As a 50th birthday treat, I was given a weekend away in Bath – a perfect little escape for an October weekend. We set off on Saturday morning and stopped at Avebury on the way down. We’ve been before and remembered it as a nice little place to stretch our legs. Avebury is one of…

So long Copenhagen.What a delightful, clean city full of charm and charisma. This was the start of our return journey – leaving Copenhagen train station to head for Berlin, then picking up the sleeper train to Brussels and arriving just in time to take the Eurostar back to the UK. The journey from Copenhagen went…

Our apartment is on the ground floor of a six-storey building – no lugging bags up endless stairs. It’s neatly placed equidistant between two metro stations, giving us options each time we head out to explore. This is also the first time we’ve stayed somewhere with a bed to convert – a little novelty for…

We arrived at our last stop – Copenhagen. The city greets us with colour and energy at every corner. It feels both old and new – rebuilt through the centuries yet still fresh and alive. There’s a sense of care here too. Copenhagen is a city that takes the environment seriously, weaving cycling, green spaces…

We left our flat this morning after an easy checkout and as we stepped outside, we noticed a small brass square set into the pavement. It stopped us in our tracks. These are the markers that remember Holocaust victims – placed where they once lived. The family linked to our apartment were taken and died…

Arriving at our apartment in Oslo was easy. We walked from the train station along clean, well-signposted roads with smart, sharp-lined buildings. We found the apartment quickly and used the self check-in to be granted two key cards. Finding the actual room was trickier, but once we realised it was a basement apartment, all was…

Our time in Stavanger has been pretty awesome. A balance of being active and resting in equal measure. No dramas to report and everything went as if planned with precision – unless ice cream was involved. In truth, the plan was not to plan. The journey back to Oslo was the reverse of Thursday’s trip…

The next two days were set aside for rest and a little sightseeing. To start with, I made sure I didn’t stiffen up from our hike by doing a mix of pilates, yoga and tai chi. To the trained eye, though, it probably looked more like me flailing my arms about than anything graceful. Either…

Today was rock day! We’re currently nestled between Pulpit Rock and the Floating Rock – almost equidistant as the bird flies. Setting ourselves the challenge of climbing one is one thing, but getting to the start is another. The Floating Rock would have meant a journey of nearly three hours, including a ferry crossing. Tempting,…

We now enter a very different culture. Oslo. Having cancelled our overnight stay we pushed on to get the train to Stavanger and came across a minor problem. The train wasn’t running from Oslo to the west coast at all – engineering works had taken over our plans. Instead of the scenic glide we’d expected,…