I've just been lucky enough to visit Venice in January and savour this amazing city out of season when the number of day-trippers must be at its lowest in the whole year.  It is an experience I can wholly recommend as it's such a pleasure to wander the streets without the usual summer...

As we (that is Jackie and Annabel) were sitting in a restaurant in Parma one evening, we thought how good it would be to recognise some of the people who help to make our Italian walking holidays so much fun.

The Australian passion for coffee must be almost equal to the Italian, but we often notice on our tours that the differences in terminology can catch a visitor out, and lots of great coffee-drinking moments are getting lost in translation!  We have designed this simple guide to ordering, to...

Very close to our headquarters at Porepunkah in north east Victoria lies the magical Mount Buffalo National Park. It was one of the first National Parks in the region to be established in 1898 and today covers some 31,000 hectares, encompassing the entire granite plateau...

Risotto is one of the most versatile dishes as it can be made with an unlimited selection of fresh vegetables and herbs, funghi and truffles, nuts, meat, seafood and cheeses and you need hardly ever make the same risotto twice. Ready in just 20 minutes with a little...

Perhaps less well-known to the many visitors who come to see Florence, Pisa and Siena, Lucca is a cosy and civilised Tuscan city totally encircled by its historic walls. The walls were orginially built in the 1500s as fortifications for the city defenses but, today,...

This week we went with our group on the Tuscan Harvest tour to one of our very favourite restaurants in the heart of Chianti Classico. 

At the end of our tour of Parma, Tuscany and the Cinque Terre we arrive at the charming coastal town of Lerici which sits on the famous Gulf of Poets to the south...

I've just been staying with my friend Caroline on the stunning coastline of East Lothian, to the east of Edinburgh, on the Firth of Forth.  It is a really beautiful and unspoilt part of the UK with some great walking on the fabulous wild and empty beaches.  Caroline is a professional...

The Night Before The Palio

Last night we went with our Hedonistic Hiking group to witness the unique events of the evening before the famous Palio horse race in Siena.  The build up to the Palio is of equal importance to the race itself and by tradition all the different...