‘WELCOME to our park,” beamed the hotel receptionist at our sprawling French theme park. “We like it when people from Scotland choose to come here and they always have a great time.” This is not the Parisian theme park most people think of though. We were not at Disneyland Paris, but its homegrown sibling – Parc Astérix.
THERE is something about Paris. There must be, as it’s the continental European city I’ve travelled to most. Grab comfy shoes as I’m going to share with you some of my favourite sides of the French capital on a two-day walking tour, as well as tips to make the most out of Paris.
IT was Somerset Maugham who summed up the Côte d’Azur as “a sunny place for shady people” – as apt a description as it is brilliant.
THERE is no sugar-coating the unholy quartet before my eyes – one shop to let, a brace of vape stores, and on to another vacant shop. Welcome to Union Street, one of Scotland’s great throughfares – and once the heart of Aberdeenshire’s retail action.
THERE is an island in Scotland’s Small Isles where the community increasingly runs much of its own affairs and generates its own electricity through renewables, as it powers on towards growing its population. No, it’s not the one people usually think of – Eigg. We’re talking instead about Canna.
IT’S coming home. That will be a refrain I will hear many times this summer in Germany. But this spring in Perth it already has come home. I’m talking, of course, of the Stone of Destiny, surely the most symbolic stone in the British Isles.
THERE is something intrinsically exciting about a hike that straddles two countries crossing a border.
I’VE long known that Arran is a deeply special place, but I wasn’t aware that time began here. Well, not time exactly, more our modern understanding of it. It’s just one of the discoveries – along with a “new” Neolithic site, a brilliant community cafe and an ambitious Unesco bid...
I’VE got a friend in his 50s who has never been to London.
TO a passionate, ambitious chef, there is simply no higher accolade. The award of a Michelin star is the crowning of a lifetime of hard work, creation and dedication.
