United Kingdom

How losing my blood-pressure medication in Cornwall turned my trip into a three-day Doc Martin story across England and Wales — except there was no Doc Martin when I needed one.Everything that follows is true. It is also why I now travel with two sets of my regular medication, packed in two different places.At the time, however, I was still innocen

Seven Sisters at 5:51 — grey skies, indifferent cows and the Coastguard Cottages I had travelled to see.I almost always go somewhere for my birthday, and more often than not I end up in London. In 2022, though, things were a little different. London was still part of the trip, but one of the main reasons for the trip lay south of the city, on the E

How I plan a trip to London around theatre, flights, hotels and transport — without treating the plan as sacred.Last time, Ncuti Gatwa and Edward Bluemel were to blame. I knew Gatwa as Eric from Sex Education and the Doctor from Doctor Who, and Bluemel from Killing Eve and My Lady Jane. In Born With Teeth, they were going to play Christopher Marlow

I returned to Edinburgh for Elizabeth II’s private rooms. W Edinburgh rewrote the script. By the time I reached Edinburgh, Queen Elizabeth II had already hijacked my Scottish itinerary from beyond the grave. Balmoral had top billing. It was the reason for returning to Scotland: the private Highland estate where the late Queen spent her summers, r

A £3.85 bus from Aberdeen, a castle seen from the outside and an easy coastal walk to Stonehaven There are places I visit because I want to understand them, and places I visit because I want one photograph good enough to justify the journey. Dunnottar Castle belonged firmly to the second category. I had known about it for years. It appears with s

Seven years after my first visit, I returned to discover what Oxford keeps behind its gates Had apparition been allowed inside Hogwarts, I could have travelled directly from the Gloucester Cathedral cloister where Mrs Norris was found petrified to the hospital wing in Oxford’s Divinity School. Unfortunately, it was not. So I had to take a train.

Scotland’s Oldest University, Medieval Ruins and the Town Where William Met Kate I had begun the morning at Dunnottar Castle. By the time I returned to Aberdeen, travelled south to Dundee and checked into another hotel, the sensible interpretation was that I had already done enough for one day. Sensible interpretations have rarely exercised much

A cliffside stay, a traditional seaside town and the fine art of apologising without acting London was not the destination. It was the large and inconvenient interchange between a flight landing at Stansted and a train leaving for the British seaside. After landing, I took the Stansted Express to Liverpool Street, one of London’s many mainline ra

The late Queen Elizabeth II kept Balmoral fiercely private — King Charles III now admits just twelve visitors per tour, at £110–£175 a head. Paying between £110 and £175 to enter Balmoral in a group of twelve is not exactly sneaking in. Still, the experience comes surprisingly close to being allowed into someone’s house while the owner is away. I