The tallest building in Europe.

The bad went to Australia. The mad to Tasmania. Port Arthur, Tasmania is one of the world’s most unsettling places, both because of what happened there long ago and what happened much more recently. But that should not stop you from visiting this architectural curio. The highlights include a ring of dog statues to deter [...]

Photos by Peter Hunt
Three Hummock Island is known pretty much only to climate change experts visiting the nearby baseline station to measure air pollution (this being pure point zero). So if you are looking to go off the beaten track, where better? The island has two full-time residents, John and Beverly O’Brien, who recently [...]

Want to be somewhere were time stands still? At Pinetrees Lodge on Lord Howe Island, about 200 km flight in pretty much a straight line out over the ocean from Sydney, Australia, they’ll tell you they painted the ceiling “recently enough” which could mean ten years ago, or thirty. Who cares for such detail in [...]

When in Singapore, skip at least one lunch of chilli crab and head instead to the Battle Box, the last hold out of the British army under siege when the Japanese invaded Singapore in WW2. Amazingly atmospheric, you feel how claustrophobic it would have been, down there, closed off, waiting for the inevitable end.
Take the [...]

These hellish little poupées, writhing in purgatory on their cardboard mounts or thrown into wicker caskets, are not some macabre instillation by Jake and Dinos Chapman but instead just toys for sale at the Saturday market at sun-kissed and heavenly Antibes, on the French Riviera.

Q: What do you need for a sandcastle competition? A: A beach and an audience. So where better than the South Bank of London, where thousands of people promenade on the weekends, when the tide of the mighty Thames is low? There’s a beach, right there, with a view over to St Paul’s Cathedral. [...]

Heaven is doing this with Air Tahiti Nui, surely the most delightfully old-fashioned carrier in the air, which takes your mind off the fear of flying. You feel like you are in the tropics the minute you step aboard - the seats are lagoon blue and the pillows canary yellow. The meal service in business [...]

You need to be seriously cashed up to stay at Eichardt’s Private Hotel in Queenstown, the snow capital of the South Island of New Zealand. Eichardt’s has reclaimed the elegance of its Gold Rush days, but with a modern, comfortable twist. Downstairs, the cheery bar is the kind you wish existed more often, (great for [...]