Recipefiesta

From the Tiramisù World Cup in Italy to street food ‘battles’ in Newcastle, your culinary highlights range from the sublime to the delicious
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The town of Menton on the French Riviera is beautiful at any time of the year but becomes even more of a treat during the annual Lemon festival (Fête du Citron, 10-28 February 2027). Its microclimate, courtesy of the Alps to the north blocking colder winds, gives Menton lemons a distinct fragrance, flavour and quality that set them apart. For me, the event transformed a damp cold UK winter into a fortnight of colour, taste and light. There were food tastings, salads made with lemons, tarts, cakes and pies all full of zesty colour and flavour at stalls and markets in the town. There are sculptures made from citrus fruit, parades and exhibitions in the Golden Garden of Light (Jardins Biovès). More than a food festival, it’s a celebration of what nature can give to the world.
April

‘Legends cling like barnacles to these shores,’ says our local writer, who reveals how the lore of these craggy cliffs and beaches resonates with the Homeric classic

The incoming tide has made a labyrinth of the beach. As silvery rivulets spread across Culbin Sands to meet the mudflats, my walk becomes increasingly circuitous: weaving inland towards the pine forest, backtracking closer to the waves, skirting tidal pools and scaling dunes constantly resculpted by the North Sea breeze.

In this shapeshifting stretch of north-east Scotland’s Moray coast, there’s not another soul in sight, nothing to anchor me to the modern day. It’s easy, then, to imagine a longship bringing weary warriors ashore, or a band of man-eating giants marauding from the woodland. Which is exactly what happens here – on screen – in Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey.

A walking holiday with a group of strangers to the highest range in the Carpathians promises adventure, stunning views and camaraderie

We are giddy as we reach the summit, breathless with exertion and a guileless, childlike joy. In every direction the jagged peaks of Slovakia’s High Tatras stretch out into the distance, nubs on a colossal spine, glittering lakes embedded like shards of glass far below the rocky, ice-streaked slopes. An eagle wheels above. Somewhere on the lunar landscape a marmot squeaks. Easy laughs ricochet around the group, photos are snapped, backs thumped, words of encouragement offered to the more vertigo-inclined.

The summit of Slovakia’s Kôprovský štít had been playing a Kafkaesque game of mountain mirage with us for several hours, always just over the next ridge which, once conquered, revealed a string of further, seemingly endless ridges. Eight hours and about 23km after we had set off on our hike through the Vysoké Tatry mountain range, an eddy of smiles rippled from person to person (some, granted, of the more clenched-teeth variety). “Yes, team! We did it!” Roman, our high-spirited Slovakian mountain guide, stood atop the tip, clasping each of our hands in congratulation as we crested the peak.

The seven inhabited isles off the North Sea coast, part of a Unesco world heritage site, are a sanctuary for wildlife – with great hotels and restaurants too

‘Can you hear that?” my guide Andrea Wellmeyer asks as I sink a little deeper into the wet ground, cold mud seeping between my toes. When the wind drops, I detect a faint but distinct crackling, similar to the rustle of a sweet wrapper or the bubbling of sparkling water. “That’s the Wattknistern,” she says, “a natural phenomenon caused by the tens of thousands of mud shrimp that live here.”

We’re standing in the Wadden Sea mudflats on Norderney, an island just off Germany’s North Sea coast. It’s Friday evening at low tide. In the town centre, bars are pumping with music, but here, just 15 minutes along the southern edge of the island, it’s a completely different story.

After exploring the cathedral city, I battled the heatwave while walking to the Kent coast on the Via Francigena

Canterbury for Evensong. Is there a more delightful cluster of syllables in the English language? Old English, I should say, as æfensang comes from that tongue, an update on the Latin-derived “vespers”. But whatever you call the service, Canterbury Cathedral does it in style. How beautiful the singing from the choristers in their white and purple. How beautiful the light as it honeys the stone of the quire. I had been in the city only an hour or so, and considered this early evening worship a sort of overture for my stay.

What a relief to get inside the great stone building. The lovely old city was horrible with heat. A statue of Chaucer on High Street appeared overdressed in robe, cloak and hat. He held out a page inscribed with the opening lines of The Canterbury Tales: “When in April the sweet showers fall … Then people long to go on pilgrimages.” The bronze had been hot to the touch and I began to suspect that I’d made a mistake starting my own pilgrimage at midsummer.

With bus fares capped at £3 and free for kids in August, it’s the ideal time for wildlife watching, woodland walks, world-class art and more

Trips to waterfalls, gardens, galleries, medieval forests and prehistoric caves will make the long school holidays a lot more fun. To help families explore affordably, throughout August buses in England will be free for kids and adult fares will be capped at £3 single. Or, if you arrive somewhere by train, you could buy a PlusBus ticket, which include unlimited local bus travel. Here are six ideas for family outings by bus around England.

From 100,000 sunflowers in Gower and cosmic art in Galloway to a bat safari and messing about in boats, there’s enough here to keep you and the kids busy till September

At the westernmost tip of the Gower peninsula, Rhossili Bay is a gloriously wide sweep of sand, backed by dunes and licked with waves perfect for bodyboarding and surfing. Wild ponies graze on the southern headland, while walkers time their trip across to the serpent-like Worm’s Head promontory to not get cut off by the tide.