Tortoise Travelling

At the start of October I found myself between roles at work and with an increasing desire to escape London for the last of the summer...

Feeling very fjordtunate to have just spent a few days exploring Norway. What a place! My friend Lottie and I had spent the first half of...

Krakow! What an underrated city - or perhaps it just hasn't really crossed my radar until now. What I am sure of is that I’ll be back in...

Oh to live in Ireland. As serendipity would have it, I received the email confirming my Irish citizenship the night before travelling to...

Having visited all of Austria's states (no epic feat given its titchy size and excellent transport links), I decided it would be a fun...

I procrastinated writing this post because I left Paris desperate to return immediately, to the extent that I was googling possible...

My time left in Vienna is drawing to a close.… I wrote the exact same line two years ago, knowing full well that I’d be back as soon as...

It wouldn't be a Tortoise Travelling trip without at least one unseasonal swim and multiple vertical hikes. What better place for it than...

What's the final country that borders Austria? Errr…Luxembourg? No wait, Liechtenstein! Liechtenstein indeed. Although I haven’t yet been...

January 2023 brought with it a fresh bucket list, complete with many travel goals (tbc) and a few crazy challenges. One of these, was to...

This past week has perhaps been the best of both year abroads thus far! Having had one Viennese Christmas in lockdown two years ago, it's...

All hail business trips! Not mine, alas, but a friend's, which provided me the perfect excuse to catch the first airport train after work...

Autumn in this country is hard to beat and boy do the Austrians know it! From late-September, as the leaves start to set fire, Austrians...

One of the big draws back (absolutely not a drawback) to Austria for me was my lengthy list of unaccomplished hikes. Whilst here in the...

From Como we headed over the border into Switzerland, hopping out in the country's most expensive city - ideal destination for a...

Sad to leave Garda but keen to make a Como comparison, we set off for the station as the first of the many daily lake-lapping cyclists...

Summer 2022 was defined by swimming. Inspired by both the heatwave and Roger Deakin's wonderful Waterlog, I found myself in rivers, seas...

All roads lead to Rome. At least that's what it seemed like when a friend began her Erasmus placement in the city at the top of my bucket...

Back in the depths of Viennese lockdown my friend Francesca chanced upon a copy of Patricia Highsmith's The Talented Mr Ripley in a...

A final year abroad day trip - this time to Arles with Kitty! After two surprisingly on-time buses, I made it to Arles to meet up with a...

With friends stationed in Nice for July, two days off from work and a Bastille day to celebrate, I took my first (mid)weekend trip on...

Following my two very chilled first weeks here, work began and I found myself splitting my days between the Château and the bus stop....

Two countries in one day = two posts in one day! Following my nail biting wait for a negative test result, the rest of my journey to...

And just like that, 9 months in Austria have come to an end! Thanks to a lost PCR result the day before my flight, it was looking more...

With my time in Austria disappearing at an alarming rate, another bank holiday lengthening the weekend and my bucket list still far from...

The first non-Viennese post in a very long while! Just a few days before lockdown lifts here in Austria, I escaped the rain this weekend...

It’s cold, grey and absolutely pelting with rain. A far cry from the spring vibes I’d been hoping for so I thought I’d do a photo dump of...

Spring has well and truly sprung here in Vienna and what with another lockdown beginning on Thursday, it couldn't be more welcome. But...

Austria's infamous pastry and the country's 'most beautiful city' in the same blog title? Yes, today's post is just one cliché after the...

I'm an optimist by nature which is probably down to both ignorance and naivety, as proven by my sincere prediction that corona would "be...

Right until the very last minute my Christmas travel plans were up in the air - were the fam going to make it out here? would we meet...

We're well into lockdown 2 over here so this post is more of a commentary than an update - prepare yourself for new photos of similar...

It's tricky to know where to start and what to say and whether to say anything at all. But it would also be to leave a gaping hole in...

(Below: a snap from Semmering - read on!) Since the Graz trip a couple of weeks ago, the adventures have continued here in Vienna!...

Teaching. Hmm, it seemed like such a good idea at the time.. My first few weeks at school have been nothing if not intense - early...

As it turns out, finding a flat in Vienna is easier said than done. Rather naively, I came out here with the idea that a week in an...

My first week in Vienna was truly a dream - so much so that the ensuing stress (see next week's post) was entirely inevitable. But we'll...

If only it were a whole summer in Sardinia. One day perhaps! Way back in the depths of lockdown, an email pinged onto my laptop with the...

Scopello has my heart. No seriously, I shall be returning here as soon as I can. It is truly wonderful in every possible way. Perhaps my...

Marettimo! The name just has to be said with an exclamation mark, for that's the best way of conveying how the locals pronounced it. Not...

Somehow this trip slipped through the net. Not because it wasn't wonderful and certainly not because I have no photos to show for it but...

On recommendation from a friend and one that was followed up by every 'top things to do in Lithuania' search, we set out to the town of...

Riga to Vilnius was just a quick 4 hour bus journey, landing us in Lithuania in time for lunch! Maybe it was just a nice day but the...

And so to Riga we went! From rural idyll to urban beauty. Riga has so much going for it - incredible history, beautiful buildings and the...

Baltic buses are amazing. For the longest journey of our trip - Saaremaa to Cesis (320km) - we merely hopped on a bus from the island to...

Saaremaa is supposedly the country's prime summer destination and the nation's favourite place for an annual week of sea, sun and sand....

The Baltic States - Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Travelling from north to south, my brother and I began our two week trip this August...

When looking back at 2018, there's one thing that's certain - we had a white Christmas, a very, very white one indeed and what a...

This post is dedicated to my fortnight in Florence. My history of art adventure. Two weeks that I'll never forget. Having decided not to...

While most of my year were heading off to Mallorca and Ibiza after A Levels, a friend and I hopped on the Eurostar to the beautiful...