All these points are specific to how I feel about Mumbai, where I live and work. I am not an authority on what living in another Indian city is like. Of course, I am also well aware that my …
Slum Tourism: Life Inside the Real Dharavi
The monsoon rains have waned, swelling Mumbai’s air with thick, sticky summer heat. It was in heat like this that I started my tour of Dharavi— the slum that was once considered the largest slum in Asia, and the area …
My Top 5 Wow-Factor Destinations
According to the dictionary, spectacular is an adjective that means ‘beautiful in a dramatic and eye-catching way’; synonyms of which are striking, picturesque, breathtaking, arresting, glorious, and my two favourites, sublime, and awesome. Awesome as in the Romantic poets’ …
Sustainable Tourism in India: Redstone Eco Centre, Mahabaleshwa
India is a country that forces travellers to question their lifestyle choices, which is why so many people come here looking for change; and in many cases sustainable tourism can offer a chance for the changes they require. Some people …
Unwinding in Udaipur
India has blessed us with a number of long weekends recently, thanks to a large number of festivals and celebrations. Most of these holidays I have spent either recovering from busy working weeks, or getting to know Mumbai better—although I …
Pigeon Purge
Before I moved to Mumbai I read many blogs about living in India, and became an avid reader of Rachel, the Hippie-in-Heels. She writes a regular feature called ‘This Is India’ in which she shares amusing anecdotes about what …
So Long, Sweden! I’m Going To Miss You.
Four years ago I moved to Sweden; a country often associated with long, cold, snowy winters. But, little did I know that after the harsh winter Swedes are rewarded with beautiful summers where the sun shines all day long. In …
Finding History and Nature in Gorgeous Gotland
In my last post I write about Visby, a perfectly preserved medieval town and UNESCO World Heritage Site on the Swedish island of Gotland; but the colourful labyrinthine alleys of this Baltic-blasted, cobbled town are not the only thing worth …
Visby: Sweden’s Perfectly Preserved Medieval Town
Swedes are travellers: roaming foreign lands is in their blood.
It is Viking blood, after all.
You’ll be hard pushed to travel far without running into a Swede or two. This is especially true of South East Asia, which …
What to do in Skopje When It Rains
You’ve just flown 3 hours south after a long, dark and exceptionally rainy Scandinavian winter, in the hopes of finding some spring sunshine only to step off the plane into colder, greyer, and wetter weather than you left behind.
That’s …
The Time I Didn’t Make It to Anjuna
[mks_boxquote align=”right” width=”400″ arrow=”0″]These were the days before the technology revolution: we had no laptops, not even a regular phone. We didn’t even have a watch between us. We were two foreign females, alone in the middle of nowhere, …
Life Advice From ‘The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty’
**Warning** This post contains spoilers, so if you haven’t seen The Secret Life of Walter Mitty turn off the computer right now, go and see it, and come back later.
From the first moment I saw a trailer for the …
My Upcoming Summer Plans
Now that the light is finally shining at the end of Sweden’s long, wintry tunnel, I am feeling the urge to climb out from under the thick duvet I have hidden under for the last 6 months and plan …
10 Awesome Movie Locations Around The World
When I travel I don’t deliberately seek out places that have been used as film locations, but every now and then I happen to stumble into one. Here is a round-up of the 10 best movie locations that I have …
Stockholm Winter Blues. Or, What Happens When the Snow Doesn’t Come.
Stockholm is a truly stunning city; that much has been established by pretty much any traveller to set foot on the cobbled stones of the Old Town. In the short summer months, boats chug across sparkling inlets that separate each …
The Highs and Lows of Searching for the Northern Lights
[mks_boxquote align=”right” width=”150″ arrow=”0″]”An obsession consumed me, and the more I saw, the more I wanted”[/mks_boxquote]Relentless blasts of icy wind grasped at the exposed skin of my cheeks, the only flesh not covered in layers of wool and …
Dogsledding in Lapland with Arctic Husky Adventures
A memorable journey is often more about the people you meet than the things you see, and when I went dogsledding with Arctic Husky Adventures in Jokkmokk, Swedish Lapland, last week I met quite possibly the most welcoming people I …
Exciting News: I’m Moving to India!
Judging by the response that I have received from various people to this news, you probably fall into one of the following categories: “India?! Are you crazy?” or “Wow! What an amazing experience!”
If I’m totally honest with …
Too Afraid To Seize The Day
This is a post that has been languishing in my drafts folder for four months. I have simply been too afraid to post it, because if I post it I have to commit to the message. I have to Seize …
Spending 14 Hours With A Tour Guide Who Hated Me
[mks_boxquote align=”left” width=”150″ arrow=”0″]“We were only two hours into a fourteen-hour trip. It would be a long day if we couldn’t get on with the tour guide”[/mks_boxquote]Looking through the windows on the left-hand side of the bus, we …