
Wednesday is bin day in the Polish city of Lodz. I know this because I am woken at 5am by a noisy dumpster being wheeled down the alley outside the Stare Kino hotel. But breakfast is tasty enough and today’s travel time to Warsaw is just 90 minutes. Lodz Fabryczna station is eerily quiet during…

One thing you quickly learn in Poland is the importance of accents on words. You can happily shout very slowly like a Brit at a confused local and get absolutely nowhere unless you write the word down. Thankfully, this potentially embarrassing situation had been sorted out before I travelled, when I told a friend I…

Ask a typical UK traveller where they’d choose to go to in Europe and they’re likely to name one of the classically great locations : Paris, Venice or Barcelona. Yet in the height of the summer season such destinations can be enormously expensive. I’m fortunate enough to not have to travel on a budget, but…