Bute
The sensitive topic of toilets and travel
I don’t care if you’re a member of the aristocracy with refined blue blood coursing through your veins, at some point when travelling you’re likely to get caught short. […]
Great Britain
Europe
Sleepy Sunrises and Sizzling Sunsets
Whereas sunrise gives notice it’s time to leave a cosy cocoon so the working day can start, a sunset is generally a signal for fun to begin… […]
Bute
Proud to Hail From the Isle of Bute
Over the years I woke up to how privileged I’d been to grow up in such a special location as a tiny island with shortbread tin looks which straddled the lowlands and the Highlands. Now I look on Bute with a mix of pride and sadness. […]
Europe
The Belief that British Food is Poor is Just Another Travel Myth
I regularly read travel pieces which accuse British food of being almost inedible. Whenever I read this the same question pops into my head – where do these people eat? […]
Europe
Review of citizenM in Glasgow
When did city hotels become so cool? I can say, hand on heart, that staying at the citizenM in Glasgow was the best British city centre hotel stay I’ve experienced… […]
Manchester
The Ryanair Experience
People streamed past my seat, running in the direction of the exits. A few seats in front of us a woman blocked the aisle, making room for her man to escape first. […]
Austria
Picking at Breakfasts around Europe
The realisation dawned that there is never going to be any time that I am going to think to myself ‘I really, really fancy tucking into a bowl of muesli.’ […]
Bute
A Scottish Tablet Awakening with Mrs Tilly’s
Before Jack first took me up to Scotland some 20 years ago, long before the digital revolution, the only tablet I was familiar with was the kind taken in pairs with a glass of water when I could feel a migraine coming on… […]
Bute
Why Are People Ignoring the Isle of Bute in Scotland?
For some reason Bute, one of Scotland’s most accessible, historic and interesting islands has fallen from grace and doesn’t seem to get an invite when Scotland… […]
Bute
Rediscovering Rothesay and the Island of Bute in Scotland
Bute is an island with a history that’s as rich as a Tunnock’s tea cake but that’s for another blog, this is more a whistle stop tour of some of my favourite places. […]
Bute
The Scary Rothesay Lade and why Alcohol is Good
When I was growing up the Rothesay Lade scared the hell out of me. To look at it you might wonder why a narrow channel of murky water running from Loch Fad… […]
Bute
A Pee and a Pic in Bute’s Victorian Toilets
The Victorian Toilets are one of the first things you’ll see after stepping off the ferry at Rothesay on the Isle of Bute. Years ago, when I was growing up on… […]
Europe
The Duke of Wellington Statue in Glasgow
The Duke of Wellington statue outside of the Gallery of Modern Art is a Glasgow landmark. That’s not because of the work of Italian sculptor Carlo Marochetti… […]
Food & drink
Are Brits Really Terrible Tourists?
We can’t be bothered to attempt to speak anybody else’s language. We only want to eat food we’re familiar with. We get outrageously drunk and either want to… […]
Europe
Gatwick, My Idea of Travel Hell
If I thought I was over the worst of my Gatwick experience I was sadly mistaken…by this time there was near anarchy in the queue with everyone, including me, clearly able to see that the EasyJet check-in system SUCKS. […]