Andy Jarosz of 501places.com wrote a beautiful post the other day about cruises. To sum up, despite people that there’s a cruise for everyone, he still remained sceptical.

My attitude is largely the same. I am yet to see one reason why I would enjoy a cruise. I hate travelling as part as a big group, I like my own space, I like to explore destinations in the evenings, I like to eat somewhere different every night, I’m only 30 years old, I have my own teeth, I get stir crazy when confined to a certain place and I like to discover rather than be shown.

I’m sure anyone who actually knows my personality and tastes would struggle to find a cruise that I’d not despise, let alone enjoy.

Try everything once?

Yet this doesn’t stop people who either don’t know me at all or don’t know me that well suggesting that I should give cruising a try (and that, yes, there’s a cruise for everyone). After all, until I’ve tried it, how do I know I won’t like it?

This “you’ve got to try everything once” mentality is quite prevalent in travel. But it is a nonsensical attitude.

Time constraints

Let’s face it, unless I live to be 400,000-years-old, I won’t have time to try everything once. None of us have the time to try everything once, and thus we have to prioritise what we do try. And the order of priority is defined by the basic human decision making process – we assess the available evidence and ourselves, then make a judgment.

Assessment of evidence

I have never run across a motorway. I can’t categorically say that it is a bad idea to run across a motorway, but based on the evidence and knowledge I have accumulated over the years, I can make a reasonably confident assessment that – yes – it would be a bad idea.

Similarly, I’ve never listened to a Mika album, but overwhelming evidence suggests I wouldn’t enjoy it. I’ve never tried Chef X’s avocado recipes, but the fact that I can’t stand avocado suggests they’re not for me. I’ve never watched any of the Twilight films, but it’s reasonable to say that I’ll think they’re a cinematic abomination.

What to try first

And so on. Now whilst I could buy that Mika album, try the avocado bake and plonk myself in a cinema seat for two hours to watch pathetic hormonal monsters fawning over each other, to do so would probably be a waste of my time and money.

And with that time and money, I can try something that I haven’t listened to before, tasted before or watched before. But I’ll pick things I’m more likely to enjoy based on the evidence put in front of me.

Mumbai, skiing… and cruising

The same principle applies to travel. I’ll probably hate Mumbai so, given the choice, I’d go to Buenos Aires or Kiribati first. I find people who talk about skiing all the time unbelievably tedious, so I’d rather try out a week’s walking holiday than a week’s ski holiday. And with so many things across the world that I haven’t seen or experienced yet, that cruise is going to have to wait another 399,970 years.

Travellers’ collections

I should perhaps explain a little here. A lot of travellers collect things from their travels. Some go for postcards, others like to get stamps, others go for coins. A friend of mine has amassed a fairly impressive collection of shot glasses and my brother likes getting fridge magnets with flags on.

Guatemala football shirt

In a half-hearted manner over the last year or so, I have started my own collection. It all started by getting a Guatemala football shirt for the equivalent of £5 off a market stall in Antigua last September.

It’s almost indisputably not a genuine replica shirt, but then again, neither are my Samoan rugby shirt and Macedonian football top. But it is funny to wear them in completely unrelated places. I like being asked which team I support in, say, Hong Kong and answering “Guatemala, of course”.

Knock-off sports kit

Unfortunately, I’m beginning to get a little obsessive about collecting knock-off sports kit from obscure countries. On my way to the Seychelles in November, I had a couple of hours available to have a look around Doha in Qatar. Much of the time was spent scouring market stalls for a Qatar football shirt and the best I could come up with was a cap and a scarf.

No joy in the Seychelles

It was even worse in the Seychelles – I could get a France shirt, a Brazil shirt and an Argentina shirt, but there was no Seychelles replica kit in sight. Truly gutting.

Missed opportunities

The problem with this growing obsession is that I’m now looking back upon missed opportunities. When I went to Antigua (the island rather than the Guatemalan town), St Lucia, Dominica and Montserrat in February, I wasn’t even looking. Now, of course, I want a Montserrat football shirt or a Dominica cricket kit more than anything else. Frankly, any sport would do as long as it looked vaguely like the genuine kit.

Odd spots

The same applies to other odd dots on the map I’ve been to – San Marino, Gibraltar, Vanuatu, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Anguilla etc. I now want their sports kit, and despite having scoured the internet, I can’t find anything.

Any ideas?

So, if anyone knows how I can get hold of a Vanuatu rugby top or Montserrat football shirt, I’m all ears. And I’m more than willing to try and help you source your Lesotho pin badge or Tongan baseball cap in return.

Do you have any weird travel collections? Let everyone know by leaving a comment below.

Trivia time

As you may have noticed, I’m not averse to the odd bit of trivia. That doesn’t make me a loser. It makes me very cool indeed.

Christmas quiz 

And as I’m far too stingy and Scrooge-like to hand out proper presents to the readers of this blog, I thought I’d create a Christmas quiz for everyone instead. The following questions are rampantly egotistical – they’re all based on places I have been to this year. But if you’re up for the challenge, see how many of the answers you can get. The answers can be found here – leave a comment at the bottom of the answer page and let me know how many you get right.

1. What is the capital city of Dominica?
2. The Aldabra giant tortoise is native to which country?
3. Which city is the world’s biggest gambling destination?
4. In what city would you find the Akropoli, Syntagma and Egaleo Metro stations?
5. The Sound of Music was filmed in and around which city?
6. In which British town would you find the A Team Van, a genuine batmobile and a James Bond Museum?
7. Plymouth is the destroyed capital of which Caribbean island?
8. Lake Ohrid has banks on the shores of which two European countries?
9. You’re only allowed to cuddle koalas in one Australian state. Which one?


10. In which country is Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson buried?
11. In which European capital has a plane been turned into a hostel near the main airport?
12. Which European country is known as Crna Gora in its native language?
13. What is recognised by FIFA and Guinness World Records as the world’s oldest football club?
14. Where is the Royal Yacht Britannia moored?
15. Which Australian town broke the world record for the world’s biggest pub crawl the day before I got there?
16. There are three antipodean cities in which you can officially climb major bridges. Sydney is one. What are the other two (half a point each)?
17. The Vikings called it Jorvik – what do we call it?
18. Which Caribbean island boasts of having a ‘drive-in volcano’?
19. What is the name of Britain’s biggest lake?
20. In which Yorkshire village can the Bronte Parsonage be found?
21. The seaside resort town of Neum can be found in which coastally-deprived country?
22. In which city was the Nazi party founded in 1919?
23. Which German city has bizarrely been named as European Capital of Culture 2010?
24. Which famous body of water is officially known as Port Jackson?
25. In which country would you find Nelson’s Dockyard and English Harbour?
26. Where would you take the Flåmbana to Myrdal?
27. Which football team calls the Bernabeu stadium home?
28. How many prisoners died trying to escape from the Colditz POW camp in World War II?
29. Outside which city is CERN, home of the Large Hadron Collider?
30. The Lokrum nudist beach can be found on an island off the coast of which Adriatic city?

I’m currently researching a story about travel gear and clothing, and it has got me thinking about how useless so many so-called travel products are. Many of them have so many bells and whistles but are largely designed for mountaineers or Antarctic explorers rather than members of the general public.

Multi-language translators?

Another problem is items that are bought and then never used in practice, thus taking up valuable room in your bag. Multi-language translators and altimeters, anyone? So with this in mind, I’ve drawn up a list of things I’d genuinely find useful as an everyday traveller, whether on a city break or a more adventurous trip. These things may be out there already – and if you know of anything that fits the bill, I’d love to hear about it. And, er, ‘review’ it.

THE LIST

Zip-off trousers

I want them to be quick drying, lightweight, have zip-off legs and zipped pockets for security. Crucially, they must look reasonably presentable and not designed for people with beards.

Compact battery charger

Simple equation: four AA batteries recharged, minimum bag space taken up to do it.

Keyring compass

A tiny compass that I can fit to my keyring so I know what direction I’m facing when I come out of a subway station.

Walking shoes that pass as smart-casual at night

If I’m going hand-luggage only, I want a pair of shoes with which I can walk up a mountain, trudge around a city, presentably go to a restaurant and hit the bars in. Must have good grip, plenty of air flow and not look like they’re aimed at hikers.

Powerful pocket camera

At least 10 mexapixels, and with at least 10x optical zoom – but must slide into the pocket easily.

A Ryanair friendly, multi-compartment bag

I want something that fits within Ryanair’s 55cm x 40cm x 20cm carry-on baggage limit, with multiple compartments so that I can keep everything organised. And I’d prefer to be able to carry it on my back if possible.

Warm weather socks

Trainer socks that don’t make feet sweaty and fungi-packed in hot weather. Preferably not made of cotton, but not scratchy either.

Travel towel that actually works

Travel towels are generally horrible bright blue chamois affairs that merely push water around rather than soak it up. And they tend to stink within seconds. One that actually works would be lovely.

Any suggestions for such items? I’d love to hear them. I’d also love to hear about any items of travel gear that you find indispensible yourself. Feel free to enlighten me, and other readers, by leaving a comment below.

On a cliché level, it’s not the most obnoxious one out there, but it’s a shoddy simile. How can you compare a place to an action that nobody in human history has actually performed*?

*Unless I got the wrong end of the stick, and Back To The Future was a documentary.

As I was writing my post on British pub closures, I touched upon one of the most commonly cited reasons for pubs going to the wall. Supermarkets often take the blame for a change in British drinking culture. The theory goes that by offering drinks at considerably cheaper prices than pubs, the supermarkets are ensuring that people stay at home to drink rather than going out.

There’s something in this, and I have no doubt that supermarkets have had an effect on pub attendance. But I’m not sure it’s all about price – there’s one key point that the supermarket critics are missing.

Speciality beers

As a student in Sheffield between 1998 and 2001, I was rather lucky to live next to The Dram Shop in Crookesmoor. As off-licences (bottle shops in Australia, liquor stores in the US) go, it was a cherished goldmine. Others would sell bog standard cans of Carling, Stella, John Smiths and Fosters whereas the Dram Shop had speciality beers from across Britain and the world. It also had a brilliant range of spirits – particularly whiskies.

At the time, the supermarket selection wasn’t much better than that of the average off-licence. The Dram Shop was a beautiful island in a sea of mediocrity.

Supermarket quality vs pub quality

Now I am living back in Sheffield again, I am on the wrong side of town to visit the Dram Shop. And you know what? It doesn’t matter. I can walk down to the big Tesco* on Abbeydale Road and it has a phenomenal range of beers to choose from. There’s a huge amount of shelf space devoted to specialty beers, from bottled ales to Belgian fruit beers and Czech pilsners.

There’s also a whole aisle of wine – much of which is rather good and very reasonably priced.

Put simply, my local supermarket provides a far better range of quality drinks than my local pub does. I’m not choosing between them on price – I’m choosing on variety and standard.

Real ales and continental lagers

I’m sure I’m not alone in this. Given the choice of getting some interesting tipples from Tesco* and sitting in a pub where the most exciting options on offer are Guinness, Stella and Stones, then it’s no contest. But I will go to a pub that does have a good range, be it real ales or continental lagers such as Leffe, Franziskaner or Staropramen.

Price is certainly a factor, but quality and range is being underplayed – partly because the pub industry would like to paint supermarkets as the big, bad wolf. Average pubs simply cannot compete – but good pubs most certainly can. And what’s more, they are doing.

What do you think? Are supermarkets killing off pubs? And is it all about price or is it more complex than that? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

If you believed everything you read, then you’d probably be under the impression that the British pub is going the way of the dodo. According to the British Beer and Pub Association, 52 pubs are closing down every week. Read the media reports, and it’s a national tragedy. Smoking bans, cheap supermarket drink promotions, government taxes and a change in lifestyle are all to blame; people just don’t go to the pub any more, and thousands of great pubs are going to the wall.

Kelham Island pub crawl

Well I think there’s a story we’re not being told here. Because there are plenty of brilliant pubs in Britain that seem to be doing very nicely indeed. On Friday, I went on a bit of a pub crawl around Kelham Island in Sheffield. The area has cultivated a reputation as being something of a real ale heaven, and it’s easy to see why. Just about every pub I went in had well over half-a-dozen hand-pumped ales, many of which have been sourced from local breweries.

Full pubs

And what’s more, the pubs were full. The Kelham Island Tavern and the Fat Cat in particular were almost overflowing, and not just with bearded sandal-wearers clutching their CAMRA Good Beer Guide. They had a good mix of young professionals, locals, beer enthusiasts and couples. People don’t go to the pub any more? What nonsense.

Too many pubs in Britain?

My theory is that whilst undoubtedly many pubs are closing, the good ones aren’t. It’s arguable that Britain had far too many pubs in the first place, and that losing a few of the bad and mediocre ones is no great loss. And I’m pretty sure that almost all of the closed pubs were OK at best.

What is a traditional pub?

We have this romanticised notion of the traditional British pub. Old men in a corner slowly supping a half pint, a curmudgeonly-but-firm landlord, a dartboard in the corner and a fug of smoke. Sorry, but this isn’t a good pub – it might be a typical one, but it’s not a shining example of what a pub should be. I’d also argue that it’s not ‘traditional’ either – pubs have always moved with the times, and a ‘traditional’ pub of 40 years ago would be rather different from today’s ‘traditional pub’.

A reason to visit

People are still going to pubs, but they’re not going to pubs in the same way. There has been a change in mindset, and people won’t go to a pub just because it’s a pub. Being there and serving Carling and a warm Tetleys is not enough. There needs to be a reason to visit, be it live music, beer and wine festivals, a large range of real ale or special theme parties. Have some board games that people can play in the daytime, a range of newspapers to read, regular quizzes, comedy nights in a back room or open mic evenings.

Selkirk in Tooting

My old local when I was living in London was a classic example of this. The Selkirk in Tooting had a great community feel. It has good beers, there was always something going on, the management and staff were friendly, and were never afraid to experiment with events and special theme parties. As a result, the pub was usually pretty full. Compare this to some of the ‘traditional’ pubs in the area, and the contrast is stark. They’re grim, soulless places serving largely bad beer and giving absolutely no reason for people to come in. These are the pubs we’re losing – and good riddance.

Country pubs

The same applies to country pubs. I spent last weekend in Llanthony, South Wales. I had the misfortune to visit the Half Moon pub whilst there. It provided the worst food I have eaten for years, and somehow managed to bring the atmosphere of a truly dreadful fighty city pub to a well-to-do country hamlet. It survives on its captive audience from the nearby campsite and holiday cottages, but if there is any justice in the world it will be amongst the pub closure statistics in a couple of years’ time. There is simply no reason to visit the Half Moon, other than desperation and the fact it’s there.

Peak District pub closures

Let’s take an area I know rather better. When I was a student, the Marquis of Granby was a regular feature on our occasional Peak District pub crawls. Nine years later it has been razed to the ground. You can say it wasn’t in the most convenient locations – rather out on its own as opposed to being in the centre of a village – but it closed because it was, quite simply, an awful place. I repeat; unless you had no other option, there was no reason to visit.

Poacher’s Arms in Hope

Take this in contrast to the Poacher’s Arms, which is in a similarly inconvenient position between Hope and Castleton.  But it has been refurbished in the last few years, looks really good and offers good value accommodation. More importantly, it serves up truly sensational home-cooked food, which is largely sourced from local suppliers. It is possibly the best pub food I have had in Britain. Throw in good beers and a range of wines, and there’s a fabulous reason for me to go an hour out of my way to go there. Unsurprisingly, it looks like the Poacher’s Arms is doing pretty well.

Celebrate pub closures

Bad and average pubs closing is not something to cry over. Yes, it’s preferable that they’re taken over by someone who will run them well and – guess – give people a reason to visit. But a little Darwinian winnowing is probably a good thing in the long run. I’m inclined to celebrate these pub closures rather than mourn them.

What do you think? Are we in danger of losing our heritage or do British pubs need to move with the times? Share your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

News International proprietor Rupert Murdoch has signalled his intention to end the era of free content on the internet. He has not yet announced how he will do this, but it is likely that his newspaper websites will be introducing some sort of charges in the next year. This means The Sun, Times, Sunday Times and News of the World in the UK as well as his newspapers in Australia and the US.

Impact on advertising

Some commentators clearly believe this is doomed to failure. The argument is that by charging for content, that content will have fewer eyeballs and thus advertisers will pay less. Others believe that people are so accustomed to being able to read everything for free that they simply won’t pay. We have a generation for whom news has been free on the internet for a decade.

News has a value

But Murdoch clearly believes this is unsustainable. He believes news has a value, and that he can make people pay for it again. Can he pull it off?

I’m prepared to go against the crowd and say he can. I don’t think he can do it on his own, but all it takes is a few other publishing companies to follow and the balance is tipped.

UK national newspapers

Let’s look at the UK market. Discounting the Star, Express and Independent (which I believe probably won’t be here in ten years’ time), there are seven national daily newspapers in the UK. Of these, two – The Sun and The Times – are owned by News International. A third – The Financial Times – is something of a special case and already successfully charges for content. That leaves The Daily Mirror, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian and The Daily Mail.

Free content at Guardian.co.uk

Of these, I suspect only the Guardian has a genuine commitment to free content on the internet. This is partly because the Guardian was a trailblazer in newspaper websites, partly because Guardian.co.uk gets a lot of advertising, and partly because many of Guardian.co.uk’s readers are not in the UK. The foreign online readership boosts the print version’s gravitas and ability to set agendas.

Mirror, Mail and Telegraph

The Mirror’s commitment to the internet has always been half-hearted at best. Mirror.co.uk is not a major player, and if the tide turned against free content it would almost certainly follow. The site would attract very few subscribers, but it would be more a case of making what money it can. I can also imagine that the Mail and, to a slightly lesser extent, The Telegraph, would dearly love to erect pay walls. If they could make money by charging, they almost certainly would.

Paid content domino effect

So if the FT, The Sun and The Times are charging, it probably only takes one other media group to follow suit before a domino effect kicks in. And will people go to the Guardian website because they can’t read the Times, Telegraph or Mail online without paying? I’m not so sure – these are largely different audiences.

Why buy Kellogg’s cornflakes?

I think supermarket own brand goods make for a reasonable analogy. Why would someone pay £2 plus for Kellogg’s cornflakes when the supermarket own brand cornflakes are available for half the price? Answer: because they prefer the Kellogg’s brand and are prepared to pay the extra for it.

Newspapers must play to their strengths

That brand is the key thing. The newspapers have to concentrate on what makes their paper a must-read; what only they do well. This might be breaking exclusive stories, in-depth analysis, coverage of niche topics or big name interviews. It doesn’t matter what it is, but these strengths are why people choose one paper over another. And, I believe, it is what people will pay for.

Paywalls and unique content

Any newspaper site putting an entire site behind a paywall is almost certainly doomed to failure. For a start, search engine traffic will drastically decrease, leading to haemorrhaging advertising revenue. General news can always be obtained from elsewhere; same with most sports coverage; same – to a certain extent – with opinion. The happy mix is to make the general content free, and the unique content paid-for. That unique content just has to be very good. Almost certainly better than it is now.

Website subscriptions

I don’t think people will pay a lot. But give the internet site subscription away with the newspaper subscription? That’s a workable model. Or publish a daily access code in the print edition. Or charge, say, £30 – £50 a year for a website subscription allowing access to all content and the archive. That can work too.

I’m not sure the advertising would drop off that much either – most of the traffic would be coming to the free content, and the advertising in the paid-for content would have a higher per-reader value. If someone has paid for it, they’ve clearly got a higher interest in what they are reading than the average punter.

Changing a culture

Making paid content work does involve changing what is fast becoming an ingrained culture. But this isn’t as difficult as some might think. It happens all the time.

In the past, drink driving, leaving doors unlocked, taking more than one bag as hand luggage, not recycling, watching sport on terrestrial TV and parking for free were all largely ingrained parts of the culture. They all changed, and it’s arguable in every case that the past status quo was more convenient and preferred by many.

Yes, a large sector of the population have grown accustomed to free news. But I think it’ll be surprisingly easy to train people out of that if there are fewer sources of free news. Crucially, if people will pay to access the internet (through service providers, in internet cafés or wireless hotspots), who’s to say they won’t pay to access the content on it?

What do you think? Am I being naive here? Share your thoughts by commenting below.

It seems as though some people are arranging parties to enable them to catch swine flu before it mutates into something last seen on 28 Weeks Later.

This, to me, is the jump the shark moment. Swine flu has officially become ridiculous rather than Dustin-Hoffman-chasing-a-monkey scary. There has always been the suspicion that people have been taking it a bit too seriously. It’s alright chaps – you can take the masks off now. They only made you look silly anyway.

I think the Daily Mash summed it up quite brilliantly in their spoof story from late April…