Articles
Turkish Delights
This article appeared in Volume 21: No. 4 of the Orient Express magazine I was 40 years old before I saw Turkey. True, I had sailed along the coast but never ventured any further. Finally, when...
Posted in 2004
Saints or sinners?
This article appeared in Volume 21: No. 3 of the Orient Express magazine When I was 21, I travelled from Vienna to London to study history of art. As an aspiring interior designer, I decorated...
Posted in 2004
Cats Cradled
This article appeared in Volume 21: No. 2 of the Orient Express magazine My passion for tigers dates from my childhood, when I discovered The Jungle Book. Kipling’s Shere Khan was my...
Posted in 2004
White Magic
This article appeared in Volume 21: No. 1 of the Orient Express magazine To celebrate the 300th anniversary of the founding of St Petersburg, my husband organised and led the St Petersburg...
Posted in 2004
Botswana Diary
This article appeared in Volume 20: No. 4 of the Orient Express magazine During a recent visit to the three Orient-Express safari camps in Botswana, HRH Princess Michael of Kent kept a notebook...
Posted in 2003
All aboard for Asia
This article appeared in Volume 20: No. 3 of the Orient Express magazine It is an astonishing 10 years since we travelled on the inaugural journey of the Eastern & Oriental Express from...
Posted in 2003
Bohemian Rhapsody
This article appeared in Volume 20: No. 2 of the Orient Express magazine As a young refugee in Australia, when asked by my classmates where I was born, I answered “Bohemia”. With...
Posted in 2003
Florence past & present
This article appeared in Volume 20: No. 1 of the Orient Express magazine For my husband’s 60th birthday, he was given a long weekend’s stay at the Villa San Michele, nestling in the...
Posted in 2003
The land of the Baltic Barons
This article appeared in Volume 19: No. 4 of the Orient Express magazine Until recently I had no idea of the exact location of Estonia, nor of the name of its capital. All I knew was that it...
Posted in 2002
Letter from Bhutan
This article appeared in Volume 19: No. 2 of the Orient Express magazine Bhutan is a tiny Himalayan kingdom perched precariously between Tibet, Nepal and India. The world’s highest and...
Posted in 2002
Josephine's garden
This article appeared in Volume 19: No. 1 of the Orient Express magazine There are few figures from the past who continue to have an uplifting effect on our daily lives. And yet, whenever we...
Posted in 2002
Andes Adventure
This article appeared in Volume 18: No. 4 of the Orient Express magazine It was a hot, dusty morning in southern Peru when we set off for a brief visit to a beautiful valley called the Colca...
Posted in 2001
Leopoldina lives on
This article appeared in Volume 18: No. 3 of the Orient Express magazine In 1808, Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Portugal, and the country’s king, queen and entire court moved to their colony...
Posted in 2001
Peruvian diary
This article appeared in Volume 18: No. 2 of the Orient Express magazine February 2001. Arrived in Peru’s capital city, Lima—steamy, misty, hot. Apparently it never rains...
Posted in 2001
I had a farm in Africa
This article appeared in Volume 18: No. 1 of the Orient Express magazine Well, in all honesty, it wasn’t mine, but belonged to my father and stepmother Rosemarie—although I often...
Posted in 2001
Venetian Heritage
This article appeared in Volume 17: No. 4 of the Orient Express magazine Many years ago, while on our honeymoon in India and Iran, my husband mentioned that he had never visited Venice....
Posted in 2000