Sandy seashores and a vigorous buzz, Sicily

I spent September travelling round Sicily alone, totally on foot, and I wished to flop on a seashore earlier than going residence. I settled on Cefalù on the north coast, due to its uncommon mixture of sandy seashore and medieval city – and it was love at first sight. I had heard that the tiny city will get unpleasantly packed in summer time, however by late September there was only a vigorous buzz. Cefalù appeared a distillation of in every single place else I had been: Sicily in miniature. I gazed up on the mosaic-bright Christ Pantocrator within the twin-towered Arab-Norman cathedral. I got here nose to nose with Antonello da Messina’s enigmatic Portrait of an Unknown Man, a masterpiece within the unassuming (and empty) Museo Mandralisca. I climbed La Rocca, an enormous crag that looms over the city, to a fourth- or fifth-century temple and ruined fort.

I pottered across the cobbled streets, popping into ceramic retailers and a gelateria; joined the passeggiata alongside the seafront at sundown; and idled in piazzas ingesting Campari spritz and consuming pasta con le sarde. In truth, it wasn’t till the final afternoon that I lastly discovered time to laze on the seashore.
Rachel Dixon

Bay-hopping in Croatia

Wanting like an enormous misshapen claw, Telašćica nature park dangles from the southern finish of the Croatian island of Dugi Otok, close to the islands of Kornati nationwide park. However whereas the Kornatis are scrubby barren dots of sheep-covered land, most of Telašćica is lusciously inexperienced – all the higher to indicate off its distinction with the vivid blue of the Adriatic. Inside this unusual claw are 25 bays and 6 islets surrounded by olive groves, vineyards and forested hills heavy with the scent of pine. I adopted a street as much as a viewpoint in an previous Habsburg fort, from which I might see glistening swimming pools of the Adriatic flowing between inexperienced mounds, and moored crusing boats. Close by is Mir, a saltwater lake skirted by limestone cliffs. It’s a preferred swimming spot for day-trippers from Zadar, so I headed as an alternative to Jaz bay for a swim off the pebbly shore. Right here I discovered the peace that was missing in Mir, which, sarcastically, interprets as peace. Fortunately, right here at Telašćica, there’s loads of that to go spherical.
Mary Novakovich

Rousseau’s romantic retreat

When an sudden chilly snap descended on Lac Annecy and compelled us off the pedalo, we headed into close by Chambery for a scorching chocolate – and found the indicators for Les Charmettes, the museum and former residence of thinker Jean-Jacques Rousseau. A teenage Rousseau met Madame de Warens, 13 years his senior, in 1728. He known as her “maman” they usually moved into Les Charmettes farmhouse collectively in 1736. With no guards or velvet ropes, guests are free to wander round Rousseau’s bed room and Madame’s extra romantic quarters (with hand-painted wallpaper). Downstairs, there’s a clavichord, a chaise longue and a desk set for lunch à deux. Rousseau wrote that within the 5 years he spent there, he “loved a century of life and whole and full happiness.”

He handed the time devising a numerical type of music notation, climbing within the Chartreuse mountains and advancing his philosophical “storehouse of concepts”. The gardens embrace uncommon vines, beehives and an orchard with views which have barely modified since Rousseau gazed throughout the valley. His philosophy influenced the French Revolution and Charmettes turned a spot of pilgrimage after his loss of life.
Jon Bryant

The world’s longest picket staircase, Norway

Spending my summers rising up in Glencoe means I’m always carrying the emotional influence of its serene mountains and lochs behind my thoughts. Which is to say that once I’m travelling I’m all the time assessing nature’s most awe-inspiring sights as compared, even when that always ends in disappointment. So the very first thing that struck me whereas climbing to the highest of the world’s longest picket staircase, all 4,444 steep steps above the roadless village of Flørli in south-west Norway, was how empty it was. Barring a handful of hikers from Stavanger behind me, I used to be alone and that was barely unnerving, if thrillingly welcome in late summer time. It was virtually unreal.

The second factor I’ll always remember was the heart-in-mouth panorama on the high. From the Ternevass dam, the deep-blue Lysefjord and the mammoth cliffs of Preikestolen throughout its sun-brushed floor jostled for my consideration. The panorama was bare and virtually Caledonian, and but it was a Norwegian wilderness to dream on.

So, in a salute to my short-term hosts, I indulged in friluftsliv, the Nordic concept of open-air residing and outside journey, and got here again for extra the following day.
Mike MacEacheran

Wine from Flanders? I almost spilt my beer

French individuals have a tendency to provide you an odd look if you discuss wine from Belgium, a rustic extra readily related to beer, mussels and frites. However my eyes have been opened throughout a winery and foodie tour of the bucolic nook of west Flanders generally known as Heuvelland, the Hilly Land, not removed from the sombre warfare memorials of Ypres.

It’s a shock to find these hills lined with vines and younger, dynamic vignerons opening their cellars for tastings of wines whose high quality actually impresses guests. Martin Bacquaert makes some excellent glowing vintages at Entre-deux-Monts, following the traditional méthode traditionelle made well-known by champagne makers.

Over at Monteberg, wine lovers can sit out at a panoramic terrace, feasting on cheese, charcuterie and fruit from an natural farm whereas sipping bubbly, a fruity pink or making an attempt artisanal gin. Heuvelland’s tourism workplace excels at recommending visits. A romantic spot to remain is B&B De Rentmeesterhoeve, an historic manor home surrounded by a moat and gardens.
John Brunton

Rambling to Portugal’s mountain villages

My go to to Peneda-Gerês, Portugal’s solely nationwide park, had been a very long time coming, Covid-postponed from spring 2020. However lastly, in late August, I discovered myself rambling round its granite massifs, alongside shepherd tracks and pilgrim trails – and into Soajo. This little mountain village is one in every of Peneda-Geres’s most conventional, with tight-knit alleys, an historic pillory (carved, often, with a smiley face) and an abundance of espigueiros, the area’s typical stilted, stone granaries. I stayed at Casa do Eiró, an previous home by the principle sq.. It has been in proprietor Rosa Rocha’s household for generations; her images and knick-knacks are nonetheless scattered inside. Every morning Rosa introduced a breakfast basket, with contemporary bread from Soajo’s bakery and peaches from her backyard. Within the evenings I ate at restaurant Saber ao Borralho the place Rosa – additionally owner-chef right here – cooked up large parts of carne de cachena (native beef) and fig cheesecake.
Sarah Baxter

Mosques, minarets and moreish meals, Istanbul

“As I used to be going to Üsküdar,” sang Eartha Kitt within the Nineteen Fifties in her fabulous rendition of the Turkish tune Kâtibim. Üsküdar, a neighbourhood on the Asian facet of Istanbul, had someway handed me by … however now I had Eartha’s voice in my head as I boarded the ferry for the brief scenic journey from Karaköy on the European facet. Two issues drew me there: a specific lokanta (restaurant) and a well-known waterside mosque. The chestnut pilav and dolma at Kanaat Lokantası, arrange by the Kargılı household in 1933, was nearly as good as I’d been informed by pals, the setting distinctly quaint, the meals moreish and wealthy. Then a five-minute stroll again in direction of the ferry dock took me to Mihrimah Sultan mosque), inbuilt 1548 for the daughter of Süleyman the Magnificent. Strikingly stunning with its slender minarets and stained-glass home windows, it’s however one in every of Üsküdar’s many historic mosques, giving purpose to return.
Caroline Eden

The ‘improbably fairly’ Welsh Marches

It was whereas studying Jan Morris’s e-book, Wales: Epic Views of a Small Nation, throughout lockdown that it dawned on me how little of this “damp, demanding and obsessively fascinating nation” I had visited. Earlier journeys had traced the standard vacationer routes from Cardiff’s Millennium stadium and the seashores of Pembrokeshire to Snowdonia.

My post-lockdown decision was to discover part of the nation that always will get bypassed – the drive-through borderlands of mid-Wales. The primary shock was that we arrived in the midst of a heatwave. The second got here once we climbed as much as the ruins of the Norman fort in Montgomery and took within the view. It was expansive, filmic even: an improbably fairly scene with the church tower of the little city within the foreground, and the inexperienced pastures of Powys and Shropshire operating out to Corndon Hill within the distance.

One other line from Morris got here again to me: “To have a look at, the character of Wales is misleading. Inside its small expanse the fashion of terrain modifications so usually, the mountainous countryside is so always corrugated, this fashion and that … the scene in brief is so cunningly variegated.”
Andy Pietrasik

A navy lark in Puglia, Italy

The port metropolis of Brindisi has by no means bothered a lot with vacationers. In its 2,600 years of historical past, the doings of troopers, seafarers and merchants in its large pure harbour have been much more vital. Whereas prior to now decade it has added a sensible seafront promenade lined with eating places, bars and gelaterias, its previous city, with all of the windy stone streets and church buildings you’d anticipate, nonetheless sees little in the best way of crowds. The archaeological museum subsequent to the cathedral is even free to enter. Its assortment of historic Greek vases and wonderful Roman mosaics rivals these in Naples and Sicily, but we had it to ourselves on a sunny autumn afternoon. The imposing Thirteenth-century fort shouldn’t be open to the general public as a result of – think about! – it’s nonetheless in navy use, a base for the Italian marines.

There’s loads of civic life too: Brindisi bursts on to the streets for the early-evening passeggiata, notably alongside palm-lined Corso Giuseppe Garibaldi (the 4Erre bar, on the nook of Vicolo Sacramento, does a really beneficiant Aperol spritz). Under the fort, Antica Osteria La Sciabica served us fishy starters and pillowy pizzas on a waterside terrace overlooking moored trawlers – and an enormous gray gunship.
Liz Boulter

Glamping and milking cows in Romania

I heard about Dobraia – a brand new glampsite excessive within the wild Cerna mountains – due to Romania Personal Excursions. The distant camp contained in the Domogled-Valea-Cernei nationwide park, in Romania’s little-visited Banat area, shouldn’t be simple to achieve: it’s a seven-hour drive from Bucharest, after which a steep two-hour hike (a tough monitor reaches the spot, however you want an off-road automobile). But it’s price each step if you lastly see 4 white bell tents (every costing about £35 an evening) gazing at limitless mountains.

All meals are homecooked by the self-sufficient homeowners, the Raduta household – each ingredient is organically grown or produced by them. I went in August with my husband and two younger kids, who liked serving to carry the cows residence from foraging within the forests, then milking them by hand; and we swayed in hammocks below plum bushes, picnicked in orchards and walked to remoted hamlets strung among the many peaks. It’s so bucolic I half anticipated the Greek god Pan to seem together with his flute.
Kate Eshelby

The perfect of the Pennine Means

A few of the Pennine Means may be depressing. Days are spent trudging throughout desolate moors. Even when it’s dry, secret bogs lie beneath, hungry for drained legs. Cottongrass is the one factor in a position to abdomen the acid beneath and gloom above. However there’s historic majesty in these 268 miles. West of Middleton in Teesdale, the trail runs alongside the river and the shrubs thicken with juniper, a relic of the top of the ice age. Quickly, the water gathers tempo and turns into Excessive Power, a 22-metre waterfall that plunges over a shelf of dolerite shaped 295 million years in the past. Two hours west and the skies widen because the river yawns round Cronkley Scar. The grass flows within the breeze, tickling the tummies of the Belted Galloways from Widdybank Farm. Above, curlews and lapwings soar with delight. After I was there, the solar perched above Cauldron Snout. It appeared to attend for hours, as if loath to show its again on the wonder beneath.
James Gingell

The one approach is Essex church buildings

It started, like all the most effective journey discoveries, by likelihood. I used to be in Brightlingsea on the Essex coast when somebody really helpful All Saints Church. There I found a dado path of 211 massive sq. tiles girdling the inside, every recalling an area sailor misplaced at sea. Beginning in 1872 with a father and son drowned off Hartlepool, it continues by means of horrible winters, giving a couple of particulars: Samuel Bridges, for instance, was “washed overboard from the Mary Anne of Aberystwith 15 miles north of Bishop Mild”. There was even an area man on the Titanic: steward Sidney Siebert, who leaped overboard however died within the lifeboat.

Essex church buildings repay your dedication. Too many are locked, or open hardly ever, however be persistent: St Clements in West Thurrock, is a flinty-faced Twelfth-century chapel overshadowed by a cleaning soap manufacturing facility , a visible oxymoron and magnet for movie scouts (keep in mind the funeral a part of 4 Weddings?). Stroll down the Thames from Purfleet station previous a feast of graffiti artwork and industrial structure.
Kevin Rushby

Going Gothic on Germany’s Baltic coast

Flanked by the Baltic Sea with its vigorous harbour dipping into the Ryck River, I spent two days within the Western Pomeranian metropolis of Greifswald throughout a blisteringly chilly October break. It was the primary time I had visited the attractive Hanseatic metropolis, 50 miles from the Polish border. Round each nook was yet one more magnificent piece of structure with an equally spectacular historical past – from its St Nikolai cathedral, peeping above its central sq., to the previous Cistercian monastery, Eldena Abbey, on the outskirts. Stood within the centre of its marktplatz you might be cocooned inside renovated Gothic-style buildings in shades of crimson, sunshine yellow and dusky pinks. These buildings have been immortalised within the work of its most well-known son, the Romantic interval artist Caspar David Friedrich. There may be an exceptionally vigorous bar scene because of the metropolis’s Fifteenth-century college and an opportunity to go on a ship journey to the close by charming city of Wieck with its conventional salted fish eating places.
Nazia Parveen

Shocking safaris on the Isle of Wight

Funnelling into the thick cover of bushes at nightfall, I felt as if somebody out of the blue turned out the lights. “Are you able to see something?” I whispered to my information Dave Fairlamb, as my eyes strained, hoping to make out the form of an elusive and endangered creature. “Not but,” he replied as we continued to really feel our approach alongside the footpath on our nocturnal safari.

On the subject of observing and photographing wildlife in its pure habitat – notably in Britain – my mind mechanically wanders north, picturing deer and pine marten in Scotland’s Cairngorms, seal pups on the Isle of Mull, or puffins on the cliffs of Northumberland’s Farne Islands. But 2021 was the yr I found that now we have a very wild isle additional south – the Isle of Wight.

I visited this summer time to spy sea eagles at Brading Marsh, pink squirrels in Borthwood Copse, wall lizards at Ventnor, stingray at Thorness Bay and, guided solely by the sunshine from the moon, elusive dormice in Alverstone. And although a few of my safari was spent at the hours of darkness, I felt like a lightweight had been shone on the wilder facet of this Victorian beachside favorite.
Phoebe Smith

A monster journey to Loch Ness

Whereas there are stunning parks close to us, we do stay in the midst of a concrete jungle in east London and I usually dream of being within the wilderness. So, in October, in celebration of our third marriage ceremony anniversary, we obtained on a practice to Inverness. The eight-hour practice journey was one in every of my favorite components of the vacation. I liked seeing the space I used to be placing between myself and the place I had felt so caught in for thus lengthy and eventually having the time to learn.

We spent a couple of days driving throughout totally different areas of the Highlands, from Loch Ness to the Isle of Skye. In Inverness, I liked visiting Leakey’s secondhand bookshop, and the Culloden Battlefield. The boat journey in Loch Ness is unmissable – even on a wet October day – as is the fantastic stroll we went on in Kinloch Forest and the fort, Eilean Donan. I notably liked how small I felt driving across the North Coast 500 route. It was an vital reminder that after greater than a yr of feeling my world shut inwards, there are such a lot of issues a lot greater than me.
Aamna Mohdin

Pigs trotters with prawns within the Pyrenees

With Spain below partial lockdown for a lot of the yr, and inter-regional journey off the playing cards, residing right here I discovered it an excellent aid to have the numerous landscapes of Catalonia shut at hand: its ragged shoreline of lengthy, sandy seashores and hidden bays; the rice paddies of the delta to the south; the crystal-clear mountain lakes and aromatic pine forests to the north. Up right here close to the border with France, on the roads that wind by means of the foothills of the Pyrenees, is the place you’re most definitely to stumble throughout one in every of Catalonia’s biggest charms – the random apparition of the form of restaurant city-dwellers can solely dream of. Thick stone partitions, backyard tables dappled with shade, and a blackboard trumpeting the sticky chargrilled soul meals that ought to all the time spherical off a day’s climbing. And so it was with Restaurant Girul, simply exterior the village of Meranges.
Oxtail stew, pigs’ trotters with prawn, and doormat-sized T-bone steaks share the billing with trinxat (a Catalan tackle bubble and squeak) and a tray of snails simply as they need to be: not bland, not rubbery, simply the correct quantity of garlic. Three programs and a bottle of first rate native pink introduced the invoice for 2 to €70.
Sally Davies

Following Hippocrates into Greece’s therapeutic springs

As somebody who begins shivering as quickly because the mercury sinks beneath 15C, I’m a agency fan of Greece’s scorching springs, which surge out of the bottom at blood-warming temperatures.
Mentioned to treatment every thing from eczema to arthritis, they’ve been fashionable since antiquity: celebrated doctor Hippocrates was satisfied of the therapeutic properties of thermal water and fifth-century BC historian Herodotus was additionally an enormous fan of balneotherapy, appropriately sufficient in a rustic the place legend has it that child Achilles turned (virtually) invincible after his mom dipped him within the Styx’s spring-fed waters.

I found the new spring lake of Vouliagmeni whereas exploring the Athenian riviera, 30 miles of beach- and tavern-fringed shoreline stretching from the stylish suburbs of Palaio Faliro to Poseidon’s temple at Cape Sounion. Surrounded by pine forests, the lake is definitely a sunken cave fed by thermal springs that bubble up at about 21C. Wallowing within the (barely smelly) sulphur-rich waters the place Greeks have bathed away their aches and pains for two,500 years was a legendary expertise. A day move is €15-18 and under-fives go free.
Heidi Fuller-Love

The Clarion name of Britain’s final socialist refuge

I got here throughout Clarion Home by likelihood, driving residence from Roughlee, in Lancashire. There, by the roadside, was a reasonably, single-storey red-and-white constructing, with a easy trumpet for its emblem. It was inbuilt 1912 for mill and manufacturing facility staff who got here up into the countryside round Pendle Hill to flee the grime and noise of more and more congested cities reminiscent of Colne and Brierfield. Inside are posters from the Spanish civil warfare, a good looking piece of stained glass and a banner emblazoned with “Staff of the world unite”. Smooth daylight streams in by means of the home windows. Lengthy benches are laid out for chatting over a cup of tea and the Communist Manifesto. Throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Clarion Homes popped up in a number of rural areas – many linked to biking golf equipment – together with Halewood in Merseyside and Sheldon in Birmingham. Sadly, the Clarion Home I “found” in 2021 is the one one nonetheless standing. In my dream future, there are Clarion Homes dotted all around the regreened, rewilded UK, serving as waystations and watering holes on “sluggish methods” that be a part of up all our hamlets and villages, cities and cities. That’s my clarion name for right now.
Chris Moss

Consuming within the ambiance of Valletta’s again streets

Like most of my favorite locations all over the world, this one was uncovered by chance. Dropped off on the mistaken handle down a backstreet within the Maltese capital, I scanned the nice and cozy limestone partitions, balconied and shuttered, and puzzled which housed our restaurant. Early for our seating, we climbed a set of steps anticipating an empty alley and seemed up at what seemed to be a makeshift restaurant cascading in direction of us. Tables and shiny picket chairs wobbled on the slabs, {couples} sipped cocktails and shared deep-fried duck rolls and steaming pizza. Ready employees appeared from picket shutters within the partitions and strings of golden bulbs zigzagged from one facet of the road to a different. Heat, inviting, quiet sufficient to speak, noisy sufficient to mix in, Saint Lucia Avenue was the proper spot for a pre-dinner drink, naked shoulders and flip-flopped toes nonetheless heat within the salty coastal air.
Monisha Rajesh

Riverside hike close to Belfast

In Might, I spent every week exploring the wild inexperienced areas round Belfast: the basalt cliffs of Cave Hill, heather-covered Black Mountain, the glens of Antrim and the wooded seashores of North Down. One revelation for me, even within the rain, was the favored 11-mile towpath beside the River Lagan to the neighbouring metropolis of Lisburn, with trains again to Belfast. Strolling upstream from the ceramic large fish sculpture, celebrating the river’s 1999 regeneration, I detoured by means of the clematis-covered arches and 1840s palm home of Belfast’s Botanic Backyard. Cows have been grazing the flowery Lagan meadows, two miles additional on, and a lock-keeper’s cottage stood below pink-and-white apple blossom. My favorite stretch was Minnowburn with its mossy waterside beeches, winding waterways, and van promoting tea and cake. There have been clouds of cow parsley, clumps of yellow kingcups, herons within the willows, and a swan nesting proper by the trail.
Phoebe Taplin

The economic landscapes of Luxembourg

It was an curiosity in migrants from Cape Verde that took me to the south of Luxembourg. Most guests to the Grand Duchy make first for the capital after which, in the event that they go anyplace else in any respect, enterprise into the hilly Ardennes area within the north. However the former industrial landscapes that nudge up in direction of the French border are actual hidden Europe territory. This southern fringe of Luxembourg is wou dat roud Gold gegruewe gou – Luxembourgish for “the place the pink gold was dug”. The pink gold was iron ore. The foundries and smelters within the Alzette Valley are lengthy gone, and the area round Esch is now the hub of one in every of Europe’s most-ambitious programmes of regeneration and concrete renewal.

There’s actual visible drama in these erstwhile industrial areas and I fancy we’ll be listening to much more about this area in 2022 as Esch-sur-Alzette steps into the limelight as a European Capital of Tradition.
Nicky Gardiner