“Know, Sir, that Llewelyn ap Gruffydd is dead, his army broken and all the flower of his men killed.” This despatch from his winning troops at the front was all the planning permission Edward the First required to begin one of the most intimidating programmes of military construction of the Middle Ages. Within three months,… Continue reading →

The mournful wail of a Canadian Pacific express split the deep silence of the Romney Sands Holiday Park. It shimmied down the ranks of caravans and reached the steps of my top of the range Ashcroft model, where I sat reading about the biggest shingle bank in Europe just down the coast. So what acoustic… Continue reading →

The National Trust has charted a circular walk through the national nature reserve that wraps around the 300 year old Calke Abbey, where the rooms were left exactly as they were when the trust acquired the estate in 1985.

Oman is on the NE corner of the Arabian peninsula, with many more natural wonders to build its still small tourism industry on than its near neighbours. The 600 miles of scintillating coast and beach is as undeveloped as the Costa Brava must have been in about 1910. Inland Oman is a power landscape of towering mountains scattered with deserts, lush oasis settlements – wadis – and a surprisingly green south country.