Don’t be a Tourist in Provence: A Weekend Guide

How easily I could slip back into my sleepy Provence, to a village called Vers, next to the Roman aqueduct I used to swim under, near the medieval town of Uzès where my mother bought our vegetables, in a garden where an imagination could run wild. I’ll find my way back, with silver hair and…

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The Miserable Mansions of Montserrat

We’re following up on a previous adventure today. Do you remember visiting the AIR recording studios the other week; one of the most prolific studios in music history which is now rotting away on a Caribbean island? Urban explorer Shane Thoms took us along on his journey with him to Monserrat in the West Indies, where…

Book your Bedroom in the Paris Catacombs on Halloween Night

So I’ve given you tips on how to explore the catacombs, party in the catacombs, farm organic mushrooms in the catacombs and even swim in the catacombs, but would you dare to sleep in the Parisian catacombs? Picture a fluffy white duvet, expertly plumped pillows, surrounded by candlelight … and six million human skeletons. Yup, it’s the latest…

Shoot & Stay: Turn your Vacation into a Photoshoot

While the rest of us might go straight to AirBnB as soon as we schedule our vacation days in search of accommodation, there’s a well-kept little secret of industry insiders that you might not have considered… JJ Locations is a boutique location agency based out of Shoreditch, London, that scouts some of the most interesting,…

She Lives at The Last Stop to The North Pole

For the adventurous of spirit, and those who yearn to pack a bag and disappear to somewhere as remote as possible, arguably nowhere quite captures the imagination as Svalbard. The far flung Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ice lies just six hundred and fifty miles from the North Pole. It may be a place where…

Oh, Just an Utterly Insane Japanese Robot Restaurant

There are themed restaurants, and then there’s Japan’s Robot Restaurant, which will steam roll your brain with glow sticks, techno, and robots. Running counter to the Japanese cultural rubric usually shown, it’s a space age Cirque du Soleil on acid or a cyberpunk Moulin Rouge that gives a mind-blowing taste for bedazzled silliness and whimsical…

Down the Rabbit Hole into a Parisian Wonderland

Paris might already have its own Euro Disneyland, but I know a little place, away from the crowds that’s more like the real thing. If Alice had just chosen a bright yellow door at the end of the rabbit hole and if the Mad Hatter had in fact been a legendary clown from Soviet Russia (I’ll…

The Reformed Nazi Cult trying to Open its Colony to Tourism

I was sent down a deep and dark rabbit hole today when I came across a new movie trailer for Colonia. The film is based on true events which took place in 1970s Chile at the Colonia Dignidad, a dangerous cult that was revealed to have Nazi ties and to have used torture among other atrocities within its inescapable walls.…

The Largest Cave in the World, Complete With Its Own River, Jungle, and Climate

People have been crawling around the cavernous mountains of Asia for centuries, but remarkably, the largest cave in the world remained hidden from discovery deep in the forests of Phong Nha Ke Bang National Park in Vietnam until 1991. As the story of the Sơn Đoòng Cave goes, “local farmer Ho Khanh was walking along a stretch of…

The Forgotten Villas of Italy

Thomas Jorion has been exploring abandoned buildings since he was a child and he’s one of those lucky people who managed to make a career out of it. His series, Forgotten Palaces, is mostly comprised of extraordinary villas taken in northern Italy which have been left to decay for a variety of reasons from financial ruin and…