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INDEPENDENT COLUMN – HACKFALL
It’s easy to imagine woods in winter as desolate places, but within seconds of entering Hackfall in North Yorkshire, movement and colour surround me. With no greenery to block it, light blooms and burns. Down the length of this wooded gorge, glowing trees fringe the turbulent River Ure. Trunks washed by a low sun seem smelted [...]
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YORK CITY GUIDE – TELEGRAPH
Few cities in the world can rival York for history and character. A picturesque riverside city encircled by a ribbon of ancient walls, York has a fascinating provenance that stretches back 2,000 years. Roman emperors were crowned here, William ‘Braveheart’ Wallace’s head decorated its battlements and cannonball scars from the English Civil War pockmark the [...]
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FESTIVE UK HOLIDAYS – TELEGRAPH
For many of us, Christmas shopping is far from the joyous experience of twinkly television ads. Unless you’re one of those super-organised pre-planners who has everything wrapped up by October 1, it usually involves a frantic hurtle around depressingly familiar shops in your local town. So this year take a different approach. Set aside a couple [...]
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Hotels under £150 – TELEGRAPH
I wrote the Yorkshire hotel reviews for The Telegraph‘s feature on hotels for under £150, including the lovely Angel Inn at Hetton and The Red Lion, Burnsall. You can read all about them here.
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Call of Duty – CRUFTS
Former naval Chief Petty Officer Allen Parton says, “Life is always a jigsaw puzzle”. Despite being out of the services for decades, he still speaks gruffly, as though in an Ops Room briefing. “It’s just that disabled servicemen and women have had their puzzle blown to bits. They need help putting the pieces back together [...]
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Ardeche adventure – Independent
I arrived at the vineyard and farmhouse B&B, Notre-Dame de Cousignac, ready for action. This was, after all, the gateway to the Ardèche, one of France’s most celebrated activity hot spots, a playground for the adventurous. Yet a rather different idyll awaited. Cats stretched out in the sun; children ran among pear and apricot trees [...]
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Island of Dreams – PR success
Handling the PR for a new client that has had no real coverage can always be a little challenging; it involves more than just creative thinking around a one-off campaign and often requires launching a brand in the media for the first time. I was recently asked to handle the PR for a new and [...]
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Dam a Stream – Independent
Rarely nowadays do we encounter water that isn’t chlorinated, filtered, distilled or vitamin-filled. Building a dam brings us back into contact with our wild streams and rivers, and their myriad inhabitants. It is a childhood joy worth resurrecting and returns us to what author John Cheever called “our natural condition”. Read my latest column feature [...]
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Working like a dog – CRUFTS
Traditionally the dog of gamekeepers today’s gundogs are more likely to be seen chasing a ball rather than a bird or loyally providing the eyes, ears or limbs of their human companion. But since man first called on his four-legged friend to help him hunt, gundogs have been happily serving their masters in all walks of life. This feature [...]
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Elder whistles – Independent
The human animal can still get a thrill from using wood to suit our purposes. Taking the time to carve your own whistle from an elder branch traces the handiwork of our ancestors and resounds in us long after the note has vanished into the air. Elder is very common and easy to identify. Look around [...]
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Learn about reconnecting with nature and follow the progress of our book Skimming Stones at robandleo.com.
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