Category Archives: Travel

JANE CABLE’S HIDDEN CORNWALL: FOOD & DRINK

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I sometimes wonder how much, if any, of Cornwall is really hidden these days. It’s one of those locations that thrive on visitors finding something off the beaten track… even if that track is not much more than six feet wide and they’re towing a caravan.

Nevertheless, the county is my adopted home and I am sure I see it a little differently. For a start, I see it out of season; lashed by winter storms and on unreasonably soft and sunny spring days. I see city, countryside, and coast. I love its history and it inspires me. I love the people, because, let’s face it, the ones I know are my friends.

So as a taster for the first of these articles I’m going to write about another love of mine. Food and drink. And to give you a few ideas you may not have thought of if you find yourself hungry or thirsty in Cornwall this summer.

TAPAS TIME

No, not in Spain, but every bit as delicious, with a fabulous atmosphere and seasonal menus suitable for vegans and meat-eaters alike, as well as – a big plus for me – gluten free options. I’m talking about Bodega 18 in Truro, our current favourite restaurant. There’s a branch in Falmouth too, but we haven’t tried it. We have no reason to when we can stagger home from this one.

TAP YARD

Very sadly for Cornish folk, Skinners Brewery went into receivership more than a year ago, taking with it not only its most famous beer, Betty Stoggs, but also its brilliant tap yard bar in Truro. It had an amazing outdoor area with a casual vibe and visiting food trucks, and filled with locals on Friday evening it was just the most laid back place to be.

The good news is that Goodh Brewing, who have taken Skinners over, will be bringing back the tap! Hopefully in July, just in time for it to start pouring with rain again.

WOOD FIRED

The St Kew Inn is rather less hidden since chef Andy Tuck appeared on the Great British Menu earlier this year, but it’s still in the middle of nowhere a few miles inland from Port Isaac, and not a place to tow your caravan to. It’s definitely worth a visit though, because the wood-fired food is genius. If you haven’t tried Baked Alaska cooked that way then you haven’t lived. Not only that, the welcome is super friendly too.

BEACH BREAKFAST

No 4 Breakfast & Bistro in Perranporth gets my vote every time. After a walk along the beach – which can be miles and miles when the tide is out – or a bracing swim – the portions here are as generous as the welcome. Even for the dogs… although the local cat who seems to own the garden can make life interesting for the pooches at times.

A GOOD HONEST PINT

Tucked away near Trevaunce Cove in St Agnes (or St Pirans, in my first Cornish Echoes mystery, The Forgotten Maid) is The Driftwood Spars. A pub, a brewery, a restaurant, and a guest house, all within a stone’s throw of a fab surfing beach with the added seasonal entertainment of some idiot who thinks it’s a good idea to park their very expensive car on the sand. Trust me, it happens. Don’t let it be you.

The bar of the Drifty is on the ground floor and their own beers are amazing, and perfect for me because they are brewed using a gluten free process.

 

Photo credits belong to the venue concerned as I never take pictures of my food!

 

WRITERS ON THE ROAD: CAROLINE JAMES

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Meet Venus. My writing retreat on wheels.

“Come and write in me!” Venus whispered when I reluctantly went to view her. I’d never had any desire to be a caravaner. It suggested too much Hi-de-Hi! But from the day I met Venus last summer, it was love at first sight.

She’s a big twin-axle unit and, combined with the car, as long as an articulated lorry. Spacious with bedroom, bathroom, kitchen-diner and lounge.

Our first few forays into caravanning were in the UK as we took in the delights of Wales and Northumberland, with only minor mishaps with awnings and wrong turnings. I could write in the peace of the countryside or overlooking a beach. Venus has few demands. There’s minimum cleaning and washing and no gardening – no distractions to stop me from writing.

Now we felt prepared for an overseas adventure. Unlike a motorhome, travelling with a large caravan needs plenty of planning. Would we get stuck in the Eurotunnel? Would our ‘BipandGo’ get us through tolls in each country automatically? Would the pitches be big enough for Venus? The list of checks was long. But most significantly, would all the travelling distract from my writing?

Leaving in mid-December to head south through France, the adventure began, and I was too distracted to write as the days progressed. We enjoyed many stop-offs along the way, including Christmas shopping in Lyon and being frozen to the bone in Beziers during the coldest temperatures for years. But once over the border to Spain, the weather warmed up, and we eventually settled for several weeks on the coast, south of Alicante. Now Venus became our Spanish home, and she adapted beautifully. The awning was up, the canopy open, and wine poured. With a novel to finish and perfect, the peace and tranquillity of my writing environment was a writer’s dream, and the words flowed. Distractions from our European neighbours were pleasant. Bonjour! Guten Morgen! They called out and encouraged me to write.

Travelling around Spain sparked many plot ideas. I know that I will have future characters enjoying the mud baths at Lo Pagan on the Costa Blanca and visiting the eclectic rastro market in Calpe or taking in the rich history of Alicante. With so many festivals to enjoy too, I made prolific notes as I planned the outline of a novel.

Heading home, we took a different route. Driving across Spain via Madrid, I saw how beautiful and rich the country is as we encountered miles of orange groves and vineyards. Every town and village seemed to have a castle built precariously high on a hill, or a medieval church tucked around a corner. Approaching the Pyrenees, bathed in glorious sunshine, the view was magnificent, and I didn’t give the drive a second thought.

But now, I know how to write about fear.

Suddenly, the temperature dropped to sub-zero, and driving snow became a blinding blizzard as darkness fell. Venus is a heavy vehicle, and as we drove along the top of mountains with nowhere to shelter and a hundred miles to go, I thought I was going to die. Look out for a scene in a future novel when the terrified characters disappear into a wintery Spanish night – the story will write itself!

Our next trip will avoid the mountains in winter.

Happy travels everyone!

With love,

Caroline

 

Out now – THE CRUISE

 

EVA GLYN’S HIDDEN CROATIA: THE MUSEUM OF BROKEN RELATIONSHIPS

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“A museum about you, about us, about the ways we love and lose”

We stumbled upon it one warm September afternoon in Zagreb’s Upper Town, a sign so intriguing we crossed the road to take a closer look. A museum? For broken relationships? One where the artefacts are contributed not by historians or professional artists, by those involved; the heartbroken, the newly released, the despairing and the ever hopeful.

Zagreb may be the museum’s permanent home but it also has a virtual presence and outreach exhibitions. And anyone can contribute, either by sending their item to the museum or one of the exhibitions, or by filing their story online. Indeed you can upload a story that no-one else will see; it can remain your personal testimony until you are ready to share it, or timelocked until a date of your choosing.

The idea behind donating is this: “Recently ended a relationship? Wish to unburden the emotional load by erasing everything that reminds you of that painful experience? Don’t – one day you may regret it. Instead, send your item to our museum and take part in the creation of a collective emotional history!”

Photo credit: Museum of Broken Relationships/Sanja Bistiric

And which of us has not been there? The decision to part with (or not part with) a possession so intrinsically wrapped into a relationship that is broken beyond repair is one of the toughest. We have lost the person (for better or for worse). Would it be cathartic or even more heart wrenching to lose that birthday card, that pair of boots, that book, that kitten… Please don’t sent the museum the kitten – a photograph will do very nicely.

So what sort of things does the museum receive? The answer is anything and everything and the collection is growing so fast that only around a tenth of it is ever displayed. But it is all carefully curated and kept, seeing the light of day for themed exhibitions and when new space becomes free. Online contributions, in the form of pictures and stories, are published to the museum’s website within a few days.

The Museum of Broken Relationships began in 2006 as creative art project conceived by Olinka Vištica and Dražen Grubišić. Even now the fundamental idea behind it is to pull creativity, rather than destruction, from grief by giving something to the museum. The idea is a sound one. I remember many years ago hearing a rabbi on the radio say that if you make a mistake, rather than fret about it you should wrap it up in a beautiful parcel and make a gift of it to your god. Unlikely as it sounds, it worked for me.

Photo credit: Museum of Broken Relationships/Sanja Bistricic

If you visit the museum or one of its exhibitions you could be confronted by anything so do so with an open mind. Everything is displayed anonymously, with the dates and place the break up happened. A drawing, a doll, a dildo… a piece of belly button lint. Everything has a place here and a story. But one of my absolute favourites is a toaster. The toaster of vindication it’s called, the label pithy and brief: “That’ll show you. How are you going to toast anything now?”

To visit, contribute, browse, or support the museum by buying something quirky or hilarious from its shop, check out its website at https://brokenships.com/

WRITERS ON THE ROAD: CHRISTINA COURTENAY

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I write stories about the Vikings, and being half Swedish, it would have been easy to just set all of them in Sweden as it’s a place I know well. But where would be the fun in that? The Vikings were intrepid travellers and explorers, and journeyed far and wide. I had a wealth of places to choose from, and as I’ve been working on a series, I decided early on that each book would feature a different location. That hopefully makes it more fun for both the readers and myself!

Book five, Promises of the Runes, (out this month) is set in Norway, and I’d previously used Sweden, Russia, Iceland and England. For book six, therefore, which I’m working on at the moment, I turned my sights on the Orkney Islands. It was a place Scandinavians had traded with for centuries, and no one really knows exactly when they began to settle there rather than just visit occasionally. By the 9th century, when my book takes place, they were well established and had integrated fully with the previous occupants, the Celts. Most of the islands have Norse names – any that end in ‘ey’, for example, as that means ‘island’.

There is nothing better for an author than to actually visit a place we are writing about. It helps with descriptions, catching the essence of a place – its scents, sounds, nature and people. So I dragged my husband along on an epic road trip. A twelve hour drive up to Scrabster, followed by 90 minutes on a ferry, and suddenly there they were – the gorgeous Orkney Islands.

We were incredibly lucky with the weather and had beautiful sunshine and blue skies interspersed with fluffy clouds. The air is so clear and I found myself wishing I could paint the landscape just because the light was so brilliant. There’s a huge amount of history, going back to Neolithic times, but I was concentrating on anything remaining from the Viking era. We headed first to the Brough of Birsay, a tidal island that can only be reached by a causeway during low tide. Here are the remains of a large Viking settlement, the outlines of the houses clear on the grassy site. I could definitely see why they’d wanted to live in such a beautiful location! It was also perfect for use in my story.

We visited several other Viking sites – one at Orphir called Earl’s Bu and another at Deerness. To reach the latter, we had to walk along spectacular cliffs that were part of a nature reserve. The Vikings had a settlement on top of a 30 metre high sea stack on a promontory sticking out into the North Sea – an isolated place, but again, stunning. Nearby was a beach and cove, perfect for longships.

In Kirkwall, the main town, the historical museum had lots of Viking items, among them a bear tooth carved with runes. It might have been worn as protection against magic or to imbue the wearer with a bear’s strength.

The most poignant reminder of the Vikings, however, was in the Neolithic tomb at Maeshowe. Shaped sort of like a beehive buried inside a huge earth mound, it is reached via a 10 metre long tunnel only a metre high. A thousand years ago a group of Vikings had apparently taken shelter there and scratched graffiti all over the walls. There were more than 30 messages written in runes. It really made these people come alive for me and I could see them sitting in there, bored and restless. The connection was almost visceral and I was so pleased I got to experience this.

If you get the chance, do visit the Orkneys!

Buy link for Promises of the Runes – https://geni.us/ExsdDss 

 

 

EVA GLYN’S HIDDEN CROATIA: EATING WITHIN DUBROVNIK’S WALLS

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First let me say that I am one lucky, lucky writer. Long have I dreamt of eating at Dubrovnik’s only Michelin starred restaurant, and on my last visit, I did it. It’s a very special place (with prices to match) but I had cause for celebration – it was publication day for The Collaborator’s Daughter, my novel set in the city.

I had visited Restaurant 360 before, but only through the pages of The Olive Grove. Where else would wealthy businessman Josip Beros take Damir to impress him?

‘The design of the place alone took Damir’s breath away, the cubed rattan furniture in turquoise and grey in the lower courtyard contrasting in both colour and style with the honeyed stone of the old fort into which it was built.’

It is, indeed a stunning location, and in the summer open air tables grace the tops of the walls giving stunning views of the harbour, but on a breezy evening right at the beginning of April I was pleased we would be eating inside.

Everything about Restaurant 360 is precise, except for the service which is as friendly as it is knowledgeable about the food and wine they serve. As well as a la carte choices, there are two tasting menus; Antalogica, which showcases the chef’s latest signature dishes, and Republika, a modern take on heritage dishes from the time of Dubrovnik’s Ragusa republic.

We were delighted when the sommelier was able to match a different Croatian wine with each course. Croatian wines are hugely underrated (and my husband knows a thing or two about wine, having worked in the industry) and we were able to enjoy a selection of the best with our meal. We were especially impressed with a Grk from Lumbarda on Korcula. All the more delicious to me because that’s where The Olive Grove is set.

All the food was wonderful, but it was with fish that Restaurant 360 excelled. We do sometimes treat ourselves to Michelin starred food, and some of the dishes bettered anything we have eaten. Anywhere. The absolute star of the show was what sounded an unlikely combination of smoked eel, foie gras, melon, and date cream. The man who thought that one up, and then delivered it, is some sort of genius.

A great deal of time goes into perfecting the dishes. Our waiter told us that the ‘fish soup’ accompanying the brodet (a very traditional Croatian dish) of grouper and clams had gone through almost forty iterations before it was deemed worthy of serving. And I would imagine it was the same with everything else; the sea bass with leek and langoustine was one of the most amazing things I have ever tasted. And the scallop tartar with kohlrabi and yuzu gel was as delightful as it was refreshing.

Great care was taken with my gluten free diet and I felt very safe all evening. The bread was delicious and plentiful, accompanied by a colourful array of butters, and where a dish could not be adapted, (as with one of the amuse bouche) the chef made something specially for me. Nothing was too much trouble for kitchen or staff, which made dining at 360 a wonderful experience.

I couldn’t resist taking a copy of The Olive Grove with me, and gave it to our fabulous sommelier when we left. He was delighted to hear it was set on Korcula, where he and his wife had honeymooned. It seemed such a small thank you for a night we will never forget.

JANE CABLE ON THE BENEFITS OF A WRITING ESCAPE TO THE SUN

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I have just returned from a third fabulous week of writing led by one of my favourite authors, Rosanna Ley, in one of my favourite places, Finca el Cerrillo in the mountains north of Malaga. My first was in February 2020 then, courtesy of Covid there was a gap before I returned in March 2022 and again this year.

So why do I keep going back? And if you are looking for a writing retreat, or writing holiday, as Rosanna calls them, what might help you to decide which one to choose?

The first year I went my objectives were quite broad; I had a contract with a small publisher but was desperate to break into the mainstream, so I wanted to hone my skills, find inspiration for ‘the book with the hook’, and pick Rosanna’s brains about where my writing career might take me.

On every level, the retreat worked for me. Every morning, after a hearty breakfast and an optional walk through the finca’s olive grove, we met in the light and airy classroom for a themed session aimed to both inspire us and improve our skills. There were people at every stage of their career and Rosanna managed the sessions cleverly so we all got something out of it. Topics ranged from beginnings and endings, to writing dialogue, and short stories so there is plenty to get your teeth into, whether you are writing a novel or not.

After that, the day is your own to write, relax, or chat to other participants. One-to-one sessions with Rosanna are offered, including feedback on your writing, which is always detailed and incredibly valuable. Everyone meets in the dining room or on the terrace for lunch, and part of the whole joy of the week is making connections with other writers. In fact, simply having time to be a writer, with no distractions, was a revelation in itself.

Towards the end of the afternoon is a feedback session where we could read a piece of our work for comment by the group. I had never done this before but soon lost my fear as the other participants were so constructive and helpful.

A couple of evenings we had dinner at a local village, but otherwise ate at the finca, where the food is excellent. There is always some sort of entertainment; a quiz night, group singing, dancing, party games… and on the last night the finca tradition of desert island discs, where we have to guess who from the group chose a particular song.

All of this goes to form strong bonds, and after my first retreat, when we were plunged into lockdown so soon afterwards, we kept in touch via Zoom. This year we have a WhatsApp group instead. Time marches on.

Rosanna is very flexible in her approach, and this year arranged things so that those of us who wanted to focus on a particular project could leave the morning sessions early, and as a result my wordcount went through the roof. I was bashing out the first draft of my summer 2024 Eva Glyn novel and when I wasn’t at my laptop took invigorating and mentally stimulating walks around the olive grove between scenes, or when I needed to unknot a thorny problem.

Because of the way the week is structured it is quite genuinely suitable for everyone from absolute novice writers to published authors. And Finca el Cerrillo is a little piece of heaven on earth. At the time of writing Rosanna has a place or two left on this June’s retreat, and is taking expressions of interest for next year. I hope to see you there!

For more information, visit Rosanna’s website: https://rosannaley.com/writing-retreats-events

EVA GLYN’S HIDDEN CROATIA: DUBROVNIK SYNAGOGUE AND JEWISH MUSEUM

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I would never have even realised Dubrovnik had a Jewish Museum if I hadn’t been researching the city’s Jewish community during the Second World War. As it happens, their story – and the museum itself – became an important part of The Collaborator’s Daughter.

I tracked the museum down online first. There are walking tours of the city with a Jewish focus that appear to be aimed specifically at the cruise passengers, and through this I discovered the heart of the Jewish community in the old town. The name of its location, Zudioska (Jewish) Street might have given it away if I’d thought about it.

As with many medieval trading cities the Jewish community in Dubrovnik were important and the synagogue is one of the oldest Sephardic ones in Europe. It is on the top floor of the rather anonymous building and is a beautiful and calming sacred space even today. The dark wooden seats are rich with age and the Wedgwood blue decorations on the ceiling reminiscent of the Mediterranean sky.

Even more interesting to me was the museum that takes up the floor below. It is tiny but showcases the community’s history so well, from the fabulously embroidered vestments and ornate fourteenth century torah scroll that represent the Jews’ proud history, to a second room with chilling artefacts from World War Two.

Compared to other parts of Europe, overall Dubrovnik’s Jews suffered less because initially at least they were under Italian control. While Croatia’s (and yes, it is correct to use that term for the period) home grown fascists persecuted the faith with even more vigour than the Germans, in this small enclave they were safe. For a while at least, and their numbers grew.

Then, in 1942 the Italians were told the clamp down. Curfews were imposed, yellow armbands issued. All the awful paraphernalia of ethnic hatred. Finally in the November the eighty or so members of the community were interned near the harbour at Gruz and on the island of Lopud. Eventually they were moved north to a larger camp at Rab, and during the chaos resulting from the Italian surrender the partisans took the area and a majority were saved. In all twenty-seven of the Dubrovnik Jews died, many more moved to Israel, and the community never recovered.

Although the synagogue is rarely used, helpful volunteers are available to show visitors around and to talk about the artefacts and history. The museum is open all day, every day, and is well worth half an hour of anyone’s time.

PUBLICATION DAY SPECIAL: THE FOREVER GARDEN BY ROSANNA LEY

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I’m a big fan of Rosanna Ley’s books and this was no exception; in fact, it’s one of my favourites. The characters are instantly believable, the descriptions sumptuous and the whole story is perfectly tensioned between three viewpoint characters and two timelines.

The story is told from the points of view of Lara (in the 1940s and present day), her daughter Rose, and her granddaughter Bea, and it revolves around two very special gardens. The first is in Dorset, created by Lara’s mother based on the principles of the Arts and Crafts movement. It is this garden that Lara promises her mother to protect, which is the starting point for the drama that follows. The second garden is one that Lara later creates in Puglia.

The relationships between the women – and their gardens – are beautifully drawn. That Lara left the Dorset garden behind is evident from the outset, but in the hands of such a skilled storyteller, my desire to find out the whys and wherefores made it hard to put the book down. The Forever Garden will not only transport you from Dorset to Italy and back, it’s a journey you cannot fail to enjoy.

I was so entranced by the gardens that I asked Rosanna what her inspiration for them had been, and what her own Dorset garden is like:

 

I’ve always loved gardens. My parents were both keen gardeners and I have happy memories of running around our back garden as a child, playing out imaginary stories, dodging amongst my mother’s washing pegged out on the line and my father’s precious raspberry canes and gooseberry bushes.

Our own garden here in Dorset is not large but it wraps around the house and so I feel cocooned and sheltered – which is good as we live near the sea and it can be very windy! Because of the sea air I have plants that can withstand these conditions such as lavender, rosemary, thrift, hollyhocks and erigeron daisies. I am a fan of the cottage garden and of fragrant plants that attract insects, butterflies and bees – natural gardens and wild gardens. The garden also has two bird baths, two tamarisk trees, a pergola of clematis, honeysuckle and roses and a couple of places to sit and write or think in. And we are very lucky because it also has a sea view…

I was inspired to write about an Arts & Crafts garden after I visited Barrington Court in Somerset. The gardens there were laid out in the 1920’s to a structured design influenced by the famous Arts & Crafts garden designer Gertrude Jekyll. She believed passionately in the beauty of the natural landscape and – like me – valued the ordinary plants familiar to gardeners today, such as hostas, lavender and sweet-scented old-fashioned roses.

I immediately loved the Arts & Crafts concept of the garden being a continuation of the house, and of that garden being made up of several small rooms – each one with its own character and flavour. After all, when we go into a garden, we don’t always want to do the same thing. We might want to grow vegetables and be in the mood for some hard-core digging, or we might want to sit quietly in a soft and beautiful space that enables us to reflect, read a good book or just watch the birds go by.

In an Arts & Crafts garden, plants are sometimes chosen for their colour. A white garden, for example, can create a sense of tranquillity through the green of the foliage and the white flowers which are often considered healing for the mind and spirit. Or they might be chosen according to season. In ‘The Forever Garden’ there is a spring garden full of early bulbs such as daffodils and tulips which represents hope and new beginnings; this symbolism becomes very important to Lara in the story.

I like to think of the ‘Forever Garden’ as an important character in the book. For Lara it is both prison and sanctuary. The garden saves her and it also sets her free.