Recipefiesta

The most exciting places our writers came across this year, from untouched islands in Finland to an affordable ski resort in Bulgaria and the perfect Parisian bistro

On a midsummer trip to Ireland, I saw dolphins in the Irish Sea, sunset by the Liffey, and misty views of the Galtee Mountains. The half-hour train journey to Cobh (“cove”), through Cork’s island-studded harbour, was especially lovely. As the railway crossed Lough Mahon, home to thousands of seabirds, there was water on both sides of the train. I watched oystercatchers, egrets, godwits and common terns, which nest on floating pontoons. Curlews foraged in the mudflats, and an old Martello tower stood on a wooded promontory.

From contemporary art exhibitions to eccentric festivals, regional Australia has no shortage of big events over the summer of 2025-2026

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Icons of Pop Art: Warhol and Lichtenstein, Mudgee
Two of the 20th century’s most influential artists, Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein have works on display at Mudgee Arts Precinct. Visitors can take a look at Warhol’s iconic Campbell’s soup cans up close, or get comically existential with Lichtenstein’s Reflections on the Scream.
On now until 15 March 2026.

Most metros use plastic or metal, but the distinctive fabrics on London’s network are full of clues to its history

When I first came to London from Yorkshire in the late 1980s, I found the tube replete with bizarre novelties. Among them was the way most trains required me to sit sideways to the direction of travel, as on a fairground waltzer. Directly opposite me was another person or an empty seat, and while I knew not to stare at people, I did stare at the seats – at their woollen coverings, called moquette. I have since written two books about them, the first nonfiction, Seats of London, and now a crime novel, The Moquette Mystery.

I was attracted to moquette firstly because it, like me, came from Yorkshire (most of it back then was woven in Halifax), and whereas many foreign metros have seats of plastic or steel, moquette made the tube cosy. Yet it seemed underappreciated. The index of the standard history of the tube, for instance, proceeds blithely from Moorgate to Morden.

It’s a far cry from the sun-kissed beaches of Cape Town where she grew up, but the simple pleasures of a seaside village in Cornwall draw the author back year after year

The idea of the sea that I grew up with was associated with sundowners and souped-up cars and skipping classes to sunbathe with the models who took over Cape Town’s beaches each summer. As a student, long nights would end, not infrequently, with a swim at sunrise (until, one morning, the police arrived to remind us that sharks feed at dawn). So it’s hardly surprising that, after moving to Norwich to study in my 20s, the British seaside trips I made felt tepid. Cromer, with its swathe of beige sand sloping into water an almost identical colour, seemed to suggest that over here, land and sea were really not that different from one another. That the sea as I’d known it – with all its ecstatic, annihilating energy – was an unruly part of the Earth whose existence was best disavowed.

It was only several years later, burnt out from a soul-destroying job, that I took a week off and boarded a train to Cornwall. I was 25, poor and suffering from the kind of gastric complaints that often accompany misery. With a pair of shorts, two T-shirts and a raincoat in my backpack, I arrived in St Ives and set off to walk the Cornish coastal path.

You don’t have to be a child to enjoy Seiffen, the magical ‘home of Christmas’ where they’ve been making traditional wooden toys for hundreds of years

I feel terrible … I’ve left the children at home and Seiffen, nicknamed Spielzeugdorf (The Toy Village), is literally a Christmas wonderland. Every street is alive with sparkling fairy lights and soft candlelight. There are thousands of tiny wooden figurines, train sets and toy animals displayed in shop windows, wooden pyramids taller than doorframes and colourful nutcracker characters. Forget elves in the north pole, this is the real Santa’s workshop. For hundreds of years, here in the village of Seiffen, wood turners and carvers have created classic wooden Christmas toys and sold them around the world.

Near the border of the Czech Republic, Seiffen may be well known in the German-speaking world as the “home of Christmas”, but so far it has been largely missed by English-speaking seasonal tourists. Tucked away in the Ore Mountains, about an hour and a half south of Dresden, it is not the easiest place to get to by public transport – the nearest train station is in Olbernhau, nearly 7 miles (11km) away. Buses are available, but we opt for a hire car and make our way into the hills, arriving the day after the first snowfall of the year. The roads are cleared quickly, but snow clings to the branches of the spruce trees. We half expect to see the Gruffalo’s child, but only spot a rust-coloured fox making its way through a fresh field of snow.

A cultural initiative in Piedmont is unlocking a trove of priceless medieval frescoes in rural churches

The Santa Maria di Missione chapel in Villafranca Piemonte, northern Italy, stands at the end of a long cornfield. Behind it, the mountains rise gently, their outlines caressed by the sun. The colours of autumn frame the 15th-century frescoes that embellish the structure’s interior, painted by Italian artist Aimone Duce, of the Lombard school. The chapel is the municipality’s oldest religious building, serving about 4,000 inhabitants, and stands on the site of a pre-existing building dating back to 1037.

Inside the small chapel, my footsteps echo softly against the walls, breaking the stillness of the surrounding countryside. The sharp scent of plaster mingles with the earthy smell of the fields outside, carried in on the wind along with the sweetness of wheat. Light filters through the narrow windows, catching the vivid hues of a fresco that depicts the seven deadly sins – a theme often revisited in medieval iconography.

Italian sweets, Irish smoked fish, honey cakes in Belgium … travel writers choose the stores and local delicacies they make a beeline for when travelling

I fell in love with Belgian snacks when cycling the amateur version of the Tour of Flanders some years ago. The feed stations along the route were crammed with packets of Meli honey waffles and Meli honey cake. I ate so many that I suffered withdrawal symptoms after finishing the last of them at the end of the 167-mile route.