Category: Uncategorised

Small Group Tours in Your 70s and 80s: What to Expect

Odyssey Traveller · A practical guide Small Group Tours in Your 70s and 80s: What to Expect The number to check is the Activity Level, not the birthday. The honest answer to “can I still do this?” is almost always yes — but which tour, and how it is paced, matters more than any assumption […]

Tours for Seniors Travelling Alone: What to Look For

Odyssey Traveller · An editorial guide Tours for Seniors Travelling Alone: What to Look For The right questions matter more than the right marketing words. Not every tour marketed at solo travellers actually works well for one. Here’s what is worth checking before booking — and why each detail matters. A practical guide Start with […]

Solo Senior Travel: Safety Tips for Small Group Tours

Odyssey Traveller · Practical travel guidance Solo Senior Travel: Safety Tips for Small Group Tours Travelling alone is not the same as being left to handle everything alone. This guide covers the practical side of solo travel safety: what a well-run small group tour removes from the equation, what to check before you book, and […]

Bashō’s Tokyo: Fukagawa, Asakusa and the Start of the Narrow Road

Fukagawa’s quiet canal-side streets still open onto the skyline of the modern city just across the river. Long before Matsuo Bashō became the wandering poet of The Narrow Road to the Deep North, he was a Tokyo local — living not in some romantic borrowed lodging but in a modest, banana-tree-shaded cottage in the working […]

Francis Drake & Birth of the British Empire

Sir Francis Drake and England’s Challenge to Spain’s Global Supremacy On the morning of December 13, 1577, Francis Drake, a pirate and former slaver, ordered his small fleet in Plymouth, England, to weigh anchor. Two of the most consequential figures of this era, Francis Drake and Queen Elizabeth I, knew the expedition’s true purpose: to […]

Empires of the Sahel

Gold and Empires of the Sahel European expansion is often seen as the trigger for modern history, but in reality, globalisation came even earlier to West Africa’s Sahel region, underpinned by the gold trade. Analysis by archaeologists of the gold coins used in Tunis and Libya suggests a major change around the ninth century CE, […]

Riquewihr, France

Riquewihr, France Riquewihr is classified as one of France’s most beautiful villages, and it’s easy to see why. Nestling at the entrance to a small, tree-clad valley on the Alsace plain, the village offers a splendid view over the valley of the Rhine, from the edges of the Alps to the fringes of the Vosges. […]

Derinkuyu Underground City, Turkey

The Ancient Underground City of Derinkuyu The Derinkuyu underground city is a massive subterranean network of caves and underground dwellings located in the Derinkuyu district of Nevşehir Province in Cappadocia Turkey. The caves may have first been excavated by the Anatolian Hittites in ancient times as far back as the 15th century BCE, but the […]

Venta Silurum

Venta Silurum of Roman Wales In the village of Caerwent in the south of Wales stand the impressive remains of Venta Silurum, a market town established by the Romans in 75 CE. Named after the defeated local Silures tribe, it stood as their civitas capital during the Roman era in Britain. Established as an administrative […]

Wedgwood Anti Slavery Medallion

Josiah Wedgwood Anti Slavery Medallion Throughout his life, the famed English entrepreneur Josiah Wedgwood was deeply concerned with the social issues of his contemporary 18th century Great Britain.  Unsurprisingly then, he was actively involved the cause for the abolition of slavery from 1787 until his death in 1795, serving as a committee member of the […]

Conques, France

Conques The small village of Conques, located in the Aveyron region of Southern France, is an incredible site. Lying at the confluence of the Dourdou and Ouche Rivers, it is surrounded by stunning mountain and forest scenery forming a kind of shell – hence its name, derived from the Latin concha for ‘shell’. The village […]

Saint-Cirq-Lapopie, France

Saint-Cirq-Lapopie From atop its cliff, the French medieval village of Saint-Cirq-Lapopie has been looking over the valley of the Lot for centuries now. The Gallo-Romans, and perhaps even prehistoric people before them, were attracted to this rocky headland as their home. Situated on a steep cliff 100m above the river Lot, it served as a […]

Vikings and the Carolingian Empire

Vikings and the Carolingian Empire When the Viking Age began in the late 700s, the Carolingian Empire was already established as the mightiest political power in Western Europe. Under Charlemagne, the Franks had expanded the kingdom in all directions, eventually stretching from Saxony to northern Italy. Now sharing a common frontier, you can’t blame the […]

Troy, Turkey: The Ancient City Behind Homer’s Iliad

Troy, Turkey: The Ancient City Behind Homer’s Iliad Troy is one of the most famous cities in the ancient world — not for its size or wealth, but because it was the stage for Homer’s Iliad, one of the foundational works of Western literature. The real archaeological site sits at Hisarlik in northwestern Turkey, and […]

Liverpool Cathedral, England

Liverpool Cathedral, United Kingdom Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, located on St James Road, Liverpool, is the biggest church in England and the eighth largest cathedral in the world, towering over the city skyline. It has the world’s tallest tower at 101 metres, offering panoramic views over the river Mersey, and with a total external length of […]

Empires in World History

A History of Empires Throughout the World The history of human civilisation has been for the most part a history of empire. The term empire refers to the rule by a particular group in a…

Great Museums of New York City

Great New York City Museums, United States New Yorkers are obsessed with their museums. And why wouldn’t they? The city has arguably the richest and best museum culture in the world, with the utter number of museums and cultural institutions absolutely mind-blowing. In addition to an impressive number of classic institutions, there is also a […]

The Rosetta Stone

The Rosetta Stone The Rosetta Stone is an ancient Egyptian stone slab discovered in 1799 by a French officer near the town of Rosetta, or Rashid. Until this point, we knew very little of the ancient Egyptians. But this would all change with this one discovery. Bearing the inscriptions of the same text translated in […]

The Country House, Britain

The British Country House Cliveden House, Burghley House, Blenheim Palace: country houses have long stood as icons in the British landscape. From the Middle Ages until today, the historic houses have gone through various changes, evolving in styles from Jacobean, to Palladian, Baroque, Neoclassical, Neogothic, and more. All the while they have stood in various […]

John Constable

John Constable  English artist John Constable (1776-1837) is one of the greatest landscape painters of all time and one of the most important artists of the Romantic Tradition. Nature was his primary inspiration. Along with his rival J M W Turner, he created a new style that detailed nature as the focal point in the […]

Shetland Salt Fish, Scotland

salt fish once played a significant role in shaping the economies, societies, and cultures of much of Europe. That’s because before food could be preserved by freezing, salting was vital to cure meat and fish, assuring a supply of protein during winter months.