A London Food and Travel blog full of unique experiences.
They say that “jobs fill your pockets, adventures fill your soul” and with this in mind (plus the memory of lockdowns fresh in our minds) I announced to the better half that I fancied doing [minimum] 12 trips in 12 months this year.
He sighed – for context I spent December and January on the other side of the world and I hadn’t even unpacked my suitcase from that trip – but simply gave in.
Whenever I get the opportunity, I love running away to the English seaside [read: literally any sun-filled excuse] and recently we loved a day trip to Margate beach enough to go back a couple of weeks later, hiring a beachfront apartment for a leisurely three day break.
One of the things I miss the most about living in New Zealand, is the easy access to beaches. They (whoever ‘they’ are) reckons that no-one is more than 1.5 hours drive from a beach in my narrow home country, so when I was home recently, I made FULL use of that access.
If you google ‘romantic weekends for couples in England’ you’ll get a thousand recommendations. Misty country breaks, city exploring, beach bach staycations full of sand, four-poster beds in castle hotels, forest-dwelling glamping – the lot.
England is a land full of history, romance and a train network that linking up all of these fabulous places to explore.
One of my favourite free things to do in London is exploring the amazing museums dotted around the city. I’m as guilty as any one of taking this city for granted at times, so recently I’ve started to make a point of exploring it properly again.
Now, you’ve got all your classical Grand Dames of the London Museum scene (sounds like they all rave together with that sentence – though I have heard things about the joint Christmas parties…) We’re talking the British Museum, the V&A (my personal favourite), the Science Museum, the National Gallery, the Tate Modern… or proper niche places like the Clown Museum, the Sewing Machine Museum, the Doctor Who Museum or the Freud Museum.
One of the best things about running my own business (as a freelance social media consultant) is being able to run away from my desk at short notice to places like Folkestone Beach.
The sun was shining and my diary was relatively quiet so I booked a train from London (there’s a direct 55-minute service to Folkestone beach from St Pancras), grabbed my book, fished out the sun screen and slipped a beach towel in my bag.