I believe I’ve mentioned once or twice in this blog that I love travelling! It’s the thing I’ve most missed during the past two years, when the world has been turned upside-down. Yes, I know that sadly worse things have happened to very many people than a few missed trips abroad. But the fact remains, I’ve missed travelling, and I know many others have felt the same.
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It would be hard to visit Dorset without at some point coming across the name of novelist and poet Thomas Hardy. He is inexplicably linked to the county, so many places in which featured in his novels. On a recent visit to the county I found links to Hardy everywhere.
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When the Domesday Book was written, in 1086, what is now the pleasant London suburb of Ruislip was known as Rislepe, ‘leaping place on the river where rushes grow’. The book also tells us that it had more pigs than human inhabitants. These pigs roamed the extensive woodlands; and Ruislip Woods remain to this day, although smaller than they once were.
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On my first afternoon in Riga, as I sat with a coffee in the Livu Laukums, my eye was naturally drawn to the large bright yellow snail in one corner. Later that day I spotted a green one in the Ratslaukums and I was to come across several more during the course of my stay. What is more, these snails were on the move; slowly (as is normal for snails) they made their way around the city, each day a little further from their original starting place.
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If you want to find street art in London (and I mean LOTS of street art) you could do far worse than to head to Shoreditch. This trendy (albeit some say ex-trendy) district is a mecca for enthusiasts, both those who create and those, like me, who go to admire.
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In recent years I’ve been fortunate to celebrate my birthday in a number of different places. A memorable day in Ecuador visiting Cotopaxi, which was somewhat spoiled by an attack of altitude sickness! An even more memorable one in Ranthambore National Park in India, where a guide promised to find me a birthday tiger – and did! A day spent travelling to the Atacama in Chile, one of my dream destinations. A number of birthdays in Paris, including my 40th when my husband surprised me with a weekend visit. And a lovely birthday weekend three years ago in Lucca, Italy.
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We had learned to dance in the rain on Iceland’s Golden Circle; now today we were dancing in sunshine! Well, OK, not exactly dancing but certainly smiling. The sun was shining for the first time in several days. We, all friends from the Virtual Tourist community, were enjoying each other’s company at a wonderful weekend gathering. And we were off to explore the Snæfellsnes Peninsula, so packed with scenic spots that it has been dubbed ‘Iceland in Miniature’.
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What do you think of when you imagine a traditional British seaside resort? My guess is that Brighton would have pretty much everything on your list.
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What does a Golden Circle sound like to you? Something shiny for sure, and probably bright. And on a sunny day I am sure Iceland’s most popular tourist route is exactly that. But when I was there a few years ago with Virtual Tourist friends, it was anything but. If ever we needed to learn to dance in the rain, it was today!
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When the Prince Regent (later King George IV) built his seaside retreat in the small fishing village of Brighthelmstone in 1842, he didn’t know what he was starting. Or maybe he did? After all, all the fashionable world of his time followed his lead in everything, so it was only to be expected that they would follow him to the town that soon became known as Brighton.
