Customised Tours this month

Much of September was spent on the road, with two big bespoke tours here in the UK and Ireland. Both itineraries started and ended in Heathrow, but followed slightly different trajectories.
The first was a two week cultural tour of Wales and Ireland, staying on Cardiff Bay, Dylan Thomas' Laugharne, Dublin, WB Yeats' Sligo, Snowdonia and Shakespeare's Stratford-upon-Avon.
The second tour was with a party of just over 20 people, staying in hotels at Bath, Cardiff and London. Again, the focus was on the cultural and historical sites that make the UK such a popular destination. Are we Brits guilty of taking what we have for granted?

 

Summer Plans

  "Education is not the filling of a pail, but rather the lighting of a fire..."

The words of WB Yeats always struck me as one of the wisest, but most widely ignored things ever said about education. This summer a Single Step Tour will give me the opportunity to visit his grave in County Sligo to pay my respects to one of the great names of Western civilisation.

The bespoke cultural tour will start with a Heathrow pick up, followed by a drive to Cardiff, where there will be some family roots to uncover. After a stay at the beautiful St David's Hotel on the Bay, we will drive to Laugharne. A night of "Poems and Pints" at Dylan Thomas' favourite watering hole, Brown's Hotel should get us in the mood for a day spent around the Welsh wizard's home town.

A crossing from Fishguard to Rosslare takes us next to the Emerald Isle. First up, a stay in Dublin, where we can sample the delights of Temple Bar, as well as retrace the steps of the Easter rebels of a hundred years ago. Our base will be the Grand Canal Hotel

Then the pilgrimage to Yeats country - with a visit to his grave and a trip to the mythical The Lake Isle of Innisfree

The route back to Heathrow will take us back over to Wales - North wales this time, where we will spend some time at Portmeirion and Snowdonia as well as studying the work and creative environment of another Thomas - the priest poet, RS Thomas.

A day and night at Shakespeare's Stratford rounds off a busy few days for the "pilgrim souls" on this bespoke tour...