Last updated August 2, 2025 This is my guide to living in Copenhagen. After seven years here as a foreigner, I often get asked for tips, so I’ve put them together for visitors. The guide is always changing and I’ll keep updating it with new discoveries. It focuses mainly on Vesterbro, where I live, and shares my personal favourites. 🥨 Bakeries Copenhagen is famous for its legendary baking, so you…
The project master plan Looking for the full list of countries and posts ? In 2021, I embarked on a journey unlike any other. In the dark, depressing, depths of winter, and during our second lock-down I decided I would compensate for the lack of travel in my life by virtually visiting every country in the world. This was spurred on by an evening of watching Youtube drone videos and guessing the…
Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe (and Zambia) Well, here we are. Our final country of this journey! Zimbabwe has one hell of a tale to tell. Zimbabwe began the twentieth century as a British colony called “Rhodesia”. Named after the notoriously racist mining magnate Cecil Rhodes . Cecil was also a friend of Dorothy, in love with his private secretary Neville Pickering. Sadly for gay people in Zimbabwe,…
Lake Kariba, Zambia Tonight we’re almost at the end of our journey. We’ve reached Zambia, our penultimate destination. I can’t believe we’re almost there! Zambia is a landlocked country spanning central and Southern Africa bordering eight other countries, including our final destination, Zimbabwe. Zambia is home to 73 ethnic groups, and one of only two only places in the world where the currency…
Socotra, Yemen Today we head to Yemen, the most untouched corner of Arabia. Yemen as an official country formed relatively recently in 1990 from the unification of North Yemen, the Yemen Arab Republic and South Yemen, the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen. Yemen is a lot older than this though, Yemen’s capital Sana’a is one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited cities at over 2500 years…
A Lotus flower in Hue Today’s post is going to be a photo overload. I visited Vietnam back in 2014. Vietnam is a truly mind-blowing country changing at a frenetic pace. Today I’ll let the photos do most of the talking, but I have listed my favourite things I did in Vietnam, and a few things you might want to consider avoiding. Setting out on our journey to Hue My favourite experiences in Vietnam…
Caracas, Venezuela My first encounter with Venezuela was when I was a child and my grandparents visited and brought me home some spare Venezuelan bolívars as a souvenir. Sadly the days of newly retired pensioners taking Caribbean cruises to Venezuela are long gone. Venezuela has been in a state of perpetual crisis since Nicolás Maduro’s rise to power in 2013. The BBC has a really good, succinct…
A Swiss Guard giving me the eye The Vatican City is a weird anomaly of a country - it’s the smallest country in the world at under half a square kilometre in size, but is home to the Home to the world’s largest church, St Peter’s Basilica . The Vatican City is also surprisingly new in country-terms as it was only established as an independent country in 1929 and was signed into existence by Benito…
Port Vila, Vanuatu Today we head to the final Pacific island nation of our journey, and it’s an absolute gem of a country to write about. Vanuatu is a chain of 83 volcanic islands in the South Pacific between Fiji and New Caledonia. Similarly, to neighbouring Fiji, Vanuatu has a history of practicing cannibalism, although in Vanuatu it was reportedly practiced as recently as 1969. At this point,…
Khiva, Uzbekistan Today we head to Uzbekistan, the world’s largest double-landlocked country. Actually, there are only two double-landlocked countries. The other is Liechtenstein . Uzbekistan is however the only country though that shares borders with all five of the other ‘Stans. Since gaining independence in 1991 after nearly 200 years of Russian rule, Uzbekistan has been led by authoritarian…
Hand in the sand in Punta del Este, Maldonado Uruguay Today we head to South America for the penultimate time on our journey around the World. Uruguay, or literally “river of painted birds” is a small country roughly similar in size to Cambodia. Uruguay is arguably one of the best places to live in Latin America. In fact Uruguay is sometimes referred to as the Switzerland of South America due to…
Miami beach (please evacuate before sunset) Welcome to the USA! This will be a short one as the US is a country everyone knows at least a little bit about. America’s movies and TV shows are so pervasive that everyone knows what to expect from the US. Work trips to the US “Asbestos Island“, in Boston Harbour That’s why I was genuinely surprised at the level of culture shock I experienced when I…
Folk music in the Chiltern Hills As a British person living abroad, I’ve gradually reached the conclusion that the UK is a particularly misunderstood country. So today I’m going to use this post to take a few misconceptions about the UK. What is the UK? Firstly, what actually is the UK? I run into this one all the time, but a surprisingly large number of people don’t actually know what the UK is,…
Dubai, UAE The United Arab Emirates has perhaps transformed more than any other country in the world during my lifetime. For example, back in the 1960s, the UAE was home to a population of under a hundred thousand. Today the UAE’s population is now approaching ten million. For example, take Dubai, a city I first saw in Michael Palin’s Around the World in 80 Days was once a small relatively…
Kiev We’re back! And headed to Ukraine, an utterly fantastic country. Quite possibly the best weekend break I’ve ever had. Honestly, it was fantastic. We explored the World’s deepest metro , over 100 metres below the surface and ate our way around Kiev. The food in Ukraine was fantastic and you can really taste how Ukraine got it’s nicknames the Soviet Union’s breadbasket. The produce was fresh,…
Where in the UK was this taken? Answers on a postcard. I’m heading back to the UK today for the first time in twenty months. This is definitely the longest period of time I’ve ever been away from the UK. Spending a little time back in the UK will be the perfect time to write about country 185, or more commonly known as the UK. I’m going to take a break from writing on a daily basis so I can focus…
Banana seller in rural Uganda Boy, this is going to be an interesting one. The only thing I know about Uganda, other than it’s a big coffee grower, is that in my living memory it tried to pass a law sentencing anyone convicted of same-sex sexual activity with the death penalty. This was later, reduced to life imprisonment, but understandably Uganda is not high on my list of countries that I want…
Tuvalu Tuvalu is a cluster of nine coral islands and atolls in the South Pacific. Tuvalu is the fourth smallest country in the world and is tiny, but it is at least marginally larger than sort of neighbouring Nauru. For reference Nauru is almost 1400 km from Tuvalu. Tuvalu is from what I can tell the second lowest country on the planet. The highest point on Tuvalu is 4.6 meters above sea level…
Door to Hell, or the Darvaza gas crater, Turkmenistan Today’s country is one of the weirdest destinations we’ve visited in a while. Turkmenistan is a similar size to Spain, but that’s pretty much where any similarity ends. Since gaining independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 Turkmenistan has been ruled by a succession of larger-than-life dictators. The first Saparmurat Niyazov was known for…
Maiden’s Tower, Istanbul, Turkey Welcome to Turkey, Europe’s bridge to Asia. Turkey is the world’s largest per-capita consumer of tea, beating both the UK and Ireland. I really wasn’t expecting to learn that today. Turkey is one of those countries I’ve visited, but feel like I don’t know it. Well, other than the evil eye amulet is almost everywhere in Turkey, especially in tourist bazaars. Oh, and…