Roaming Tales

Vintage clothes, art and stuffed squirrels on Brick Lane and Columbia Road.

Brick Lane, at the eastern edge of the square mile that is the City of London, is one of the most vibrant parts of London. It’s best known for the Indian and Bangladeshi restaurants that line the street and if you go at night you can barely move for the restaurant touts trying to entice you inside with various bribes of free drinks or samosas.

I prefer to get my curry elsewhere - at places such as New Tayyabs, a Pakistani restaurant behind the East London Mosque. And I prefer to visit Brick Lane during the day, especially on a Sunday when the Sunday UpMarket is on in the Old Truman Brewery and Columbia Road Flower Market is on up the road in Bethnal Green.

The Sunday UpMarket has great food - from Japanese to Ethiopian - in one half and secondhand and handmade clothes and other assorted flea market goodies in the other. It’s all under cover, which is perfect when it’s grey and drizzly outside as it so often is in London at this time of year.

As you wander further up the hill, you pass great cafés, famous bagel bakeries from the days when Brick Lane was a Jewish rather than Bangladeshi enclave, cool art galleries and around half a dozen great vintage clothing shops.

As you exit the northern end of Brick Lane and cross Bethnal Green Road, check out the contemporary furniture studio Unto This Last. Their best stuff is made to order as apparently they have had some problems with theft.

From there it’s just a hop, step and a jump to Columbia Road, which hosts a flower market every Sunday. I prefer to go late, around 2pm, when the crowds have died down and the flowers and pot plants are often on sale. This street is also full of funky independent shops. There’s the cupcake bakery Treacle (although cupcakes are not really my thing), a few gardening and homeware shops, and Nelly Duff gallery selling cool limited edition prints to name a few. If you’re still hungry after the Sunday UpMarket, the bagel bakery and cupcake shop, there’s a good Spanish restaurant called Laxeiro and the Royal Oak Pub.

There’s always something new to see in the East End. On my most recent visit, this past weekend, my eye was caught by the window display to a vintage clothing store halfway up Brick Lane, modestly called This Shop Rocks. The window display had two mannequins in dresses, one with a stuffed badger on a lead and one with a stuffed fox. There were also six stuffed squirrels wearing clothing dancing in a circle.

Have I missed something here? Is taxidermy back? Even though I’m sure they’re antique and not freshly stuffed, I actually found it a little disturbing, especially since they were rare, native red squirrels rather than the more common, foreign grey squirrels. They were cute but creepy.

It certainly got my attention but when it came down to it, none of us wanted to go in. Maybe the shop does rock but I might never know.

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In my first post for environmental blog EcoSalon, I write about Cornwall - a stylish choice for an eco-holiday.

I have some exciting news to share - I’m joining EcoSalon as a regular contributor. I’ve been asked to write two posts a week, one on green travel and one on green tech and lifestyle.

My first post is on eco-holidays in Cornwall, looking at walking, food, art and destinations such as the Eden Project. Cornwall is one of my favourite parts of Britain and, as I hope my photos show, an extremely beautiful part of the country. The post was published today and I’m delighted that it’s currently featured as the EcoSalon Daily Favourite right at the top of the site. Please take a look and let me know what you think. Leave a comment either here or on EcoSalon and if you like it, please feel free to share the link with your friends.

The theme of EcoSalon is about going green without sacrificing style and this is something that really strikes a chord with me. Readers who are familiar with this blog and my food blog The Gooseberry Fool might know that I am a passionate environmentalist. However, I also believe that people need inspiration and a reason for hope. We shouldn’t hide from the immensity of the challenge – but if we focus on doom and gloom, we risk generating despair rather than the committed and focused action the planet needs. Despair is just as destructive to the environment as denial.

I’m pleased to be blogging for EcoSalon because the blog is committed to the environment but with an aim to empower and inspire people rather than hector or scare them. There’s enough troubling environmental news out there – the question is what we can do about it.

Lest any fans of Roaming Tales be fretting about the future of this site - never fear! I fully intend to keep my own site and my blogging duties at EcoSalon are as well as, not instead of, what I already do. It’s a paid gig so this properly falls into my day job as a freelance writer.

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Want to experience Rome as the ancient Romans did? Google Earth offers the closest possible thing - a virtual tour of ancient Rome.

With global environmental concerns at an all time high and a global economy in collapse, there are plenty of good reasons for the rise of virtual travel. It’s not the same as actually going somewhere new but armchair travellers can live vicariously by reading travel books and articles - and, of course, blogs - and watching good travel programming on TV.

Google Earth - which lets you see detailed maps of everywhere on the globe and actual street view of a surprising high number - has long been a friend to travellers. I’ve previously used the tool to take a look at places I’m planning to go and check out places I’ve been. I’ve found it can tell me interesting things about a city from the layout of an ancient fort in Tunisia to the extent of tree cover in my native Sydney versus my current home of London.

Yet virtual travel has always been second best to actual travel - until now. Google has made it possible to do something that you can’t do in real life - go back in time to ancient Rome. You can use Google Earth to see the Colosseum or Circus Maximus in their full glory - gazing on marble floors that no longer exist, and reading the inscriptions. You don’t need a passport or plane ticket or even a TARDIS.

Of course, modern Rome is absolutely a cool city that should rate high on the list of any traveller in real life. But I’m keen to try this too and I’ll report back when I do.

It’s also got me thinking - where and else should Google Earth replicate the Rome project? Perhaps medieval London or the Cambodia of the Khmer kingdoms?

Have you ever used Google Earth to enhance your travel? Have you tried the Google Earth tour of ancient Rome? What should Google do next?

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• The Daily Telegraph in the UK has published a round-up of the best travel blogs around the world. Some of them I’m already familiar with, including Gridskipper, Londonist, NewYorkology, Travel Rants, Perrin Post, Cranky Flier, Epicurious, Intelligent Travel, Gadling, Telegraph Travel Blog, and FamilyTravelLogue. Others are new to me, including Where Are You Now? (which seems to be a blogging platform and network rather than an individual blog), Hotel Chatter, A Luxury Travel Blog, Moleskinecity, Escape Blog, The Cool Hunter, Eater, RoadGladiator, InFlightHQ, and Travelistic (video site).

• Lifehacker lists the five best travel sites for finding cheap tickets.

• Visiting London and don’t know where to get a decent cup of coffee? Krista at London Restaurant Guide is doing the leg work for you, with reviews of two London cafés: Flat White in Soho and Nude Espresso near Brick Lane. She also recently ran a great blogging event on the perfect London Saturday, as defined by London bloggers.

• Browners at Around Britain with a Paunch reviews Pakistani restuarant Zayna in London. Apparently the food is fab, though the location is a bit secluded.

• Still on the food theme, Sheila at Perceptive Travel has some tips for places to eat on New York’s Lower East Side, while Jessica at Ripe London goes hunting for churros y chocolate in Granada, Spain.

• Environmental blog About My Planet on how to protect the world’s beauty spots when you’re travelling.

• Speaking of green, Intelligent Travel reports on a project to help the Masai to protect lions in Kenya - check out the great video.

• Meanwhile, New Chitose Airport in Hokkaido has a novel way to protect the environment - collecting snow in winter to help cool the building in summer. Again, Intelligent Travel has the details.

• Susie is an American woman who has moved to Jeddah in Saudi Arabia with her Arab husband and their son. She blogs at Susie’s Big Adventure and has some surprising things to say - for example, did you know that Jeddah is a huge art city?

• Sheila at FamilyTravelLogue writes about a tornado simulator at San Francisco Airport.

• Jess at FushMush on the delights of Cinque Terre in Italy.

• Natalie at Kuju Abroad brings you this wonderful picture of a old Cuban woman and a story to match.

• Julia at food blog A Slice of Cherry Pie writes about her autumn escape to Suffolk.

• Europe is really not that expensive, according to Tom at Tripinator.

• Intelligent Travel on matching music to your travel destinations. It’s a regular feature in its sister magazine National Geographic Traveler and this month the playlist takes us to East Africa.

• TravelSavvyMom is one of my favourite travel sites - I don’t even have children, but I love it because it’s so witty and well observed. This week, Rebecca writes about her children’s favourite Parisian attraction - the pigeons. Jamie writes about the agony of trying to teach her kids Spanish - and you can win a cool prize of Rosetta Stone language learning software up for grabs. And Kayt has posted a hilarious video about Ernie from Sesame Street.

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Congratulations to BeWILDerwood, Africa’s Eden and Ngong Ping 36O and all the award-winning travel writers.

I have been a member of the British Guild of Travel Writers for about a year now. It’s a professional organisation and you are only eligible to join if you can demonstrate that you are making a living substantially from travel writing, whether that be books or articles. Membership entitles you to have your name listed in the Year Book, which goes out to all members and other industry professionals who pay to receive it, and use of the snazzy new website where you can build a mini-website or network virtually with other members. You also get a membership card and various discounts but I think the biggest benefit is the opportunity to network with other writers and travel professionals at the regular Guild events.

The star event on the Guild calendar, apart from the AGM, is the annual awards dinner. It was hosted last night at the Marriott in Grosvenor Square and it was a great night. We started with a champagne reception with Jersey oysters and then moved into the main room for dinner. The food at awards events can often be a bit rubbish but last night’s meal was really good - it was a collaboration between the Marriott’s restaurant Maze (part of the Gordon Ramsay empire) and the island of Jersey (one of the sponsors), so we had Jersey crab for starters and Jersey vegetables with our lamb for main course, and Jersey cream with our dessert.

There were actually two sets of awards - the Tourism Awards where members vote on the best tourism projects around the world and the Members Awards for travel writing published in the past year. The Tourism Awards were announced before dinner, the Members Awards between starter and main course and then the raffle (to raise money for the Back Up Trust, a spinal injury charity) before dessert.

I’d come along to a Guild meeting a few months ago to hear the nominations for the Tourism Awards and vote on the short list. The final winners were then determined by a vote of the entire membership by post and email. So I was familiar with the nominations but I didn’t know who had actually won until the night. I was really thrilled because all the projects I voted for won their categories! So congratulations to BeWILDerwood in Norfolk for best UK project, Africa’s Eden or Loango National Park in Gabon for best non-UK project, and Ngong Ping 360 in Hong Kong for best global project.

BeWILDerwood

I’m almost tempted to borrow children and take them to BeWILDerwood as the description of this place really captured my imagination. It’s a treetop adventure playground - with treehouses, aerial ropewalks and zipwires, boats and boardwalks - built on 50 acres of woodland and marshland. It’s very eco-friendly - it’s all built from sustainable wood, the entire site is pesticide free, and they’ve planted a lot of trees as well. Among the magical creatures who live there are Mildred, the vegetarian Crocklebog who lives in the Scary Lake, and Swampy a March Boggle. There is nothing modern about BeWILDerwood, although the guy who built it has said he was partly inspired by 90s computer game Myst.

Africa’s Eden

If it weren’t so expensive, I would book my ticket to Loango National Park in Gabon tomorrow. The fact that I can’t is partly the point - they are trying to keep tourism numbers low so that it’s sustainable for the park’s ecology and the wellbeing of the people who live there. Rombout Swanborn, the director of Loango National Park, has said: “We will never have 20 Jeeps around a waterhole shining lights into animals’ eyes.”

The president of Gabon set aside 11% of the country as a national park in 2002 - only tiny Costa Rica has preserved a greater proportion of land. Before then tourism was virtually unknown in Gabon but they began developing the industry at this point with the ethos “ecotourism pays for conservation”. Loango National Park opened in 2007, covering grassland, rivers, forest and mangroves and featuring spectacularly varied wildlife, including whales, elephants, hippos, leopards, reptiles and primates. Visitors are accommodated in the eco-friendly lodge and satellite tented camps and wildlife viewing is small-scale with pirogue trips, forest treks or savannah drives. There are 500 Gabonese in the area with nearly 100 employed as eco-guides etc, while local farmers sell produce to the lodge, and their children attend a new school built by the park.

NgongPing 360

Ngong Ping 360 in Hong Kong combines an existing attraction - the Giant Buddha built by the nearby Po Lin monastery on Landau Island - with a new one. Previously there were so many tourists coming to see the Giant Buddha and the strain on the monastery was too much, with monks spending their whole time providing refreshments. Now Ngong Ping 360 is actually bringing more tourists but they’ve actually managed to reduce the impact on the environment and the monastery. The tourists arrive via a 5.7km cable car skyrail - the world’s longest without a car change - so they didn’t have to build a road through the forest. While tourists can still climb up to see the Buddha, Ngong Ping has also built a Chinese cultural village with dining facilities, which has reduced the burden on the monastery. A win-win situation!

Highly commended

• * Runners-up in the UK category were the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool and Thanet Greeters in Kent.

• * Runners-up in the overseas category were Highland Paradise, Cook Islands and Palazzo Falson, Malta.

• * Runners-up in the Globe Award were Musee de Quai Branly in Paris and the Dinosaur Gallery, Museum of Natural Sciences, in Brussels.

Members Awards

All Guild members are eligible to enter their work for the travel writing awards and entries are judged anonymously. The winning pieces are published in a glossy booklet, which made highly entertaining reading on my Tube ride home at the end of the night. I believe they will also be posted up on the BGTW website at some point as well. Congratulations all!

• * Nicki Gardner for Best Destination Feature under 850 words
• * Alan Hart for Best UK Feature over 850 words
• * Nigel Tisdall for Best European (non-UK) Feature over 850 words
• * Mike Unwin for Best Overseas (non-European) Feature over 850 words
• * Matthew Teller for Best Business/Trade Feature
• * Sarah Woods for Best Transport Feature
• * Will Gray for Best Guidebook Award
• * Rosemary Bailey for Best Narrative Travel Book
• * Tim Richards for Best Radio Feature
• * Carmen Roberts for Best Television Travel Feature
• * Jeremy Hoare for Photograph of the Year
• * Brian Jackman - Runner-Up for Travel Writer of the Year
• * Peter Hughes - Travel Writer of the Year
• * Jim Dunn for Lifetime Achievement Award

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• * If you ever travel with children, be prepared for a few embarrassing moments dealing with the culture clash. Kayt at Travel Savvy Mom shares her own hilarious, cringe-making moments.

• * Autumn is here and in rural England, the apple harvest is underway. Anthony from the Smith Travel Blog helped make cider in Herefordshire.

• * Enjoy these stunning pics of iconic American landscapes from Kim Wildman at Wild About Travel + Writing who took a trip to Monument Valley on the Utah/Arizona border.

• * In nearby Nevada, Liz at Perceptive Travel is living it up in Vegas.

• * Myamii from For the Love of Food shares what she learnt on her trip to Ireland.

• * Intelligent Travel has a new home, more fully integrated into the National Geographic site. The blog also brings us news of an art exchange between Atlanta’s High Museum of Art and the Louvre.

• * Lara at Cool Travel Guide recommends Art House, a boutique hotel in Damascus - unusually it’s located outside the Old City but, as Lara explains, this has some advantages.

• * Darren at Travel Rants on the rise of virtual travel, with virtual malls and the whole Secon Life phenonmenon. Personally, I don’t see this replacing real travel but I have been known to check out destinations pre- and post-trip on Google Earth.

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Spain is packed with religious artworks - some of them more quirky than others, such as these Jesus statues from Barcelona and Sevilla.

Spain is an intensely Catholic country and has been ever since the Moors were expelled in the Middle Ages and the fearsome Spanish Inquisition in the centuries that followed. So it’s not surprising that the country is brimming with beautiful cathedrals and religious paintings and statues from the medieval and Renaissance periods. Sometimes the endless paintings and statues of Madonna and child can seem a bit repetitive so I like to look for the ones that are a little different.

For example, it’s not too often you see statues of the Virgin Mary breast feeding the baby Jesus, such as this Medieval sculpture from the Frederic Mares Museum in Barcelona.

Those Medieval sculptors also liked to imagine Jesus as a playful child. From the same museum, here are examples of Jesus playing with his mother, and another of Jesus riding on the shoulders of Saint Christopher.

And at Sevilla Cathedral, we see Jesus with his stepfather Joseph and Jesus as a young boy. Not quite unorthodox but certainly less common themes than Mary and the infant and Jesus on the Cross.

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There’s a green theme to this week’s round-up of travel links.

• Liz at Perceptive Travel writes about TripAdvisor’s $1m charity give-away. Charities in the running include environmental organisations such as Conservation International, the Nature Conservancy, and the National Geographic Society, as well as development and aid organisations such as Medicins Sans Frontiers and Save the Children.

• Over at Intelligent Travel, Suzanne Roberts writes about the greening of the Burning Man festival, while Meg Weaver writes about a museum in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park that claims to be the greenest in the world, and also in San Fran, Pat Tanumihardja turns her attention to sustainable sushi.

• A piece by Elizabeth Becker in The Washington Post examines the impact of mass tourism on the planet titled Don’t Go There. It makes sobering reading. (Link via Intelligent Travel).

• Pam at Nerd’s Eye View recently hobnobbed with royalty at the Conde Nast World Savers Congress, covering the event on Twitter [search using the #WSC code], and writing two thoughtful pieces on her own blog. Beata Loyfman and Julia Bainbridge have also blogged about this on the Conde Nast site, and Conde Nast Traveler has published notes from the event online.

• Harry Pearson on the Guardian’s Travel Blog bids farewell to the passenger ferry from Newcastle to Norway - killed off by cheap flights apparently.

• Over on the Emerald Isle (yes, I’m stretching the green theme a bit here), food blog A Forkful of Spaghetti reviews breakfast at Denis Cotter’s Cafe Paradiso.

• Finally, don’t be too alarmed at these green polar bears featured by Jeremy Elton Jacquot at Tree Hugger.

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• * Pam from Nerd’s Eye View on some unscheduled excitement (not the good kind) on her flight to New York to cover the Conde Nast World Savers conference (see her Twitter feed for the conference coverage).

• * The Lost Girls - three New Yorkers who blogged their way around the world - have signed a book deal. (Link via the Perceptive Travel blog).

• * Kim Wildman on Wild About Travel + Writing extols the perks of travelling solo and shares tips on travel photography.

• * Speaking of beautiful photography - these pics of Italy on Travel Planners are just stunning! (Link via Darren of Travel Rants fame on Twitter).

• * Intelligent Travel on the cost of baggage fees for surfers. (I imagine skiiers would have the same problem).

• * Lara from Cool Travel Guide points us to her article on Western Australia for Wanderlust magazine.

• * Europe A La Carte on Ventspils in Latvia - it’s a new destination for me.

• * Beach destinations for the thrifty traveller on the Guardian’s travel site.

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• * On my foodie site The Gooseberry Fool, I share my dining experiences in Kraków, Poland.

• * Kim at Wild About Writing + Travel shares her top 10 things to do in Havana, Cuba.

• * On Sheila Scarborough’s new and improved family travel site, now at its new home at FamilyTravelLogue, she reminds us of the importance of having the airline’s telephone number rather than relying on airport staff in the case of delays or cancellation.

• * Fancy living in a cardboard box? Intelligent Travel brings us news of a hotel made out of shipping containers. It’s just out of London, though I don’t think I’ll be rushing to take a look based on the photographs.

• * Also on Intelligent Travel, I like the look of these lightweight canvas shoes with a conscience. Actually, I seem to have starred half a dozen Intelligent Travel posts in my RSS reader on subjects as diverse as Mexican cooking classes and whale watching by kayak in British Columbia so I suggest you simply head there directly and peruse at your leisure!

• * Interesting twist on animal rights - apparently PETA is buying Sea World. The theme parks are being sold off and PETA is interested in buying at least one, in San Antonia, Orlando or San Diego.

• * Foodie blogger Jessica on Ripe London takes us on a personal tour of Amsterdam, with plenty of time to indulge in pancakes, Thai food and cocktails.

• * World Hum debates the rise of female-only beaches in Egypt.

• * Finally on Gadling, this English language name for a restaurant in China is hilarious. Lost in translation, perhaps?

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