Absolutely nobody should be sharing this.

There is nothing to see here!

Intra Intra: 18th October 2025. Close by the Villa Taranto Gardens is Lake Maggiore, and Intra, where they hold an extensive market on Saturdays. It’s not the sort of place to go for your food shopping, …

Today's blog post: Intra travelrat.wordpress.com/2026/04/22/i...

Arrival at Rascafria Rascafria: 24th November 2013 Rascafria is only a couple of hours drive from Madrid, and came as rather a pleasant surprise. I’d done some research before my visit, and Google Earth showed it to be…

From my archives: Arrival at Rascafria travelrat.wordpress.com/2014/03/06/a...

Ta Prohm Siem Riep: 11th November 2019 The temple of Ta Prohm lies just a short distance away from the other complexes within the site. It is … or rather, was … a Buddhist temple built by Jayavarman VII, th…

From my archives: Ta Prohm travelrat.wordpress.com/2020/01/28/t...

Makes more sense than what's coming from the White House!

Tonle Sap Tonle Sap: 10th November 2019. The Tonle Sap Lake, the outflow of which eventually joins the Mekong, is about 20 miles from Siem Riep, and the reason the city wasn’t actually built on the lake is p…

From my archives: Tonle Sap travelrat.wordpress.com/2019/12/17/t...

The Time Top When we first saw it, we thought it was a piece of junk … a redundant marker buoy or something, cast on the foreshore of Vancouver’s False Creek. But, as we got closer, we realised it was a Sculptu…

From my archives: The Time Top travelrat.wordpress.com/2017/01/16/t...

Pic of the Week: Amsterdam

A Visit to Grumpy’s When I blogged about Australian beer last week, I neglected to mention the excellent beer brewed by a micro-brewery in the hills behind Adelaide, which we visited in 2006. It’s near Hahndorf, a vil…

From my archives: A Visit to Grumpy's travelrat.wordpress.com/2008/04/09/a...

Around the Horn It would be nice to think that America ended with a dramatic cliff, with a monumental lighthouse, or a huge statue of Magellan, or somebody atop, but it doesn’t. It fizzles out in a ragged archipel…

From my archives: Around the Horn travelrat.wordpress.com/2017/08/08/a...

Aboriginal Art I was sitting in the Art Gallery in Adelaide when a friendly volunteer stopped to speak to me. I was looking at a painting called ‘The Sailor Prince’. He said he didn’t know which Prince, and I sai…

From my archives: Aboriginal Art travelrat.wordpress.com/2016/09/13/a...

House Hunting I was AWOL last week, because we’ve been up north house-hunting. We thought it was about time we downsized and relocated, so we’ve had an offer on our house. Next thing was to find somewhere else t…

Today's blog post: House Hunting travelrat.wordpress.com/2026/04/15/h...

'He's not the Messiah. He's a very naughty boy!'

Roa Island Roa Island is a place of holiday cottages and a dormitory suburb for the people of Barrow in Furness. There’s a boat club here, and the Barrow lifeboat station. It’s also where you get the ferry to…

From my archives: Roa Island travelrat.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/r...

Laguna Lodge Tortuguero: 11th November 2022. If you’re looking for somewhere to chill out ‘far from the madding crowd’, the Laguna Lodge, near Tortuguero, is probably the place you’re looking for. Unless, of co…

From my archives: Laguna Lodge travelrat.wordpress.com/2022/12/15/l...

Laguna Lodge Tortuguero: 11th November 2022. If you’re looking for somewhere to chill out ‘far from the madding crowd’, the Laguna Lodge, near Tortuguero, is probably the place you’re looking for. Unless, of co…

From my archives: Laguna Lodge travelrat.wordpress.com/2022/12/15/l...

Peterhof St Petersburg: 28th November 2012. Since I got back from Russia, I’ve really had to hit the books. As I’ve said before, our history lessons at school concentrated mainly of English history, with a …

From my archives: Peterhof travelrat.wordpress.com/2013/02/18/p...

From my archives: Palacio de Soñanes travelrat.wordpress.com/2011/08/12/p...

Pic of the Week: Street Art, Leeds

From my archives: Mount Osorno travelrat.wordpress.com/2017/11/12/m...

Tea in China We often use the expression ‘I wouldn’t do it for all the tea in China’. ‘Char’, the slang word for tea is one of the few words we’ve imported from Chinese. Yet, at home, we rarely drink Chinese te…

From my archives: Tea in China travelrat.wordpress.com/2014/07/07/t...

Pictures: Villa Taranto When I posted about the Villa Taranto Gardens the other week, I couldn’t let it go without posting a few more pictures!

Today's blog post: Pictures: Villa Taranto travelrat.wordpress.com/2026/04/01/p...

The Chocolate Factory Rascafria: 27th November 2013 When I returned home from Torrecaballeros in 2012, I found a chocolate shop had opened on Madrid Airport. Of course, I bought chocolate … and found it surprisingly goo…

From my archives: The Chocolate Factory travelrat.wordpress.com/2014/04/17/t...

Chand Bara Step-Well. Abhaneri: 23rd September 2018 We rose early this morning, and drove to the site where Shah Jahan had proposed to build a second mausoleum, on the opposite bank of the Yamuna River. That project was…

From my archives: Chand Bara Step-Well travelrat.wordpress.com/2018/12/06/c...

Malzmühle We are departing in a couple of days on our Danube/Rhine river cruise. We’ve been to one or two of the places we’ll call at before, so I’ll put the blog into ‘standby’ with an old article arising f…

From my archives: Malzmühle travelrat.wordpress.com/2018/03/22/m...

Pic of the Week: Intra, Lake Maggiore, Italy

The Diner Even if we haven’t actually been in one, we’re all familiar with the American-style diner. It appears in many a movie or TV show, where the characters go for an inexpensive, but good meal. A place …

From my archives: The Diner travelrat.wordpress.com/2016/01/15/t...

Film Locations The other day, I missed an old film on an obscure cable channel. Now and Forever (1956) wasn’t a very good film, but, for me, it was notable for two things. Leading lady Janette Scott, on whom I ha…

From my archives: Film Locations travelrat.wordpress.com/2021/03/07/f...

Coast to Coast A couple of years ago, we visited Robin Hood’s Bay, on the Yorkshire coast. This, I said, was the first time I’d visited since 1988, when a group of us arrived here, having walked across the countr…

Today's blog post: Coast to Coast travelrat.wordpress.com/2026/03/25/c...

Roa Island Roa Island is a place of holiday cottages and a dormitory suburb for the people of Barrow in Furness. There’s a boat club here, and the Barrow lifeboat station. It’s also where you get the ferry to…

From my archives: Roa Island travelrat.wordpress.com/2010/06/23/r...