Most of my long trips begin with a red-eye out of Montreal, and a fair number of those red-eyes put me down at Schiphol with hours to spend before the next leg. …
Hello, fellow adventurers! Some places feel important the moment you arrive. Not because they overwhelm you, but because they carry weight – quietly, steadily, and with purpose. Parliament Hill in Ottawa is …
I came out of the Willem-Alexander Pavilion with a vague piece of information and no map sense whatsoever. Somebody had mentioned an orchid exhibition. I had no idea where it was, so …
You walk into the V&A and the first thing above you is a storm of blue and green glass. The great Chihuly chandelier hangs in the domed entrance hall, eleven metres of …
We came out of dinner at Sea Containers Restaurant, just along the river, into the cold and walked straight into Christmas. The South Bank does this every winter. The riverside fills with …
I wanted to love dinner at Sea Containers. The room is good-looking, the South Bank outside is all river and lamplight, and our table looked across the Thames to the dome of …
Most of us know Elizabeth I only as the powerful queen she became. The Virgin Queen. Gloriana. The pale, jewelled figure in the Phoenix portrait, a woman who ran England on her …
I expected to be charmed. Henry VIII is the king everyone knows, the one from the rhyme, the giant standing square in the famous portrait. I went round the places that carry …
Some nights you just want comfort food. It was a cold evening in early December, I had spent a few hours in Selfridges, and I had not booked anywhere. Selfridges in December …
I had Westminster Abbey near the top of my London list, and the Abbey had other plans. The day I went, it was closed to visitors. Catherine, the Princess of Wales, holds …
There is a stretch of the South Bank, somewhere between Westminster Bridge and the London Eye, where I always stop. Across the river, the Houses of Parliament line the water like a …
Some places make you stop and count the years. Standing in the Lower Ward at Windsor, below the chapel where Henry VIII lies buried, I worked out that the castle had already …
Across the street from Harrods, on the curve of Hans Crescent, there is a café that glows pink even in December. EL&N London had a garland of silver baubles around the door, …
You do not need a ticket to see the best of Buckingham Palace. The building you picture when you think of London (the long pale front, the gold-tipped railings, the balcony) is …
