Deborah O’Donoghue is a reporter at Travel Tomorrow. This British-Irish writer lived in the UK and France before moving to Belgium. She has travelled all over the world and worked in car body repairs, in the best fish ‘n’ chip shop in Brighton, and been a gopher in a comedy club, as well as a teacher. She’s a past winner of the Commonwealth Broadcasting Association Short Story Prize. Her début novel, Sea of Bones, was published by the UK's Legend Press in 2019 and Droemer Knaur Germany in 2021.
Leuven is known for its stunning medieval squares, great shopping and for KU Leuven, its world-leading university (Big Bang Theory, anyone?), but it’s also blessed with […]
Remember, Finland is for life, not just for Christmas. Helsinki’s summer season is just hotting up and there’s never been a better time to visit. Glorious […]
There’s something magical about the chime of carillon bells and there’s no better place to experience their charm than Mechelen, the international capital of carillon culture. […]
Art lovers will already know that Ghent has a world-class arts scene and this year is no exception. Just an hour from Brussels, easily accessible by […]
Ribatejo is a central, coastless province, located in southern Portugal, named for the banks of the Tejo (Tagus) River, which courses through the region from northeast to […]
An hour’s drive from Lisbon, Santarém grips a plateau above the Tagus river, the city’s fingers fanning out and reaching for the edge. It’s a place […]
João Leite is a councillor in Santarém, Portugal, with responsibility for urban revitalisation and tourism. I met him on a November morning at Quinta das Rolas, […]
Owner Jorge Cancela at Landscape Farm first saw the rolling hills and valleys north of Santarém when he arrived as a boy, a 12-year-old sent from Lisbon to […]
A statue of King Leopold II on Brussels’s Place du Trône could be melted down for scrap, as Belgium reckons with its horrific colonial history. But […]
1. Quinta da Cabrita Just 45 minutes from Lisbon and 10 minutes from Santarém, this is an 18th century farm and its grounds, appealingly guarded by […]
Santarém, just an hour from Lisbon in the heart of Ribatejo region, is a dream for fans of architecture. Known as the ‘Gothic Capital’, it possesses so many Gothic monuments that it single-handedly provides a journey […]
Travellers have always known what Gen Z have apparently now discovered: experiences are more meaningful than material goods. And in a world where everyone is competing […]
With a growing reputation among food-lovers, this historic and up-and-coming Portuguese city, just an hour from Lisbon and easily accessible by car or train, has everything […]