They were selling cannabis when I was there a lot of years ago. Even walking along the water front every second person asking if I wanted to buy drugs.
Bloke used to come in my pub, a Southerner and Arsenal season ticket holder who had moved up here, and the lucky so and so had a daughter living in Lisbon and one in Valencia. Used to spend part of the year in each,Loved them both. One of his favourite places in Lisbon was this food market. (He went mostly where locals went). It is supposedly open to midnight but in summer he was still in there at 2am. When they opened that food hall in Hull he said he hoped it would be like this but said something like it wouldn’t work anywhere in this country the way we approach eating and drinking. Which is a shame.
We were staying about 5 minute walk from there and went for breakfast on the Saturday. It was full of tourists.
On a night, especially late on he said it was locals. Of course he was often there at non peak holiday periods as well as peak times. Would love to see somewhere in Hull as full as that place to midnight every night. Or even for breakfast. Though there aren’t the tourists here to sustain it. You get a lot of tourists because it is on the route for guided tours and heavily featured on sites like Trip Advisor.
Lots of reasonable options just to the south in Cinque Terre. We particularly like Portovenere, just south of Cinque Terre but a lovely spot and well connected by water taxis.
We went later one night and couldn’t get a seat, it was that full. I couldn’t tell you if it was full of locals or not because I was spangled.
I was looking to book a last minute week away somewhere hot and found a fantastic newish five star hotel in Cyprus. It was in Ayia Napa, which I knew wouldn’t be my cup of team, but being in a nice hotel, I didn’t really think it would matter. The hotel was as nice as we expected, but Ayia Napa is really is a bit of a dump and as we walk a lot, we definitely wouldn’t go back.
For winter sun I'd always look at Essaouira in Morocco. Been there a couple of times now at the back end of the year. Not too far, weathers good, locals welcoming, plenty of hotel and food options and enough to see and do for a week, even if it's just strolling around or sitting in the old town drinking coffee and watching life go by.
The hotel was absolutely a five star hotel, I’m just not sure why they built it in Ayia Napa. If I was going back to Cyprus, it would definitely be to the Four Seasons, been three times before and it was fantastic (but sadly not available the week we went).
Did you venture out into the desert plum?? A mate did a walking tour and he said sleeping in a tent in the desert was an unbelievable experience
Not from Essaouira, I can imagine your mate's experience would have been special, in fact I might look into it! I lived in Kuwait for 3 years so saw lots of desert then, it really is quite unique although I wouldn't recommend going there, Kuwait that is!
I went hiking up Toubkal in June 2011, with a group of friends, which was great if you like that kind of holiday, although wouldnt advise women to travel alone there. We had a couple of days in Marrakech at the end, which wasn't that enjoyable because there had been a terrorist attack in the centre 6 weeks before, so the atmosphere was incredibly jittery with nervous police everywhere. Some kid's motorcycle backfired and the whole souk dived for cover. 10 days of tagines for dinner though... Not had one since.
So is it local life you can watch go by or tourist’s? Anything cultural nearby? Looking for some winter sun close to home
