Sustainable tourism: ‘going green’ doesn’t just mean a splash of colour

Green has become cool. Show me a hotel, restaurant or travel company that doesn’t have a green policy or environmental statement and I will eat my organic hat. This is, of course, fantastic: the more places that commit to recycling or saving water, the better for us and our environment. Problems appear when ‘going green’

Does technology help or hinder our travels?

On a month long tour around Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos I noticed a frequent pattern amongst the thirty people I was traveling, me included. We all noticed it, and laughed at ourselves for it. Arriving at any hotel we did not look the amenities, or consider the comfort of our beds, or even delight

Cooking a feast in Chiang Mai

Home is where the hearth is. Just like mum used to make. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. The belly rules the mind. Tell me what you eat, I’ll tell you who you are. Ask not what you can do for your country; ask what’s for lunch. Food is far more

The Pink City – A weekend in Marrakech

As I avoid the other commuters on the bustling Broadway, lugging my laptop, trying to appear an efficient Real Grown Up, the waft from one of the sheesha cafes now more prolific than Starbucks in London, hits me. It channels not just through my nostrils, but envelopes my brain and caresses my sense. Suddenly I’m

Books, books, everywhere

Rachel Hazell sees books in everything. Repetition and order are for her stories and narratives, reminders of her favourite art form. Whether that’s the rows of clothes hanging on the rail next to us in the Kensington shop we meet at (‘like these clothes, the colours, the threads, the textures could be lines of runes