Recipefiesta

From traditional festivities in the Arctic Circle to blaring techno on the banks of the Seine, our tipsters celebrate midsummer across Europe

• Tell us about your favourite UK coastline – the best tip wins a £200 holiday voucher

I enjoyed midsummer at a rented beachside cottage in the Skåne village of Bjärred, north of Malmö,with Swedish friends. We ventured to the local church to enjoy the dancing round a midsummer pole decorated with vibrant blue and red flowers, with many local residents adorned in intricately decorated flower crowns. After taking a dip in the Öresund strait along the long jetty with its bathhouse, we towelled off to indulge in deliciously sweet strawberries and sip Briska ciders into the late hours of daylight.
Caitlin

Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on the island of Flores, east of Bali, erupted on Tuesday afternoon, leading to several airlines cancelling flights

A volcano in eastern Indonesia has spewed a colossal ash tower into the sky, forcing the cancellation of some flights to and from Bali.

Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki, a 1,584m twin-peaked volcano on the tourist island of Flores, east of Bali, erupted at 5.35pm local time on Tuesday, the volcanology agency said in a statement.

A new trail follows the 26-mile route of the world’s first passenger train journey on the Stockton and Darlington Railway

It was as strange a sight as you could stumble upon in the English countryside. As a muggy summer’s day began outside Shildon, Durham – rain threatening, bees drowsy in the hedgerows – I found myself standing on an embankment, surveying two rows of colossal stone teeth jutting through the earth. It looked as if someone had buried a sleeping giant.

“You wouldn’t believe it by looking at it, but this is one of railway history’s most amazing feats,” my companion, rail expert Richie Starrs, said as we gazed down at the molars beneath our feet. A closer look revealed they were abandoned rail sleepers, laid out between the hawthorns and along which coal wagons were once pulled uphill by steam traction locomotives. “This is the Brusselton Incline, a section of the original Stockton and Darlington Railway. Nationally, it’s a story that’s not well known, but it’s one we’re rightly proud of.”

Breckland is a little-known part of England that sings with peace and rare wildlife. It would undoubtedly be a national park if so much of it hadn’t been commandeered by the military. But there is a place to stay on its borders

The small white signs with red lettering are dotted through the landscape: “Military training area – keep out”. It adds to the eerie feel of unusually quiet roads and twisted Scots pines, which gather the long summer dusk around them.

But when we arrive at our accommodation on an old farm bordering a forbidden area where the British army conduct secretive manoeuvres, the whole place sings with peace. A red kite cavorts in the breeze over handsome parkland, a cuckoo calls and, down by the Wissey, a gin-clear chalk stream, reed warblers chunter from deep within the rushes.

With cooler air, fewer crowds and lower prices, the mountains make a great alternative to the coast

All Italians race to la spiaggia in summer, leaving the hinterland marvellously empty. Tuscany gets a lot of love, but travel one region over to Umbria and Monti Sibillini national park bewitches with views of the Apennines and eyrie-like, honey-coloured hill towns such as Castelluccio, soaring above a plateau of brightly coloured poppies, cornflowers and daisies. It’s a gorgeous spot for hiking, biking and tracking down a trattoria to dig into specialities such as wild boar with locally grown lentils. You’ll find some of Italy’s finest salami in butcher shops in Norcia, as well as black truffles on the menus of restaurants such as the Michelin-starred Vespasia, which is in a 16th-century palazzo. Alternatively, you could join a tartufaio and their dog to head into the woods on a truffle-hunting tour.
How to do it Organic farm Agriturismo Casale nel Parco dei Monti Sibillini (doubles from £84 B&B) has truffles and wild herbs in its grounds, and a terrific restaurant serving up local and homegrown produce.

Our writer recalls his favourite mountain experiences, from hard-won views to splendid isolation and the comforts of simple refuges

After a tough scramble to the summit of Rhinog Fach, we look down into the deep valley holding the chilly waters of Llyn Hywel, then west across several miles of heather, bilberry and bare rock to the Welsh coast. Turning my gaze north, there is the entire Llyn peninsula leading east to the peak of Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon), no doubt weighed down by thousands of visitors. Up here there are just two of us in an utterly peaceful landscape. No clouds on the horizon. No surprises.

I lie down for a few minutes and feel myself drift off. There are no human voices to be heard, only birds. Summer has come early to these mountains and I wouldn’t be anywhere else, drinking in that particular kind of tranquillity to be found on a peak under a blue sky.

From the Alpujarras to the Dolomites, our tipsters hike, camp and devour hearty mountain food in some of Europe’s most spectacular scenery
• Send us a tip on European wilderness – the best wins a £200 holiday voucher

After a gruelling journey from the UK, arriving at Alpe di Siusi during golden hour felt like stepping into a dream. Farmers turned hay in some of Europe’s highest alpine meadows, framed by jagged Dolomite peaks glowing in soft evening light. We can recommend staying at the Hotel Schmung, a family-run gem with delicious northern Italian food and direct access to scenic hikes. Rifugios provide great lunch stops along the trails. The peaceful setting, breathtaking views and freedom to explore on foot without needing a car make this a perfect base for the Dolomites.
Louise

A decades-long crackdown on organised crime is opening up Catania, with previous no-go areas now welcoming tourists and new businesses. Discover its restaurants and bars before the prices catch up

In 1787, Goethe wrote: “To have seen Italy without having seen Sicily is not to have seen Italy at all, for Sicily is the clue to everything.” I’d go one step further and claim it’s impossible to really understand what makes the island tick without visiting Catania.

Located on the east coast of the island, Catania is Sicily’s second-largest city and has been dubbed the Black City because of how prominently basalt features in its baroque architecture. Until recently this Unesco world heritage city, whose beauty can more than compete with its flashier neighbours, Palermo and Taormina, was blighted by organised crime and bad governance. But this is now changing, and fast. A decades-long crackdown on the Cosa Nostra has borne fruit, and previously no-go areas are now welcoming tourists and new businesses. My father’s family hails from San Cristoforo, the city’s poorest neighbourhood, and our conversations often centre on how the good times are finally arriving in Catania. But price points haven’t yet caught up with the city’s new-found buzz, especially in its many restaurants.

How an enterprising couple have transformed their farm into a bucolic base amid cider orchards and vines – perfect for exploring an ancient landscape and flourishing arts scene

In Old English its name meant “the land of the summer people”, after the local practice of coming down to the Somerset Levels after the winter flooding receded. Today, Somerset is still somewhere where seasons are felt vividly, as Sophie Brendal and Panu Long discovered when they and their two children moved to Thornfalcon, their farmstead in a village of the same name, 15 minutes’ drive from Taunton, at the end of 2022. Here, they are on constant weather watch, tending their young vines (Panu, now a winemaker, has a background in the drinks industry) and harvesting daily from the kitchen garden. They are also busy making plans for the apple harvest, which will go into the 150-year-old cider press.

In addition, they have created a handful of places to stay on their 16-hectare (40-acre) site, which sprawls through woods, orchards and vines to a reed-fringed lake. Walking around it at the end of May, you feel the cusp of summer, from the water lilies coming into bloom and the nesting swan, guarded by her mate. “Soon the eggs will hatch, and later she’ll teach the cygnets to fly, before taking them down to the Somerset Levels,” says Sophie.

A six-day hike on Arran – a new Unesco Geopark – reveals tales of dinosaurs, tectonic plate collisions and lightning strikes from millions of years ago

Around 240m years ago, a 12-foot-long reptile called a chirotherium walked along a beach in what was then part of the supercontinent of Pangaea, and what is now the shoreline of Kildonan village, on the rugged, southern coast of the Isle of Arran. Natural dykes of black igneous rock – cooled magma – jut out into the ocean here. The houses on shore are backdropped by grassy cliffs.

We know that this giant proto-crocodile once roamed here because it left behind footprints – which can still be seen today. “This is older than the dinosaurs,” says Malcolm Wilkinson of Arran Geopark, as we crouch down next to the trace fossil. I place my hand in the massive print and attempt to imagine the world millions of years ago, when Scotland sat just north of the equator and the climate was tropical.

Still gliding above the town of Wuppertal on an overhead track 125 years after it was built, the charming Schwebebahn has lost none of its magic

It’s easy to be seduced by the romance of train travel. Think of sleeper trains, boat trains, vintage steam railways, elegant dining cars. But it’s rare that an urban transport system can capture the imagination quite as much as the Wuppertal Schwebebahn in Germany caught mine, and that of anyone else who’s clapped eyes on the world’s oldest suspended railway.

In October it will be 125 years since Kaiser Wilhelm II took a test ride in the Schwebebahn, just a few months before the hanging railway officially opened for business in March 1901. It was an incredible feat of engineering then, and remains so today. Even with sleek modern carriages having long replaced the original ones, it looks like something imagined by Jules Verne, with carriages smoothly gliding under the overhead track. They have even preserved the first 1901 carriage, nicknamed Kaiserwagen, which can be hired for private occasions.

From Baltic beach holidays to Spanish city breaks and cruising on French canals, here’s our pick of the best getaways for dogs – and their owners

Dogs have a sense of adventure, don’t they? We thought Missy would enjoy exploring France and Spain. She had other ideas
Plus tips on travelling with dogs

When, two years ago now, our dog sitters cancelled on us just 24 hours before we were due to go on our summer holiday, we felt more than a little put out. Aware that we couldn’t leave Missy, our border terrier, home alone with a tin opener, we sent out frantic texts and made urgent phone calls before at last finding someone, a friend of a friend of, I think, another friend, and simply hoped for the best. What else were we to do? The flights were non-refundable.

It all turned out fine, but it was not an experience we were keen to repeat. And so, the following year, we took Missy with us. Dogs are portable, after all, and have a nose for adventure. Also, this was to be an extended holiday, away for a full month – working part time in order to fund it – and we couldn’t be apart from her for that long.

The city once neglected its most famous son. But this summer visitors can immerse themselves in a major new exhibition and see the artist’s restored studio, home and the landscapes that inspired him

Paul Cezanne is everywhere in Aix-en-Provence: there are streets named after him as well as a school, a cinema and even a sandwich (a version of traditional pan bagnat but with goat’s cheese instead of tuna). And from late June, the whole city will go Cezanne mad, as the painter’s atelier, north of the centre, and the family home to the west reopen after an eight-year restoration.

But during Cezanne’s lifetime, and for years after his death in 1906, Aix seemed at pains to ignore the artist later called the “father of modern art”. When his widow, Hortense, offered several paintings to the city’s main Musée Granet, director Henri Pontier declared that Cezanne paintings would enter the gallery only over his dead body.

The broadcaster and author can’t get enough of this stretch of England’s south coast, and has even set his first murder mystery there

My earliest memory of Devon is being lost, and my mum crying. I was at junior school. I had a friend whose mother was described as “vague” – this was the 1970s, so that could have been code for almost anything. The vague mother had given my normally quite organised mother directions to a remote house where my schoolfriend spent his summers. We were “popping in” (70s code: spending the day there). The instructions to find the place were something like, “Turn left after South Zeal, pass the dirt track and follow the direction the sheep are facing.”

After an hour of pretending we were still on the right route, my mum suddenly burst into tears and uttered a rare denunciation of a fellow human being. “That SILLY woman!” she shouted. “We don’t know where we are. Nobody does.”

The hike offers dramatic views of the Swiss Alps’ ‘murder wall’ – and poignant insights into the climbers who first braved it. For the son of one of those pioneers, it had a special resonance

A few years ago, my dad told me of a mountain where I could easily sense another world. “There is a special air and light,” he had said, vaguely. “You just have to walk close to it to feel and see it. Stand in one place and just look up.”

The mountain on my dad’s mind that day was the Eiger, Switzerland’s 3,970-metre ogre of limestone and ice. Like few others, the peak exerts a gravitational pull on climbers and it remains the chief symbol of the Bernese Oberland; its most notable feature, the 1,800-metre north face, is the largest in the Alps. This gigantic slab looms over the village of Grindelwald, to the south-east of the town of Interlaken, appearing at sunrise as an immense black spectre in a valley of green.

With tuition from West End pros, this week-long singing break in southern Spain hits all the right notes

‘Do you prefer alto or soprano?” asks Steve Moss, poised at his electric piano. My mind goes blank. I’m usually more of a pinot grigio girl, but that’s not the answer the former musical director of Les Misérables is looking for. Although I struggle to carry a tune in a bucket, I’m an enthusiastic karaoke singer, a big musical theatre fan and a shameless show-off, so Sing the Greatest Showman, a residential singing retreat in Spain, is right up my street.

Founded by Zane Rambaran, a veteran concert promoter with his roots in musical theatre, Sing Eat Retreat offers a choice of breaks here throughout the year (from Sing Les Mis to Sing Mamma Mia), with 30  hours of tuition by West End professionals. (In October, Sing The Sound of Music will be held in Salzburg too, with guests recording tracks in a studio and performing in the actual movie locations. I’ve already packed my dirndl.)

Combine beautiful locations with musical creativity on these perfectly pitched learning breaks from Somerset to Marrakech

The Kora Workshop is a small UK company that makes beautiful, high quality koras (a type of West African harp) and teaches people how to play them. UK festivalgoers may have bumped into its staff at Womad or Tribal Earth, but it also offers week-long immersion workshops in the Aveyron in southern France. They include seven days of tuition (both individual and group sessions), as well as shared accommodation and the loan of a kora. The first week got booked up quickly, so move fast if you’re interested.
14-21 Sept, £510, thekoraworkshop.co.uk

Ireland’s west coast is home to a flourishing live music scene, with the pubs and music festivals attracting world-class players

A hilly lane curves round Bunratty Castle. Through an open window, I hear a harpist plucking notes at a banquet drifting as the sun sets low over the battlements. On the other side of the lane, smoke drifts from Durty Nelly’s pub, where a singer is halfway through The Parting Glass. A short walk away, the limestone facade of the Creamery hints at its past lives – as a stagecoach stop, a dairy, a roadside inn. Tonight, it’s a pub.

Inside, Bríd O’Gorman plays the fluttering melody of The Cliffs of Moher on her flute, accompanied by Michael Landers on guitar – a quiet moment before the small crowd erupt into applause as Cian Lally pulls our pints. Just 10 minutes from Shannon airport, Bunratty village sits in the south-eastern corner of Ireland’s most musical county. Along the bar, visitors from the US and France lean in, quietly captivated – likely having their first experience of an Irish music session.

With help from Gordon Dedman, a consultant on Alone Australia, Rafqa Touma learns how to survive in the wild

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On our very first night in the bush, Gordon Dedman issued a warning: “Fussy people die.”

Dedman, a man with an apt name for a military survival instructor, is all muscle and green khaki. Sat by the fire, he addresses his students.

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The opening of the V&A Storehouse and Sadler’s Wells East mark the transformation of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park into an exciting new creative hub for the capital

There’s a collective intake of breath as the curator slowly unzips the white garment bag to reveal the treasure within: a white military-style jacket embellished with gold buttons and epaulettes, worn by Elton John on his 1981 World tour. To my left, laid out on a table, are a gold Versace bag and a pair of daintily embroidered blue silk shoes dating from the 1720s. To my right, a Vivienne Westwood corset and a Balenciaga pink taffeta evening dress from the 1950s. It’s a fashion lover’s fever dream and it’s all here, at my fingertips.

I’m at the V&A Storehouse in east London, a radical new museum experience that allows anyone to order up any item from the V&A’s vast collection – for free – and to examine it at close quarters. Housed in the former Olympics Media Centre, on the edge of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, this lofty warehouse space gives unprecedented access to more than 250,000 objects, from an 11m wide stage cloth designed by Picasso to a cross-section of a maisonette from the Robin Hood Gardens council estate in Poplar. Gone are the glass cases, white walls and carefully curated exhibits of a traditional museum space. Instead, visitors are invited to look behind the scenes of a working museum, to wander among open shelves stacked high with deliriously eclectic objects and to peer into the workshops where conservators are at work. The effect is part Ikea store, part Victorian cabinet of curiosities. It’s bonkers, exhilarating and I love it.

The South West Coast Path and the Coleridge Way link National Trust bothies, pubs and sea cliffs on an exhilarating three-day walk

Where was Wilhelm of Prussia crowned German emperor? Which year did Ian Botham make his Test match debut? And how long can a sea anemone live? These were the big questions we considered, sitting outside Heddon Orchard Bothy, listening to the river gurgle through the steep valley (for answers, see * below). I had a fat Penguin book of trivia (1991 edition) balanced on my knees, gifted by a past guest who’d written on the yellowing flyleaf: “This is your only entertainment.”

In some ways they were right. The bothy – a 19th-century apple store turned bare-bones bolthole – has nothing. No electricity. No running water – just space for sleeping and access to a loo, 100 metres away. In other ways it has everything you really need.

The pavilion at Tarlair lido, on the coast outside Macduff, has reopened after a decade-long restoration campaign. Now swimmers await the whistle to hit the pools again

The vastness of Tarlair lido is hard to comprehend. Just a mile east of the town of Macduff, in Aberdeenshire, the lido’s three bodies of sea water are supplied by a tidal filling system and divided by a concrete wall, slippery with seaweed. The water’s reflection announces a striking mint-and-cream art deco pavilion, and a cinematic sea view. From the pavilion’s roof terrace, where dandelion-coloured tables and chairs are set out, it’s easy to lose a few minutes gazing beyond the salty outcrops to a northerly horizon.

Originally commissioned by Macduff town council in 1929, the pavilion and pools – a paddling pool, boating “lake” and swimming pool – were designed by architect John C Miller and opened two years later as one of only three art deco lidos of their kind in Scotland. The site reopened in late March after 30 years of closure and a decade of work costing approximately £2m. Momentum is building around the pavilion’s heavily anticipated summer comeback and it is hoped that the pools will eventually be able to welcome swimmers again, too.

You won’t see legions of tourists on this trail in Peneda-Gerês, first blazed by ancient imperial invaders – but it’s just possible you’ll see a lone wolf

‘Fabulous views in wonderful scenery,” say today’s walking notes. I don’t doubt it. But now, with the wind getting up and a mist creeping over the ridge, there’s little to see other than the ground at our feet. Which is why my attention is drawn to, shall we say, a canine deposit.

“But there are no dogs up here. It’s been two hours and just over four miles since that yappy little mongrel in the last village. And there are certainly no dog walkers; not one hint of another human in this wild terrain. No, the size, shape and furriness of this trailside offering reveal its author was the ancestor of all dogs: a wolf.

From a castle in Cumbria to a subtropical paradise in Cornwall, these are some of the top unsung gardens across the country

In the dash for Cumbria’s lakes and fells, the area’s other green attractions can get missed. On Knipe Scar, at the edge of the Lake District national park, Lowther’s acres sprawl around the shell of a ruined 19th-century castle. Wildflower meadows, bee-friendly tree hives and rambling woodland contrast with a parterre, sculptured hornbeams and a Sleeping Beauty-inspired rose garden designed by Dan Pearson. Bikes and ebikes can be rented for pootling around the estate’s trails or perhaps a five-mile cycle to Ullswater. There is a Lost Castle adventure playground and a cafe. Before leaving, visit the west terrace for views across the Lowther valley to distant fells. Open daily, adults £15, children £10, lowthercastle.org

With its vibrant festival scene, gorgeous swimming spots and rugged mountain biking trails, the Victorian town has a lot to offer, says local writer Doug Wallen

• Read more local’s guides to Australia

Beechworth is on the traditional lands of the Wiradjuri, Wavereoo, Dhudhuroa, Min-jan-buttu and Ya-itma-thang people, who collectively make up the Pallanganmiddang nation. It’s about three hours from Melbourne. People used to visit en route to the Victorian alpine region ski fields but it’s become its own destination now, known for its well-preserved gold rush-era sandstone buildings.

Before they closed in 1995 and 2004, respectively, most residents worked at Beechworth Asylum (also known as Mayday Hills) and Beechworth Gaol. Later, Beechworth Bakery (which opened in 1984) got popular for its pies and cakes, more things opened and now tourism is the main industry.

Our tipsters discover rainforests, rare flowers blazing with colour and the finest tea and cake

Thornton Hall Gardens, near my home town of Darlington, are described by its owners as “a hobby that got out of hand”. With no previous gardening experience, the owner Sue Manners began to work on the garden alone after buying the old hall in 1989 with husband Mike. Nowadays, the gardens are among the finest in the country. As you wander, you’ll discover a rich variety of rare and unusual flowers mingling with striking trees and beautiful shrubs. Over 100 roses bloom alongside vibrant collections of delphiniums, peonies, and irises, all set within lush, flowing borders and thoughtfully arranged island beds. Because Thornton Hall is a working farm, the gardens are only open on nine days this summer (£10, 10am-4pm).
Mike Ladyman

I’m partially sighted so birding has always felt out of reach for me. But a stay at Slimbridge wetlands centre learning to identify bird song helped me connect with nature

Silhouettes dart across a lake and the pale morning sky. Avocets screech high-pitched cries, defending their eggs from a squawking crow that circles above, while a barnacle goose with a barking call flies overhead.

There are 12 of us watching and listening on a dawn chorus workshop at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) Slimbridge centre in Gloucestershire. Being partially sighted, birding has felt out of reach for me. But this morning is about identifying birdsong, and I’m curious as to whether this will help me feel a deeper connection with nature.