travel

Cliveden Literary Festival: History, Politics, and Decadence at Cliveden House

4th September 2017 by Gemma Leave a Comment

Cliveden House Hotel (photo from Luxurious Magazine)cliveden literary festival

One of my many interests is visiting stately homes and historic residences. There’s a few of them in London, but the remarkably grand ones are outside the capital, far from any form of public transport. Palatial houses come with extensive grounds and beautiful gardens after all.

My husband and I keep a list of houses we want to visit but we’ve never come across Cliveden House. It is jointly owned and looked after by the National Trust and Iconic Luxury Hotels. The former handles the gardens and the grounds while the latter manages the house as a luxury hotel.

Imagine my delight when I was asked to look around the place in anticipation of the Cliveden Literary Festival!

So why hold one at Cliveden House? That would involve some history-telling, so bear with me and I’ll try to keep this as short as possible!…

Photo Log: Things To Do In Santander

28th February 2017 by Gemma 2 Comments

Santander, in case you were not aware, is not part of the Spanish Basque region. It is the capital of Cantabria, a different area altogether, but also lies along the northern coast. The city is roughly two hours by bus from Bilbao. things to do in santander

Santander is not a city that would pop in a tourist’s mind. What are entertaining things to do in Santander, anyway?

However, I have a somewhat personal connection to it: one of my lovely colleagues that I used to work with was born and bred in Santander….

Photo Log: Bilbao 2016

21st February 2017 by Gemma 4 Comments

Around the same time last year, we went to Northern Spain, somewhat skirting the coast of the Bay of Biscay for a week. We flew into Bilbao, took a bus to San Sebastián and spent most of our time there, then another bus to Santander, before returning to Bilbao to see the city for two days then flew back to London. This post has photos from Bilbao so I’m obviously going backwards — it was a bit easier to sort out the photos this way!

Bilbao is the biggest city of the Basque Country, or Euskal Herria in Basque. The Basque Region includes three provinces in France (Northern Basque) and three/four in Spain (Southern Basque — someone correct me, please, as to whether Navarre is definitely in Basque?).

When you hear of Bilbao, is the Guggenheim Museum the first thing you of? I wouldn’t blame you because that’s what came to my mind too. It’s the most architecturally imposing building in the centre of the city, and its very modern design rises quite singularly from the other buildings around it. …

I went to see Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: The Play

7th September 2016 by Gemma 3 Comments

A FOREWORD TO THIS POSTThe show has been going on since June, I think? So it would be nice to have a discussion with some fans who have seen the show. I will keep the contents of this blog post VERY GENERAL and NON-SPOILERY for those who have yet to see it on stage. You can DM me on Instagram or on Twitter if you want someone to discuss it with! If you have only just read the script and want a discussion on how things translated from the page to the stage, feel free to do the above, or leave a comment below!

If I do mention anything spoilery, it will be underneath a clickable notice of text. I absolutely promise to #KeepTheSecrets!

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Independent Bookshop Crawl 2016: Goldsboro Books & Marchpane (3-4/8)

22nd August 2016 by Gemma Leave a Comment

Before I went on an unannounced blogging sabbatical, I was in the middle of featuring different independent bookshops in London. Let me resume with two bookshops located in famed Cecil Court, also known as a model for the movie version of Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter movies!

Independent Bookshop Week (IBW) in the UK is a campaign run by Booksellers Association and its members to celebrate indie bookshops in the UK and Ireland¹. It is modelled after the American campaign bearing the same name¹, which was held earlier across the pond in 2016. The UK had theirs on the 18th to 25th of June in 2016, and on the last day, the campaign encourages people to do a bookshop crawl (if you can’t do it on one day, do it during the whole IBW!).

I did the bookshop crawl on the last day, and planned to visit ten bookshops. All the best plans do not go as expected sometimes, and I only managed eight. Still a respectable number I think, considering I started at 12 noon and finished by 5:30 PM! I first went to Belgravia Books then John Sandoe Books, and I’ve shared photos of those visits in previous posts here and here, respectively.

Goldsboro Books is called as ‘The Home of Signed First Editions’, and they have over 25,000 first editions of various books in stock². Their collection is carefully curated; their books are the kind that readers would actually want to read, and not just display on their shelves. …