One of the things that has helped me get through this bleak 10 months or so has been my long-standing plan to take a bit of a sabbatical later this year and do a little (well a lot) of travelling and some writing.

Increasingly though I just don’t think it is going to be possible to really travel internationally in 2021. It feels like travel restrictions and closed borders are going to be a factor for some time. Vaccinations are definitely progressing at different rates in different places. Certainly feels like there are a few airline bankruptcies in the future as well – probably hotel chains as well.

Anyway that will almost certainly scrub my current plans…but truth be told I don’t think I have it in me to keep going without a big break on my horizon.

So I was wondering what a UK tour might look like? Almost all my travels in the UK have been work related – I really haven’t explored many cities in depth and there are pretty major places I’ve never been at all (like Cornwall or the Lake District!).

So let us say I had two or three months off. Probably the back end of the year. With a reasonable budget for trains and accommodation. Where would you go?

Here are my starter ideas.

There are places where I have friends I’d like to visit that are no-brainers –

• Brighton
• Cardiff
• Swansea
• Durham
• Dumfries
• Birmingham

There are cities I know a little through work and sports etc that I’d like to explore more –

• Liverpool
• Manchester
• Glasgow
• Nottingham
• Belfast

There are these pictures in my head I’d like to experience –

• Watching waves crash against a sea wall from a bar or something in Cornwall
• Browsing bookshops in Hay-on-Wye (assuming thats ever a thing again!)
• Taking a selfie with the Desperate Dan statue in Dundee
• If I can’t have a Hallmark movie Christmas then the UK quaint village/town equivalent?

…but I suspect none of these are very imaginative 🙂

I’m open to ideas.

Not London though.