A selection of family-friendly countries in Europe which are perfect for visiting with the kids this spring, by Mammaproof.

Cod is a major institution in Portugal. Across the length and breadth of the country, you'll find it on every menu every day. Which is why we've prepared a useful little guide to help you learn more about this fish, including its history as well as the cultural and gastronomic aspects. And make no mistake… you'll be licking your fingers!

A getaway to Leeds is the perfect excuse to do two diametrically opposite things. First, you should take the chance to do some quality shopping, as the city boasts an abundance of shopping centres, markets and pedestrian precincts packed with stores – a pleasurable exercise in which we put the credit on our card to the test. In contrast, you can also make the most out of your trip by exploring some of the jewels that lie in the Yorkshire and the Humber region, which is where cosmopolitan Leeds is situated. In the following we propose four outings to destinations less than two hours from the city where you will discover just how special and manifold is this beautiful area in the north of England.

1. Saltaire – In Search of the Region’s Industrial Legacy

Our first stop is Shipley, situated in the Bradford metropolitan district. Here we find the Saltaire model industrial village, a jewel from the Victorian era which was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2001. Strategically located next to the river Aire and the Leeds and Liverpool Canal, it was founded in 1853 by Sir Titus Salt, a philanthropist and entrepreneur of the Yorkshire wool industry – wool was the region’s major driving force during the Industrial Revolution.

This model village was purpose-built to house both the wool mill and the living area for the workers and their families. It featured a number of different spaces, designed to meet the needs of the community: a hospital, school, library, recreational areas, a church, etc. This enabled the workers to live near their place of work and also provided them with better conditions than in the nearby city of Bradford.

Nowadays it operates as a leisure area in which most of the buildings have been restored and turned into shops, art galleries, restaurants and cafés, but it still conveys the idea of the region’s important industrial past.

2. The Evocative Scenery ofWuthering Heightsin Haworth

The picturesque village of Haworth, situated some 36 kilometres west of Leeds, owes its fame above all to the Brontë sisters (Emily, Charlotte and Anne), who wrote their acclaimed novels right here. Most of the tourists who come here do so on account of one of their best known literary works, Wuthering Heights, penned by Emily Brontë, and to see for themselves the places depicted in the novel. Apart from having a walk through this peaceful setting, permanently marked by the curiosity of sightseers eager to capture snippets of fiction, we recommend hiking through the area and soaking up this unusual scenery which acted as the source of inspiration for what has become a veritable classic of English literature.

3. Outdoor Art

You’re an art lover but you hate enclosed spaces – in that case the Yorkshire Sculpture Park is for you. Located half an hour from Leeds, in the grounds of Bretton Hall, stands this unusual “museum”, where you can delight in their magnificent collection of modern and contemporary sculpture in an inimitable setting. Something to note – it boasts Europe’s largest number of bronzes exhibited in the open-air by Henry Moore, the most international local artist in this region.

4. Castle Howard – A Movie Set

North of the historic fortified city of York, which is well worth stopping over in, stands this magnificent country house, as these rural palaces owned by the British aristocracy are known. Castle Howard was built between 1699 and 1712 for the Earl of Carlisle. While its exterior, designed by the architect, Sir John Vanbrugh, is an exquisite example of the English Baroque, its interior will not leave you unmoved either. There you can enjoy the incredible collection of paintings by the likes of Canaletto, Leandro Bassano, Titian, Annibale Carracci, Marco Ricci, Joshua Reynolds and Gainsborough, among others.

A visit to this priceless mansion, which has been the home of the Howard family for over 300 years and is open to the public, has the added value of having served as a cinema and television set. It was here that Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon was filmed,as was Brideshead Revisited – both the successful 1981 series and the film from 2008, adaptations of the literary classic by Evelyn Waugh.

You simply must visit the region of Yorkshire and the Humber – book your Vueling to Leeds here!

Text by Los Viajes de ISABELYLUIS

Images by Tim Green, John Robinson, Nick, Michael D Beckwith, vagueonthehow, Karen Bryan

Por Michael Schuermann de Easy Hiker

London is a great city for hikers. For one because there are so many scenic trails and nature reserves near-by – the Ridgeway, the South Downs Way, the New Forest – and for another because they are all so easy and convenient to reach by what is probably the world’s best public transport system. (I know the London urban and suburban rail networks get a lot of stick, but I still have to find another city in the world where it is as easy to get around even if you have no car.)

We will spend more time in London in the near future and intend to explore the walking trails of the area in some detail, although the more serious hiking trips will have to wait until the spring.

For the time being, however, we will keep things simple and start you off this week with two short walksalong the Thames, one in the east and one in the west, each roughly two to three hours long, allowing you to set out late, after a leisurely breakfast on a weekend for example, and still be back in time “for tea” to watch the afternoon soccer game “on the telly”. Are you still with me, “guv”?

Ghosts of London Past

Wapping in the east of the city has always been my favourite part of “walking London”. I have done this walk several times over the past twenty years or so, but it was never the same walk – because the area has changed and still changes so quickly.

This stretch of London – between the Tower and Greenwich – was once the most important hub of global trade, the place where shiploads after shiploads of coffee, tobacco and sugar from the British colonies arrived on their way to the European consumers.

The London docks were abandoned in the 1960s, and the area lay fallow, a barren industrial wasteland, for twenty years before it was redeveloped in the 1980s. When I came here first, a little over twenty years ago, this process was still very much ongoing, and the “docklands” at the time were a surreal blend of derelict industrial buildings, waste dumps, modern office developments and handsome 19th century mansions.

Nowadays, the docklands are very trendy and chic, but they are still nothing like similarly trendy and chic areas of West London. They are, for one, much less lively. Wapping High Street is a residential area, but when we went there, on a Saturday around lunchtime, we were almost the only people in the street, give or take the odd jogger. Between old warehouses, centuries-old taverns and narrow stairways that lead down to the river, you feel that ghosts are walking with you every step of the way.

Our walk starts at St. Katharine Docks in the back of Tower Hill station. Walk down the stairs on your left hand side, turn left in front of the moat of the Tower of London and simply follow the signs.

The three basins of St. Katharine Docks were developed in the 1820s when one of the largest London slums – with over 10,000 inhabitants – was razed to the ground. (The rubble of the destroyed dwellings, ironically, was used to lay the foundations for one of London’s most luxurious property development projects in Belgravia.)

The St. Katharine Docks were never a great commercial success – the gates to the river Thames were too narrow, preventing larger ships from entering – and, having been heavily bombed in WWII, never fully rebuilt and gradually abandoned.

They became, however, also the first of the London docks to be redeveloped as a leisure-plus-retail facility and the blueprint for all such projects since, in the capital and all across Britain. They are a very pretty sight indeed, particularly on a sunny day. (Unfortunately, we were not quite so lucky on our walk.)

Leave St. Katharine Docks in the back of the Dickens Inn through Thomas More Street and turn left into Wapping High Street along the Thames. Look out for Wapping Pier Head, two early 19th century brick buildings that were erected right on the entrance to the docks to accommodate leading dock officials and their families …

… and, a few houses down the road, the ancient Town of Ramsgate pub. The Wapping Old Stairs beside the pub – they lead down to the river – are said to be haunted: for many men, convicts on their way to Australia and drunks who were imprisoned in the pub’s cellar before being “press-ganged” into the navy, these stairs would have been the last things they ever saw of England.

A little further on, in the garden next to the modern HQ of the London River Police, the City of London used to execute pirates – not removing their bodies before three high tides had washed over them, as a kind of deterrent presumably. The infamous Captain Kidd was hanged here in 1701, and a couple of blocks down, there is a pub that was named in his honour. (Go check it out. It has stunning views over the Thames.)

Continue past some more old warehouses before turning right into Wapping Wall – look for London’s oldest riverside pub, the Prospect of Whitby – and crossing the bridge into Shadwell. (Another modern development, called Shadwell Basin, appears on your left.)

Immediately after the bridge, turn right in the direction of King Edward VII Memorial Park, and continue by the bank of the river with some spectacular views of Canary Wharf in the distance.

Turn left into Spert Street for Limehouse Basin, where this walk ends. There is a DLR station on your left hand side from where the trains of the “Docklands Light Railway” take you back into the centre of London within a few minutes.

By Michael Schuermann de Easy Hiker 

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