Month: February 2013

Story of the day: Father’s Day in Burgundy

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A couple of personal journeys to round off the week.

First up is a piece about a Father’s Day trip to France, which was somewhat mangled by the subs at the Daily Mail.

This was the first in a series of stories I wrote about Dijon and Burgundy. There’s still even one yet to be published in the Sunday Telegraph on a contemporary art theme – details to come.

Here’s an extract:

“People are afraid of stuffy tastings at local wine cellars. It can be intimidating, so we try to demystify the process,” says Celine Dandelot on Sensation Vin (pictured above).

We take our seats at a lightbox-style tasting table and watch the introductory briefing on the wall-mounted TV as Celine uncorks the bottles.

Burgundy’s five wine-producing regions, we learn, produce 200 million bottles a year – one-third red, two-thirds white, split into four categories: grand cru, premier cru, village and region.

“We simply look at colour, smell and taste, repeating the same three tests for each of the six wines,” says Celine.

“You can tell the age of a wine from its colour and aroma. By tasting, we identify its characteristics.”

Read the full story, Happy Father’s Day.

Do you have a favourite place in Burgundy? Or a good angle on the region?

Post your comments below.

Story of the day: Island walking trails in Croatia

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Another one from the archive.

This time it’s the first in a series of stories about Croatia and the Dalmatian archipelago. I must have done something right because the last one won a travel-writing award.

As is often the way, the first trip sparked off lots of new ideas. Lucky, really, as this firs trip was a bit of a shambles.

Tip to trip organisers: seven hours on a minibus with a bunch of Germans looking at tourist-trap souvenir shops does not good copy make.

What I did enjoy was the walking on the island of Brac.

Here’s an extract:

The last walk takes in three lost-in-time villages – a far cry from harbour-side apartment blocks and all-night clubs.

A bus transfers me to the trailhead at Lozisca, where I start walking from under the Baroque bell tower of St John and St Paul, one of the island’s Unesco-listed monuments.

I head uphill through the cobbled backstreets of the village, following a path to the nearby settlement of Bobovisca, with the waft of wild catmint on the air.

From there, as a couple of donkeys look on nonchalantly, I head across country through rough scrubland, taking a less waymarked trail to St Martin’s, a 1,000-year-old white-stone church clinging stoically to the hillside overlooking Milna [pictured above].

Read the full story, Walking in the rural heart of Croatia.

What’s your favourite walk around the archipelago? Or what angle should I look at next to revisit Croatia?

Post your comments below.

Story of the day: Riding the rails in Snowdonia

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Time to wrap up and move on. I’ve been posting stories from my back catalogue since January and I’ve enjoyed revisiting some old features.

Maybe even someone reading did, too? Do let me know.

But with St David’s Day and spring on the horizon, daffodils in bloom in my local park, it’s time to give this site a more newsy edge.

So these are the last archive articles for a while.

First is a rail journey across Snowdonia, a similar idea to a more recent story in the Telegraph.

Here’s an extract:

Arrival at Rhyd Ddu was marked by a flurry of walking boots and Gore-Tex on the platform.

The station acts as the gateway to a series of day walks, including an 13km-round-trip Snowdon ascent along well-marked paths, or tackling the Nantlle Ridge walk, a calf-burning circular yomp round a steep, zigzagging rim.

I could have tackled the latter and still been back in time for the next train.

But instead I opted for a gentler hike through rolling woodlands, then down to explore Rhyd Ddu, a tiny hamlet of granite cottages set around a village pub and tearooms, where the sign outside enthused: ‘Muddy Boots Welcome’ [pictured above].

Read the full story, Riding the Welsh Highland Railway.

What’s your favourite rail journey? How do you rate my description of the Glacier Express?

Post your comments below.

An audience with Alan Garner

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The words are easy but the meaning isn’t.

I rather agreed with this sentiment, expressed by the Cheshire-based author Alan Garner, who I met last week at his home near Alderley Edge.

It was a long and slightly rambling interview at times but the elderly author did make a few important points about the link between writer and landscape.

Landscape has shaped him, and hence his writing, since childhood. He describes it as “a kind of spiritual geography.”

You can read the story as part of a Visit England supplement in The Guardian.

One anecdote that didn’t make the edit was the story about how he came to buy his medieval, timber-framed house (pictured above) in 1957 for £510. At the time, he was still living at home in Alderley Edge.

“When I told my dad, he pursed his lips and said, ‘That’s a way’.”

Read the full story Folklore and fantasy in the Peak District.

And post your comments about Alan Garner and his work below.