This morning at the hotel I sat in my preferred breakfast seat in front of the servery. The two tables there are outside the dining room...

​'When you buy or commission the work of a craftsman you buy more than just an item or service. You buy hundreds of hours of...

I loved seeing the very sophisticated Petersham Nurseries shop at Covent Garden - I tried to walk in before it even opened! But I was...

That's the gist of what Samuel Johnson said way back in 1777. I couldn't agree more! So when I woke on Saturday to grey skies and...

Picture a chef standing in front of you shucking ice-cold Mersea Island oysters as fast as you can eat them. That was Thursday night,...

I've been looking forward to searching the archives at Kew for so long I could hardly believe that the day had finally arrived. I was so...

The weather in Cork was just brilliant the whole time I was there but today it dawned drizzly, windy and foggy! It wasn't a pea souper...

If you've been following my research travels, you'll know there's been magic happening. When I told a man sitting next to me on a plane...

'I think Europcar is the best rental car company in the world,' I said seriously. 'That wasn't always the case,' said my helper at Cork...

Get ready. This post's a marathon. I told you about my mate Tom on the aeroplane. The next Corkonian I met was the taxi-driver - I asked...

On the way over in the plane, I was sitting in the window seat 1A, and in aisle seat 1C was a darling old fellow who said he was 87 but I...

I've heard so much about Petersham Nurseries that I was determined to see the shop in Covent Garden. These hydrangeas grandiflora were...

Thursday was another miserably ghastly London day! -:) I took the circle line to Green Park, and on my way past, dropped in at the Ritz,...

Like Frida I've had two significant events since I wrote last. On Wednesday I went to Portsmouth, and on Thursday I lost my phone at the...

I almost burst but not quite - 22,000 steps and 16 kilometres. I know because I looked at my watch. It's not easy being a tourist. I...