Category: Travel
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How to see York – in 48 hours

I love cities that have many layers of history, where the stones speak of grim deeds, majestic events, innovative creations and the odd ghost. If your itinerary allows – spend some time in the atmospheric and elegant city of York, in Yorkshire, the UK’s second mediaeval city. Eat, drink, sleep and play – all budgets…
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The ultimate town of colour

I was so excited to finally visit the Blue Pearl – Chefchaouen in Morocco. Seeing images of the pretty town for years made me wary that I might be disappointed. No. This small city does not disappoint. How many words for blue? How many shades of blue are there? Baby blue, azure, cobalt, pale blue,…
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How to do ‘heritage hotel’

Amid the tall and slender, new and shiny and fair and funky, there’s a place where refinement and coolness resides in Sydney . . . Primus Hotel Sydney. The Presidential suite. When is a hotel not a hotel? Well, it’s always a hotel if it’s a hotel! But if it’s not a tall, shiny new…
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India’s pride and joy

Originally posted on Travelgal on the move: How many times have you seen an image of one of the world’s great monuments and memorised it for years hoping to see it in all its glory one day? Stonehenge in England, the Parthenon looking down from the Acropolis in Athens, the Great Pyramid of Giza in…
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Vietnam & Singapore take the cake

It’s time to talk about cake again. Classic high tea doesn’t have to be taken in an English country garden. These two teas enjoyed in Asia take the cake! When I’m travelling I always plan an afternoon tea experience into the itinerary mix. I think it is the most civilised and friendly ritual anyone could…
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Anzac Day – Lest We Forget

2020 saw ANZAC day – the remembrance day silent in the streets due to COVID lockdown. The sound of the bugle playing the last post rang out through empty streets of country towns and solitary memorials had fresh wreaths of flowers left quietly at their base. The Sydney Cenotaph was not surrounded by silent crowds…
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Morocco gets on my goat!

This is not fake news or fake photos. There we were, driving along a flat, dry part of the western Moroccan landscape dotted with small farm houses and solitary argan trees (agania spinosa), endemic to Morocco. I squinted at the tree in the distance, with its limbs spread out in the sun and great clumps…
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Drumming up light and love

Something happened to me in my mid 30s (a few years ago now) I stopped doing any regular exercise. I had dabbled in yoga and even had personal trainer for a short while. And as a teenager, had played competitive squash and tennis. But time and work and the party life offered little useful movement…
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Coffee clutch or . . . get some caffeine into you.

Lockdown over and time to do the cafe shuffle and grab a cup of Java with friends and let the world go by. Coffee snob? Think that cafe latte is the one and only? When you take a sip of this beautiful beverage it’s about the shot, the kick, the blend, so take a chance…
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Street wise: Hanoi, Vietnam

www.sofitel-legend-metropole-hanoi.comA quick fix blog this week as I am away on a yoga retreat in the Blue Mountains, a couple of hours west of Sydney (I knoooow, what was I thinking) and am short on blogging time this week. A post on the yoga experience might even make its way here if I survive bending,…