Hi, I'm Alex, a travel writer based in London, I love writing about travel as much as traveling itself. I’m a scrappy researcher, and a hoarder of info, whether it's trivial or mind-blowing. I get a lot of joy doing justice to worthwhile places, and I’m always excited to share the stories behind them.
I have a real affection for Tarragona in Catalonia, from the golden sandy beaches to the mountains. I love Hamburg and its harbour and many waterways, especially in spring. And I'll always be drawn to the rolling countryside in the south of England, especially Wiltshire. I'll go anywhere with a great art museum, and ruins, ancient or medieval.
Kent’s historic trading centre had a handy position on the navigable River Medway, which joins the Thames Estuary not far north at Chatham. Even now, Maidstone is in a great location to see the best of Kent, known as the Garden of England. Resting in this verdant landscape are monuments like Leeds Castle, which floats …
This Cornish harbour town is not far from the most westerly and southerly points of the British mainland at Land’s End’s and the Lizard. The town is protected by the beautiful Mount’s Bay, around St Michael’s Mount, a magical tidal island. Cornwall is one of the few places in the country where subtropical and Mediterranean …
Right on the border with Wales, Chester was founded in AD 70 as the Roman fortress of Deva Victrix. Excavations at the amphitheatre suggest that Deva was pegged to become the UK’s Roman capital in the 3rd Century if the invasion of Ireland had gone ahead. The City Walls have big curtains of ashlar blocks …
An old-school English seaside resort, Lincolnshire’s Skegness has a Blue Flag beach, a Victorian pier, fairground rides and a line-up of nostalgic family amusements. Most of the appeal is on or near Grand Parade, along a strip of foreshore intersecting with the pier and embroidered with gardens. The resort’s abiding mascot is the Jolly Fisherman, …
England’s surfing paradise, Newquay has astonishing Blue Flag beaches lashed by the North Atlantic. Surfing is a year-round proposition at the resort, but there’s a special energy in summer, when the population quadruples and events like the Boardmasters Festival hit town. The surf beaches draw a young and hip crowd, but there are also inlets …
In the 15th century Boston was the wealthiest port outside London. Set in the Fens, a region of farmland reclaimed from coastal marshes by the Wash, Boston was where English wool was loaded onto ships to trade with Hanseatic league cities. The affluence of that period is unmistakeable in the Perpendicular tower of St Botolph’s …
The market town of Cheltenham would never be the same again after its mineral springs were discovered in the 1700s. This triggered a hundred-year wave of development that peaked in the Regency era in the first decades of the 19th century. With Neoclassical spa facilities, terraces of stuccoed townhouses and opulent gardens, Cheltenham has been …
In the 18th century Northampton bounced back from its Great Fire of 1675 to become England’s shoemaking and leather capital. And if you need to see a monument to this prosperity, the Neo-Gothic Guildhall (1861-64) is a masterpiece. Long before, Northampton had been the site of one of England’s largest Norman castles, and Parliament regularly …
On the edge of the low-lying Fens, Peterborough is a city commanded by a superlative cathedral. This is one of the few complete examples of 12th-century Romanesque architecture, with a Gothic facade that looks like nothing else in the UK or Europe. Peterborough emerged as an industrial city in the mid 19th century when a …
England’s 9th largest urban centre has the cachet of being both a historic cathedral city and a modern manufacturing hub. The 14th-century St Michael’s Cathedral was bombed out in the war and its ruins have been conserved as a symbol of peace next to a bold, modern cathedral built in the post-war period. In the …