find…
Today, we will offer you ideas of how to engineer a perfect three-day discovery trip to an unfamiliar destination. For starters, make sure that the three days are really three different days, not the same day played on repeat. One way of doing this is to assign different types of sightseeing activities to each of…
Tourist Italy mainly consists of cities and towns. There are beaches and lakes, of course, but close your eyes and conjure up an image of an Italian tourist destination, and I bet that it will be the image of a historic town: Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan, Naples – urban destinations are also Italy’s Big Beasts…
What people want most in life is love – or so psychologists had thought for a long time. Latest research in the field, however, appears to indicate that humans crave respect even more: and, above all, the kind of respect which is most hurtfully denied to them. Beautiful women want to be admired for their…
Just as Italy is not just the sum of Rome, Florence and Venice, Campania – the region south of Rome and its province of Lazio – is more than Naples plus the Amalfi Coast. Today and over the next few weeks, we will present this region to you in its full diversity, offering you something…
Vive la serendipité! Yes, you guessed it: this is another post in praise of serendipity walking, the art of making discoveries while wandering around aimlessly with the sole purpose of entertaining yourself. At least, this is how it is commonly defined, although, on a deeper level, there is much more to it than that. Serendipity…
For almost a thousand years, Saint Malo has been the best defended town not only in Brittany but in the whole of France: the only one that has been continuously surrounded by a fully functioning defensive wall. There has, after all, always been a lot for Saint Malo to defend itself against: the extent of…
Having explored the Brittany coast to the west of Saint Malo for last week’s hike, we will today turn in the opposite direction. But although the landscape around Rothéneuf – the starting point for today’s exploration of the GR34 coastal path – may look familiar with its mix of dramatic scenery … … and more…
A few years ago, French hikers were asked to name their favourite hiking trail in the country, and it was the great Brittany stretch of the nationwide coastal path that received the largest number of votes. I don’t know whether this vote was a one-off or whether it is conducted every year or so, and…