Spend long enough in a good hotel and you start to notice what’s missing. You can’t wander into a kitchen at midnight for a glass of wine without putting on shoes. Dinner is whenever the restaurant decides it is. The terrace, if there is one, belongs to everyone. A luxury villa solves all of this […]
The couple had chosen Mykonos because they had been there the previous summer and fallen in love with a particular view from a particular terrace on the south of the island. They wanted their wedding at that spot. They had photographs. They had a vision. What they did not have, when they first contacted me […]
With Summer now officially underway (it starts on 1st June each year according to the Met Office), there’s no better time to explore the UK‘s wonderful array of gardens open to the public. Regular readers will be familiar with some we have visited in recent years – such as the wonderful National Trust Crook Hall […]
This August, something remarkable is going to happen over the Mediterranean. On the evening of 12 August 2026, a total solar eclipse will sweep across Spain and the western Med, turning a warm summer evening briefly, dramatically, dark. The Balearic Islands — Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza, Formentera — sit right in its path. They were already […]
Most people’s Ibiza starts the same way. A villa somewhere inland, a car, daily trips to the coast, and a drive back each evening. It works. It’s also significantly worse than what happens when the beach is a short walk from where you’re sleeping. That gap matters more than most people account for before booking. […]
Kubili House is tucked into a seriously wild corner of South Africa‘s Thornybush Private Game Reserve in the Greater Kruger ecosystem. People who know luxury safari travel have always loved this place. But right now, things are moving fast behind closed doors as the lodge has changed hands. The new owners are keeping the original […]
I have been doing this since 1999. Twenty-five years. The telephone calls at two in the morning. The villa owner who said no, and then said yes. The yacht that needed a crew change forty-eight hours before departure. The table at the restaurant that had been fully booked for six weeks until it was not. […]
The best RV is not the one with the most features. It is the one that fits the way you actually travel. A weekend campground family, a full-time couple, a remote worker, a national park explorer, and a tailgating crew all need different things from an RV. That is why shopping by floor plan alone […]
Planning a trip to Peru is exciting, especially when Machu Picchu is at the top of your travel bucket list. This ancient Inca citadel is one of the most visited destinations in South America, attracting travellers from around the world every year. However, many visitors make the mistake of waiting too long to organise their […]
Travelling by train is very different to other forms of transport. You could even say it’s a luxury of sorts. Unlike sitting on a plane, where you might gaze ahead at your route map or watch a movie, a journey by train is somehow quite different. It encourages you to look around a little more […]
Many people treat Palma as a stopover. They land, spend a night somewhere near the old town, do the cathedral, and leave for wherever they actually booked the trip around the island. Having now watched this happen many times, Privadia, which books private villas for guests in Mallorca, and has done so for years, would […]
Portugal gets filed under “charming European city break” in most travel content. Lisbon’s trams. Porto’s port cellars. Algarve beach days. And all of that is real and worth doing. But the Portugal that made me rethink the country entirely is the one that doesn’t make the Instagram roundups. The one where the Atlantic hits volcanic […]
The Amalfi Coast is one of the world’s most photographed destinations yet much of its real character remains hidden from the view of most travelers. Beyond the crowded ferries, winding cliffside roads and busy piazzas lies a quieter side of southern Italy — one that reveals itself slowly from the sea. Experiencing the Amalfi Coast […]
Debt is a heavy, suffocating word. It sits quietly in the back of your mind like an uninvited guest, making every single financial decision feel completely loaded with stress. Honestly, I remember sitting at my kitchen table, the hum of the laptop at midnight, staring blankly at a screen I didn’t want to open, feeling […]
The first thing that disappears in Yasuní is the noise. Not the obvious culprits — street traffic, cellphones, car alarms, or loud talking — but the persistent drone of first-world life implanted somewhere deep in you. In just a couple hours after leaving the Ecuadorian capital city behind, find yourself gliding by canoe through a […]