A Weekend in Jersey

 As a 40th birthday gift, my long-time friend, Dawn bought me a plane ticket to a secret location. She agonised as her prerequisites were: somewhere new; somewhere close-ish; somewhere with a reasonably priced flight. And so I rocked up at the airport with my passport and weekend bag none the wiser.

It transpires that to travel to Jersey from the UK, you don't need a passport but that would have given the surprise away and so we boarded our 45-minute hop to one of Britain's three crown dependencies just off the coast of Brittany, France. Dawn and I spent a lot of time trying to ascertain the status of Jersey. Is it a country in its own right? What does the passport look like? Where do taxes go? 

Our deep dives only offered us more questions but, officially: 'Jersey is a self-governing parliamentary democracy under a constitutional monarchy, with its own financial, legal and judicial systems, and the power of self-determination.' Thanks, Wikipedia! The island's relationship to the British crown is constitutional only; officially it is NOT part of the United Kingdom. 

But that's interesting for lots of reasons: the British pound is the official currency; the national language is English; cars drive on the left. And given we were there during the official mourning period for Queen Elizabeth, the pomp and circumstance for her was everywhere. 

Fortuitously, this also meant that lots of heritage properties were free to the public the weekend we were there. This is how we ended up on a charming tour of Mount Orgueil Castle, on Jersey's east coast. 

From the town of Gorey, every vantage point offers a view of the sea. Our wanders took us past beaches, groups of cyclists, wild swimmers and myriad families with dogs taking their time. The pace was unrushed and a wonderfully stark contrast to the busy of London. 

The restaurant scene on this part of the island is also pretty comprehensive. We accidentally discovered the The Crab Shack (listed in both Gorey and St Martin), an homage to all things crab and seafood. Between loaded crab fries and crab tacos, we were in heaven. Due to its proximity to France, champagne was also reasonably priced and so Dawn was able to help me check off on of the 40 things on my 40 for 40 list: drink champagne somewhere beautiful. Winning. 

On Sunday, using very good local public transport, we made our ways with bags to the (slightly) more bustling capital in St Helier and hopped on a local bus tour. We were pleasantly surprised. The open-top bus gave us the west coat highlights of this 45-square mile haven, taking us past St Aubin, the German Memorial, St Brelade's Bay and finally to La Corbiere lighthouse. 

We learned about Jersey's Nazi-occupied status during WWII and, given more time, would have opted to go to the Channel Island Military Museum. There's a lot of money on Jersey and we also got a glimpse of the fancier houses tucked away on this half of the island. 

Our weekend kind of ended there, with only a small glimpse of this tiny not quite a country but not not a country isle. I'd love to go back, take the ferry to Guernsey and back and soak up the sun, beautiful beaches and charm of this place. Definitely worth a visit. 

San Jose

As a country, Costa Rica gets so much right. With its focus on sustainability and conservation, it set itself to be the 'most sustainable country in Central America' in the 1980s. In shooting for the moon, it landed far further and is considered a bastion of sustainable practices worldwide. By 2050, the country is aiming for complete decarbonisation, something it will likely reach. Pride for this, for the environment, for the myriad national parks and open spaces was evident throughout the country. 

Costa Rica's capital, San Jose, is not the likely representation of any of these policies. As the jumping point for most tours, tourists tend not to spend too much time here. Traffic is prolific, pavements and foot traffic are few and far between and, anecdotally, there seems to be a disproportionate number of pet cremation services in the capital. 

Despite this, I set off with Mini, Tony and Herbie in a little journey to the city centre. The grid pattern of streets wasn't exactly inspiring but some cool sculptures did adorn the pedestrian avenue. Al Viento, near the intersection of Calle 14 and Central Avenue, is an homage to the spirit of Costa Rican women. At nearly three metres tall, she rules the pavement. 

In front of the Banco Central, the Monument to Costa Rican workers stands tall. The bronze statues look both steadfast and imposing, representing the spirit of the people. 

The National Museum of Costa Rica 

Past all the statues, we made our way to the National Museum of Costa Rica, which is a rather impressive facility. At $11 for non-nationals, it's worth the price and gives you access to the museum and gorgeous butterfly garden. 

We started in the latter and though I took many pictures, this lobster claw heliconia happened to be my favourite. We'd see many, many more of these over the course of the two-week trip and they never ceased to impress. 

Inside the museum, pre-Columbian art dominates. Pre-Columbian as it pre-dating Christopher Columbus. A lot of it is indigenous, including this guy below, who holds his distended, worm-filled stomach. They can't all be winners. 

Outside the museum, we were greeted to a pedestrian-avenue of street art which felt pretty vibrant. With few other tourists around, we largely had the area to ourselves. We made it to our lunch stop just in front of the brief torrential thunder and lighting storm; we were the only people in the restaurant for some time. 

The Jade Museum 

As the rain continued, we donned our jackets and made our way to the Jade Museum, a multi-story collection, America's largest, that houses over 100 objects made entirely of jade. I enjoyed this exhibition more than I cared to admit and we took turns finding the freakiest, creepiest statues amongst the various rooms. The two below get my vote. 

Jet lag and museum closing hours ended our tour of San Jose there. I hadn't planned on spending much time in the city alone; given to my own devices I would have sat by the pool dodging the rain. And I wouldn't necessarily say anything on the day's itinerary was essential but I'm glad I got adopted by my new tour friends to see what I did. 

From London to Costa Rica

January is always a long, dark month in London. And so I went to yoga in search of escape. As my yoga teacher, a smiling Mexican man resembling a teddy bear, led us into savasana, I stared up at the mix of sun and clouds through the skylight window. By the end of the 5-minutes, I convinced myself to book a summer solo trip I've been wanting to take for years. 

Group tours are not something I'd really considered in the past. But I got tired of waiting for friends to agree to travel with me and in the post-covid world, I wanted some peace of mind just in case I got sick on my own. Enter Intrepid Travel and their Classic Costa Rica tour. The 15-day trip started and ended in San Jose, the country's not-entirely-exciting capital. 

And so I paid my deposit and booked flights with Air Canada, taking me from London to Toronto to San Jose, landing 24-hours before the tour's orientation. I won't lie in saying that I was nervous: to travel with complete strangers; to share a room with a random; to traverse Central America, a sub-continent I had little exposure of. It transpires that it's the things you don't anticipate that are the real things to be nervous about. 

I'm a seasoned flyer but post-covid airports are a different satanic beast entirely. If I learned anything from the Bologna trip, it was to expect chaos. And so I packed a sandwich, snacks and 5 days' worth of clothing--shorts, a swimsuit, pants--into my carry on luggage. Boarding and takeoff were mundane enough and the first drinks/snacks service was in full flow when I noticed a bit of hubbub near the premium economy toilets, three rows diagonally from me. A flurry of flight attendants made their way to a woman who appeared to have fallen in the toilet with the door half open. Shortly therefore the 'is there a doctor on board?' announcement followed. 

And hence the new very specific medical emergency chaos began. The very inexperienced flight crew funnelled all resources to the woman, whom they eventually managed to lay down and cover in the bulkhead aisle space. Fortunately, medical personnel were on our flight and both a doctor and trauma nurse saw to the elderly patient who continued to pass out every time she sat up. She was not in a good way but did remain largely conscious whilst laying down. At 1.5 hours in, I assumed we'd either turn back or land in Iceland. But neither immediately happened and the flight tracker took us past Iceland, heading towards the coast of Nova Scotia, full steam ahead. At 4 hours in, no food or water passed out to anyone else, the announcement to turn back was finally made. 

This is how we ended up spending 2 hours on the runway at Keflavik. Paramedics boarded the flight and carried off the woman with her husband trailing behind her. Turning on my wifi, I had messages from Air Canada suggesting a delay but offering no tangible solutions. We continued to wait for food, water, announcements regarding connecting flights but none came. In fact, the flight staff got quite surly with anyone who asked even the most polite of questions. 

When we landed in Toronto six hours behind schedule, and two hours after my scheduled departure to San Jose, I was beside myself. But so was over half the flight, who were using Toronto as a base to fly all over North and Central America. And so I ran off the flight into the arms of a very kind gate attendant who escorted the whopping 23 of us flying to San Jose to our gate halfway across the airport. It transpires there's only one Air Canada flight per day flying to Costa Rica and 1/4 of us were missing from it. Flights for the next fortnight were already fully booked and so the airline had no option but to hold the flight. 

This is how I met one of the families on my Tour. Tony, Mini and Herbie queued up behind me as we boarded and we struck up a conversation. I later found out that my roommate, Kim, was also on that flight, and that we were all shitting ourselves wondering how things would pan out.  The connecting flight passed uneventfully and minus having to pay for a meal, my first official one from the airline nearly 16 hours into the journey, we arrived in one piece. Mercifully, so did our luggage. 

We boarded separate transfers to the hotel (Kim, to a different one entirely) and promptly passed out. The next morning at breakfast of my favourite tropical fruit, Tony invited me to spend the day with his family wandering San Jose. 

That evening, all walked and rested, Kim arrived from her hotel cross town. We shared our flight dramas before swapping formalities. She lives in London, is a teacher turned educational psychologist and, because the world is absolutely tiny, has friends in common with me. We got on very well which was fortuitous because, although touted as a 'solo traveler's paradise' every other member of our tour was part of a family group: Neil, Louise and their clan of twin 19-year-old sons; Tony, Mini and 16-year-old Herbie; Charlotte, Phil and their secondary-school aged sons. Our tour guide, Luz, was a tiny, feminist wonder woman. And what transpired was a really lovely two weeks spent in rainy season humidity. 

So my TLDR message: 1. pack that carry on well; 2. take that group tour. It'll be allll good. 

Planes, Trains and Flight Delays

Friends, believe the hype. Travel in Summer 2022 is a new, ugly frontier. I had not intended to go Travel Nuts but somehow I managed to use my eight-week teacher summer to cram in maximum travel. Consider it some kind of atonement to my passport for my lack of movement in 2020 and 2021. 

In my crisscrossing of Europe and Central America, I experienced flight delays, lost luggage, a mid-Atlantic medical emergency (not me), a missed flight connection and an overnight 'weather' related flight cancelation. In all my years of flying, I've never experienced so much airport drama. 

The first leg of the summer holiday, literally the morning after my last day of school, took Paul and me to Italy for a tour of Bologna, Pistoia, Siena and Sardinia. BA had slightly other plans for my luggage. Google 'Heathrow Luggage Graveyard' to see what I mean--and how bad it could have been. After flight delays that saw us chilling plane-side next to the runway, we departed without half the flight's luggage but only found this out after waiting at the conveyor belt for an hour in Italy. After waiting in a queue for another hour, the harassed two-woman team in Bologna informed me it might be a week before we were reunited (if at all), that the airport refused to deliver my suitcase and I would need to come pick it up when I got The Call. 

I may have lost my shit. I may have cried. And then I dusted myself off, go to our accommodation, went to bed and woke up in the same clothing to go shopping the next morning. After trawling the cheaper shops of Bologna and acquiring a new set of essentials, I received a call that my suitcase had arrived, a neat 12-hours later. 

And so we journeyed back to the airport during the luggage room open hours that accommodated for a  two-hour Italian mid-afternoon coffee break. Not joking. We joined the back of a 25-person queue that moved at a glacial pace. Some people had received a call their luggage was there, some people had no clue where their luggage was. An American family in front of us flew Lufthansa the night before--the plane left without anyone's luggage and no one could tell them where any of it was. They were travelling down the country to visit children in Florence so they wouldn't even be in Bologna for long. When they eventually got to the front of the queue, they received no resolution. 

After 3-hours in the queue, we reached spitting distance of the front...half an hour before 'coffee break time.' Half an hour later, one overly loquacious Italian separated us from the front. The staff looked on miserably but didn't close the queue--in my bureaucracy-fuelled rage, I would have refused to move anyway. 

And finally, after a 30-minute taxi ride and 3.5 hours in a poorly ventilated, dimly lit corridor, me and old blue were reunited. 

In the grand scheme of travel drama, being temporarily parted with your luggage is not generally a big deal. It's happened to me several times before. But the school year was long, my sanity was at a very low ebb, the Heathrow graveyard photos haunted my already overactive imagination and Italian bureaucracy encouraged me to think the worst.

One crucial lesson learned here. Always pack a spare pair of pants in your carry on. We have reached the age of travel chaos. In fact, you might as well pack a few days' worth of clothes. Summer's later flight encouraged me to add snacks to that list as well. But that's a story for another day. 

A Weekend in Stavanger

After two years of virtually no travel, 2022 opened the floodgates once again. In passing dinner conversation one night after a particularly dizzying spin class, Dawn and I flirted with the notion of booking a weekend away. Words became plans became a May weekend away in Norway's fourth largest city, Stavanger.

We arrived late on Friday night after the the emptiest flight I've ever taken. Not complaining--I had three whole rows to myself. Our hotel was right by the lake in the middle of the city and we pulled the curtains back the next morning to a view. 

Stavanger made its money in sardines, canning, shipping and oil, in that order. It's home to both a Canning Museum and a Printing Museum housed under the same roof; although you may think you have better things to do, they're actually pretty wonderful. Explore canned fish across the ages AND learn about how those cans got printed. There's not even a fishy smell for miles and the museum is in the middle of Old Stavanger, a settlement of 173 heritage wooden houses and narrow cobbled streets. 

From there, it's a short walk to the pub-lined harbour where an ugly view is hard to find. 

A stroll around the lake and a wander around the shops later, we found ourselves at the delicious Restaurant SOL, Stavanger's very impressive answer to fine dining. Three chef friends opened the place and it was doing a roaring trade. We opted for two courses of local sourced produce and fish with wine to accompany the multitude of tastes. 

Solastranden Beach

After a decadent lunch we hopped on the airport shuttle to Stavanger's closest beach which took us back past the airport and not too far from the city itself. The weather played nice and we were greeted with sunshine and the occasional bracing sea breeze. Hearty Scandinavian families walked, rode bikes and built sand castles on the shore making the most of the increasing daylight hours. 

We found a hotel bar just off the beach to enjoy a glass of prosecco before making our way back into town for a hotel rest and pick-a-mix stop. It turns out Norwegians love their weekend sugar just as much as their Swedish neighbours. 

Daylight continued to linger and as we headed home from dinner (a first time delicious Ethiopian food experience at Gadja in town) a few hours later at 10:30pm, it gave us perspective of how miserably dark winters would be. I'm not sure the spring into summer long days would be enough to get me through. 

Fjord Tour 

On Sunday morning, we made for the port to hop on a 3hr cruise of Lysefjorden and Preikestolen (also known as Pulpit Rock), Stavanger's most stunning natural beauty. Most people come to the city to hike the famous rock but Dawn made it clear there would be 'no mad walks up big hills. I know you, Jen.' And so we queued to buy tickets for Stavanger's number one attraction, by boat. Fate almost intervened when the cruise ships docked and the ship was nearly sold out. My advice: book tickets online in advance and avoid the drama. 

We opted for the outdoor top deck views and although temperatures weren't arctic, we were grateful for our hats, scarves and layers. 

The scenery was incredible. Every which way we turned, it was impossible to be disappointed. The water danced, reflected, shone in ways I did not know was possible. The air tasted just like you image oxygenated, pollution-free fresh air would--it made a stark contrast to any day in even blue-sky London. The entire journey was absolute magic. 

Debarking and making for the airport after a weekend of fresh air and blue skies felt like a bit of a let down. And clearly a weekend is not enough to really dive into Norway's beauty. So I'll keep it on my list of places to return to--next time I'll take that hike up the big hill. 

Give Rome a Chance

The small beauty of a recent Covid infection is that the fear of imminent reinfection dwindles. And with this, Paul and I lived in hope that we'd make it to Italy for our Easter holidays, our first time since the world shut down. 

Rome was not a first choice for either of us: Paul's parents burned him out on the tour of every church and Catholic artefact in the city (no small feat at over 900) as a teenager; and my memories of travel there involved August, intense heat, travel buddies who didn't get on, travelling on a very tight MA student budget and being followed by a strange man staying in our hotel. 

But it turns out that our options were limited and Rome was one of a few places we could fly to from Edinburgh, where we found ourselves after a friend's wedding that took place in the backwaters of Perthshire in Scotland. 

Fortunately, with time, experience and a bit more money, we found the true delights of the Italian capital. We minimised time at the Major Tourist Sites and based ourselves in the Trastevere neighbourhood, a former working-class, student enclave of the city. We took our mission of eating everything and walking everywhere to heart--by the end of the week we'd wandered 183k steps, shunned all forms of transport and consumed 3 of the 4 iconic Roman pasta dishes.

As a testament to our hearty appreciation, I have over 100 photos from this segment of the trip. I won't bore you with all of them but I will start with the food. If you, like me, are a bit overwhelmed by ancient grandeur and centuries of history, you could ignore this all and just eat your way across the city. 

Let me convince you.

The Humble Artichoke 

The Romanesco artichoke rules Italy from February to April every year--they dominate menus, markets and street corners across the city. From Testaccio Market to the Jewish quarter, you can find them in all their splendour. Accompanied by their other colourful companions, they make stopping for food something you want to do whether you're hungry or not. 

Romans cook artichokes two ways, boiled and deep fried. When fried, the leaves crisp up like chips and you just peel them off and eat. 

The Four Pastas of Rome

Before travelling to Rome, we happened upon Stanley Tucci's very foodie TV exploration, Searching for Italy. His episode on Rome is steeped in food history and some delicious tips about where to eat. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the pastas of the city have their roots in poverty and necessity. Flour was cheap, cheese and pork were plenty, and thus four iconic dishes were born. 

Pasta 1: cacio e pepe

Don't let the simplicity fool you, this pasta laden with pecorino and black pepper is a genuine delight. It's rich, creamy and very more-ish. I found myself ordering it again and again and even had a concoction of it in a suppli, a Roman-style deep fried rice ball. 

Slight digression: if you find yourself in Trastevere and want epic, local suppli, head to Suppli Roma, an institution feeding locals for over 40 years. Our B&B owner recommended it and we joined the queue several times over the course of four days to enjoy the array of gastronomic delights, including the cacio e pepe suppli! 

Pasta 2: amatriciana 

Paul treated himself to this feast of tomatoes, guanciale (pork cheek), pecorino and pepper. He raved. 

Pastas 3 and 4: pasta all gricia; carbonara 

We have no photographic proof of either of these pastas but the first is a lot like the amatriciana, minus the tomato and add eggs. Carbonara, well everyone knows that one, and it's a solid favourite. 

Aperitivo
Aperitivo, not a food but a way of life, is a uniquely wonderful part of Italian life. Consider it a pre-meal drink to 'open the stomach' before eating. Aperitivo hour lasts from roughly 18:00-20:00, depending on the part of the city (and the city) you're in. Italians love drinks with a bitter flavour --Aperol and Campari come to mind--and these reign supreme. But perhaps most charmingly, you cannot drink without a snack. Sometimes the snack is a bowl of olives, some grisini (breadsticks) or a little bowl of crisps. Other times, it's much more involved as we discovered in Piazza San Calisto in Trastevere.

Depending on the size of the snack will also dictate whether a bar will charge you or not. The 'snack' above cost us an extra 2 euro/person cover, hardly breaking the bank and really putting London prices to shame. 

Upon reflection of our Italian travels, we deduced that Rome did indeed take aperitivo the most seriously. And for that, we are eternally grateful. 

Breakfast

One other food tradition I hadn't quite cottoned on to in my previous trips to Italy (I blame staying in cheap hostels) was that of breakfast. Italians aren't big on it. A coffee (espresso, not Americano size) and sometimes a pastry predominate. Pastries are low key; they come plain, or filled with nutella, chocolate or pistachio cream. Often they're accompanied by a cigarette or three. As we sat in the institution that is Bar San Calisto and watched local life, the 95-year-old woman travelling with her wheelie oxygen tank put that stereotype to rights. 

We sat here for a solid two hours, watching the world go by. It was perfect. 

Gelato

Finally, it goes without saying that gelato is a solid staple of the Italian nation. Everyone loves it, it comes in its vegan sorbet equivalent and gelaterias dot every street. This is an all-weather, all-season food. Cup, cone, one scoop or three, everyone agrees. 

So. In short, if for nothing else, go to Rome for the food. Whatever else you find along the way will be a bonus.