Christmas is a great time of year, and one that most people really love. It’s a time of festivity, merryment, present giving, seeing the family and generally giving thanks for everything you have. But whilst nearly everyone gathers at a relatives’ house too see the family, there is actually a huge market in Christmas holidays. It may seem like a slightly odd time of the year to take a holiday, but why stress about family issues, cooking etc. when you can have it all done for you? With the global age we live in today there is easy access to holidays all over the world, so it’s quite simple to move your Christmas to a different location, or even abroad!

With more and more people looking into international breaks, skiing holidays and other non-traditional Christmas breaks, where are the most popular places to go? This great infographic from HotelshopUK counts down the top 10 of this year, and there’s still time to go on one yourself! Christmas on Safari in Africa anyone?

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Spring is upon us and that can only mean one thing, it’s the Wedding Season! Whether you’re going to travel abroad for your wedding or you’re just going to get wed here and then travel abroad for your honeymoon you’ll want to stay somewhere which offers a great deal of luxury.

It used to be that a girl dreamed of a church wedding in a big white dress, these days though it’s becoming ever more popular to tie the knot by the sea on a beach somewhere tropical, white sand in place of confetti and palm trees instead of chapel bells. Even if you are getting married at home the glitz and glamour of the marriage of Prince William to the now Princess Kate has encouraged every bride and groom-to-be to up their game when it comes to the lavishness of their luxury holiday.

For many prospective spouses booking a flight over to the Bahamas with your whole family in tow is something which will have to remain a pipe dream, so what are your options if you have champagne tastes but a lemonade budget?

Laterooms.com has published the results of a survey that they carried out recently which found that eighty two percent  of the British who are getting married this year are feeling the pinch and won’t be able to afford to pay for the honeymoon they want and seventy six percent said they are intending to make shorter breaks. Most people normally want to take a long honeymoon, however, twelve percent say they would be happy to make do with a break away for seven days or fewer, forty five percent would take a ten day holiday. So, while the ideal would be to spend 14 nights on a Caribbean island drinking rum punches the reality is more likely to be a week somewhere closer to home in Europe, at least it will be for fifty four percent of people planning to make a honeymoon this year.

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The travel industry is looking forward to the April glut of Bank Holidays and so are the rest of us!

A number of other factors, not least the royal wedding have encouraged British holiday makers to take holidays abroad this spring. The government said ”Here, have a day off for the royal wedding” and, with clever use of accrued holiday, taking thee days off will give you a break of almost a fortnight. While the government was hoping The Great British Public would stick around and spend Spend SPEND on bunting, Union Flags and cake, many people demonstrated their overarching ambivalence toward the nuptials and booked holidays in other, foreign destinations instead.

When a survey was taken earlier this year of 3,000  travellers 28% said that they would be using the wedding augmented Easter break to go somewhere that they had never been to before. Luke Nathan from Travelsoon, who conducted the survey said: “The news that British travellers are becoming braver in their holiday choices is really a very positive one.” He goes on to point out that many travel companies are sending back figures which show that some destinations are up 180% compared to this time last year.

47% of the holidaymakers said that yes, the state of the economy was a contributing factor in their holiday plans and that they were being careful, looking for cheap deals on online rather than going through traditional high street travel agents. Only 18% of the travellers said that they had booked through the high street retailers, 55% said that they would look for the best deals and discounts by searching online.

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New Year’s Eve, at least for me, has always been about nostalgia. When that irrepressible clock starts counting down towards midnight, not one part of me is thinking about the new year ahead, about the resolutions I might make (and subsequently break), about the opportunities that lie ahead, the strangers I’ve yet to meet and convert into acquaintances (and maybe with a little bit of luck and grace into friends), not even the Rose Bowl in Pasadena on January 1st even though I’m a huge college football fan. No. For me, as the seconds cascade away like rain drops down a window pane, I always find myself sinking back into memory.

But I’m no masochist. I only sink back into those warm moments of the past year. Whatever those moments are for me, they’re probably the same for you, or at least the feeling of them. And that’s the thing about nostalgia. It’s just this certain feeling, no details, no specifics, just a feeling, a yearning for the past though not necessarily the want to re-live the past.

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It’s quite amazing how many “lobsters” you see out on the beach and roads when the sun comes out!

No I don’t mean the one pictured, I mean, those type of people that sunburn to a lobster colour!

Living so near to the beach and during half term for the kids or when the main holiday seasons start, there are some truly terrifying sites to be seen when driving up the local coast road, past all the holiday camps, yes I know people have to go on holiday, but surely they should take care of their skin or even dress in a suitable manner.

Usually all you can see as you drive along are a wash of middle aged men in a pair of shorts only, with a HUGE belly hanging out of the the top of the shirts and as red as a “lobster” usually in toe with 4-5 kids which look like they were born one every 10-11 months and a wife that is so skinny and chain smoking while pushing a buggy along.

I mean, come on, just because you’ve gone on holiday do you have to show off your blubber to everyone, or do they do that at home as well, hmmm maybe.

Yes, I know before anyone starts that this is normal in the UK for the “lobsters” to roam the streets, with stacks of kids in toe, but YUCK!!!

There would of been a photo, but I politely asked a man if I could take his photo for a local blog which I write, this one and he replied “R A Our Kid, if you give us a tenner you can ‘ave me kids”, shivers went down my spine at this point and I replied, “If your children are only worth £10 to you then what is the world coming to!” at which point he pulled out a can of Tennants larger from his childs changing bag and walked off, seriously, what is the world coming to.