Tri Sri Lanka review: the lake hotel wrapped in cinnamon
On a hill above Koggala Lake in southern Sri Lanka, a water tower clad in cinnamon bark rises over a scattering of villas with gardens…
Travel
21 Bolivian landscapes so surreal they look like another planet
Coloured lakes, other-worldly rock formations and stark deserts. Where does a lake turn the colour of blood? Which desert looks as though Salvador Dalí painted…
Knockinaam Lodge review, inside the Galloway hideaway where Churchill and Eisenhower planned for D-Day
A getaway to the luxury country house Knockinaam Lodge in Scotland.
Horse riding in Salta with the gauchos of Sayta Ranch (and why you’ll want to stay for lunch)
Make like a gaucho and go horse riding in Salta, Argentina.
24 San Francisco landmarks worth every hill you’ll climb to reach them
Why is the Golden Gate Bridge orange rather than gold? Which prison island still lets you walk its cellblocks? And where in the city does…
37 things to do in Tbilisi, including the hidden gems most visitors walk straight past
There’s a waterfall hiding behind the sulphur baths, a café-bar in a Soviet sewing factory and a cable car that ends at a lake. There’s…
23 South America landmarks worth every hour it takes to reach them
One of them is a salt flat so big and so flat it has been used to calibrate satellites. Another is a glacier that has…
34 UK bucket list places that deserve a trip of their own
A beach in the Outer Hebrides that could pass for the Caribbean, a wall built to mark the edge of an empire and a village…
How to spend 2 days in Ottawa, the capital Canadians keep quiet about
Canada’s capital doesn’t shout about itself, which is exactly why it catches people off guard. Two days is enough to fall for it, as long…
H Hotel El Nido review: a vegan-friendly hotel with a rooftop for sunset
My H Hotel El Nido review: a stylish, vegan-friendly hotel in the middle of town, with a fully plant-based breakfast, mountain-view rooms and one of…
South Korea in October, when the ginkgo turns gold and the festivals fill the calendar
Warm afternoons, cool mornings and palace gardens on the turn: on paper, October is the month South Korea was made for. But how warm is…
Should you rent a hanbok in South Korea? Free palace entry is only half the story
Pastel silk skirts swish past palace gates, and every few steps someone is posing for a photo in front of an old tiled roof. Renting…
Why Tradition Resort Gurume, Andong’s village of rescued Joseon houses, is worth a night
Half a century ago, a handful of Joseon-era houses near Andong were about to vanish beneath a new reservoir. Instead, they were taken down, moved…
17 dishes to eat in South Korea, and where to try each one
Outside Korea, Korean food tends to mean barbecue, fried chicken and a jar of kimchi. In the country itself, almost every city has a dish…
Mokpo travel guide: a cable car over the sea and the streets of an old treaty port
Out on Korea’s southwest corner, Mokpo is a harbour city that once ranked among the busiest in the country and still wears its history on…
Aegibong Peace Ecopark: a DMZ alternative near Seoul, with no tour needed
On a wooded hilltop where the Han and Imjin rivers meet the sea, a glass observatory looks across a strip of water barely 1.4 km…
Ride the Busan Air Cruise over Songdo Bay, then walk the Cloud Trail above the waves
A line of little cabins swings out across Songdo Bay, 86 metres above the water, linking Korea’s oldest public beach to a wooded headland of…
Haedong Yonggungsa, the Busan seaside temple a sea god asked for
Korea’s great Buddhist temples usually hide deep in the mountains. This one clings to a ledge of dark rock with the East Sea breaking just…
How to see Gamcheon Culture Village, Busan’s painted hillside
In the early 1950s this hillside was a shantytown of about 800 wooden shacks, thrown up by families fleeing the Korean War. Today its houses…
Wander Bukchon Hanok Village, Seoul’s prettiest lanes (before the 5pm curfew)
On a hillside between two royal palaces, hundreds of wooden houses with curling tiled roofs crowd along steep, narrow lanes, and every so often a…
Gyeongbokgung Palace guide: guard ceremonies, night openings and a hall on a lake
This palace has been burned to the ground, rebuilt on a staggering scale, stripped back to a few dozen buildings and patiently pieced together again,…
Changgyeonggung, the Seoul palace I’d choose over all the others
This palace faces east instead of south, keeps the oldest throne hall in Seoul and hides a lake, a stone pagoda and a 1909 glasshouse…
Eat your way around Gwangjang Market, Seoul’s century-old food market
Under a long arched roof in Jongno, cooks fry pancakes by the dozen, slice raw beef to order and roll tiny gimbap faster than you…
Is N Seoul Tower worth it? The cable car, the views and a loo with a view
Seoul sprawls across a basin ringed by granite peaks, and the white needle on top of Namsan is the one spot where you can take…
Andong travel guide: Hahoe Folk Village, Confucian academies and the town’s famous braised chicken
Two hours from Seoul by fast train, Andong moves at a completely different pace. Scholars studied by its lakes for centuries, a clan village still…
Inside Jeonju Hanok Village, where more than 700 traditional houses fill the old town
Curved tiled roofs stretch out in every direction, visitors in silk hanbok drift down the lanes, and a red-brick cathedral rises among the wooden houses….
A Jeonju travel guide, from paper made by hand to a library on a lotus pond
Most visitors come to Jeonju for one thing: its famous hanok village. Stay a little longer and the city opens up, with a Confucian school…
Visiting the UN Memorial Cemetery in Busan, the only UN cemetery in the world
Rows of low headstones run between clipped hedges, the flags of 22 nations lift in the breeze, and the apartment towers of a busy port…
3 days in Busan: the itinerary for temples, beaches and seafood
South Korea’s second city packs beaches, hillside villages, seafood markets and a temple on the rocks into one long stretch of coast, and it’s far…
20 things to do in Busan, from a glass-floored cable car to blowfish cooked two ways
South Korea’s second city rarely gets second billing for long. It’s a port where you can paddleboard beneath a 7.4 km bridge in the morning,…
32 things to do in Seoul, from a virtual royal banquet to cocktails in an old teahouse
South Korea’s capital rewards a little planning. Royal palaces sit a short walk from glass towers, a market that has fed the city since 1905…
30 South Korea travel tips to know before you go, from cash to hidden cameras
Google Maps won’t get you very far, nobody brings you the bill, and the best part of a Korean spa is paid for in cash….
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See the places before you go
Short films from the places in my guides, so you can see what a destination really looks and feels like before you go.
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