The World Opens Up

• First, the big news: on Monday 4th October, England launched its new, simplified set of travel guidelines, scrapping the ‘amber’ list and making travel easier and cheaper for visitors from those countries as a result. 

• At the same time, the Government moved a further eight countries from the red list to the green list (or as it’s now confusingly known, the Rest Of The World, or ROW list): Turkey, Pakistan, the Maldives, Egypt, Sri Lanka, Oman, Bangladesh, and Kenya.

• Then, today at xxx, the Government went even further - announcing xxxx.

• This leaves just 9 countries on the red list:

• As we predicted just last week, Australia has announced that they will open up their international borders in November, but it’s not a chance to go surfing at Bondi Beach just yet. (As individual states hit the 80% vaccination-rate threshold, the plan is to begin begin by letting Australian citizens in and out - so folks can at least go and see relatives again.)

• Meanwhile, India has announced that visitors from the UK will now have to undergo a 10-day quarantine. It’s the latest blow in a long diplomatic tit-for-tat over the UK refusing to add India to its ROW list.

• As more people in New Zealand get vaxxed, PM Jacinda Ardern has announced that her country’s ultra-strict approach will be gradually phased out, beginning with an easing of lockdown in Auckland. It’s a very welcome step, but we already know that NZ will probably keep its borders closed to travel until early 2022.

• And finally, Argentina has announced that they will once again be open to international travellers, -with no quarantine required if they’re fully vaccinated and test negative for COVID - from November 1st.

B is for...Bologna (open bars and sunkissed bliss)

As autumn temperatures set in, heat-seekers face a tricky dilemma: how do you find a weekend city break that’s open for travel and doesn’t leave you shivering through the streets?

We’d gently nudge you in the direction of blissful, red-bricked Bologna in northern Italy, which sees not-too-shabby highs of 19C throughout October.

What’s the COVID situation? 

• To get into Italy, EU, UK and US travellers will need to fill in a simple Passenger Locator form in advance. When you arrive, present your evidence of vaccination and a recent swab test, and you’re golden.
• Once you get to Bologna, you’ll find that the city is delightfully open for business - hotels, bars, restaurants, and the legendary gelato shops alike will all welcome you in, so long as you don’t mind wearing a mask indoors. (Just remember that COVID or no COVID, everything tends to shut down on a Sunday.)

Artsy Town or Party Town?

With its delightful colonnaded piazzas and crumbling medieval churches, Bologna makes for an art-loving Instagrammer’s paradise.

Crucially, though, it’s also a college town - so once you’ve had enough of snapping photos, you can slip on your favourite black puffer jacket, head to the University District, and grab a cocktail at the nearest trendy student hangout.

Our recommendation? For the perfect mix of tradition and fun, stop in at Osteria del Sole. This bustling 500-year-old joint boasts that it’s the oldest tavern in Italy, but the mood is molto casual - you're encouraged to bring your own food and chat as noisily as you like (exaggerated Italian hand gestures are optional).

Who are the local experts?

Bologna is a foodie’s city, of course (hot tip: don’t ask for ‘spagbol’. It won’t go down well), but tastebologna.net has more to recommend it than just restaurant reviews or recipe ideas.

Updated every couple of weeks by a team of cheery local residents, this blog focuses on the most useful contemporary info about local tourist attractions, churches, bike routes and day trips out of the city...everything you might want to know, in short.

Favourite it on your phone, subito!

Pick of the Clicks

All the other important (or silly, or strange) travel news from across the web:

• As their business crawls to a halt, Thai taxi drivers have started growing vegetable gardens on the roofs of their cabs.

• Heading to Reykjavik to see the Northern Lights? Let us know if you’re one of the lucky 5% who can hear the aurora borealis, according to this fascinating BBC article. (Apparently the noise sounds like whizzing, crackling, and whooshing all at once.)

• Ever got a sofa trapped in a doorway? Spare a thought for the driver of this decommissioned Air India plane, who managed to get it stuck under a bridge in Delhi. (PIVOT!)

• A US couple were struggling to arrange their wedding, as the bride’s parents were unable to fly across from Canada due to travel restrictions. Their solution was both simple and heartwarming: they got married on the border.

• And a happy ending for one Turkish man, who after drunkenly losing his way in a forest, ended up joining the search party for himself.

It's Always A Party Somewhere

Getting your calendar ready for 2022? In this column, we give you the lowdown on all the biggest bashes, celebrations, events and festivals taking place across the world every week.

Nine Emperors Festival, Phuket, Thailand (October 6th-14th)

This nine-day Taoist festival is celebrated across Thailand and other East Asian countries, but it’s most popular on the island of Phuket, where it’s often translated as the ‘Phuket Vegetarian Festival' - a name which most definitely does not give the full story.

Head to Phuket during the festival, and you will indeed find that street vendors and restaurants across the city are serving vegan-only food, as participants abstain from meat in the name of good health and to honour the Nine Emperor Gods.

However, you’ll also see raucous firework displays and street processions of Ma Song - or ‘spirit mediums’ - carrying out a variety of dangerous and often bloody acts of ritual self-harm, from fire-walking to extreme facial piercings using needles, swords and umbrellas.

It might all come as a shock if you're unprepared, but these rituals are intended as selfless and miraculous religious acts, with the spirit medium symbolically taking on the sins and suffering of the wider community.

(If you’re feeling curious, you can read a traveller’s experience of the festival here at Wonderful Wanderings - although be warned, the photos aren’t for the squeamish.) 

This year, however, COVID has had the usual impact - while the festival is going ahead in reduced numbers, the Ma Song are being asked to refrain from their rituals, and vegetarian food stalls are being banned from the streets.

Where? Phuket, Thailand.

When? The eve of the 9th lunar month, according to the Chinese calendar. (So September-October every year.)

How do I get there? Phuket has its own international airport, although direct flights tend to be most frequent during the hot November-April months.

To see the festival, you’ll want to head into the city itself - the impressive Jui Tui Shrine, about a 10-minute walk from Phuket Old Town, plays a central part in proceedings. And while you’re there, we hear that Phuket might also have some nice beaches?

Our Top 5 Holiday Haunts (Part 1)

As October begins, Spooky Season is well and truly upon us. 

And while there are plenty of terrifying travel experiences already - from over-priced flights to snorey fellow passengers - it’s the perfect time for us to pluck up our courage, come out from behind the sofa, and count down our top five of the creepiest, ickiest, eeriest travel destinations from around the world.

First up, at Numbers 5 and 4...

5: Dargavs, North Ossetia, Russia

What is it?

Take a drive up into the remote North Caucasus mountains and you’ll stumble onto something deeply strange - rows and rows of towering stone huts, keeping a silent watch over the foggy hills.

This is Dargavs: a necropolis, or ‘city of the dead’, and home to over 10,000 medieval corpses sealed within 100 crypts.

To this day, we have no idea why so many people were buried like this in such numbers. Was it a plague? A superstition? Or something worse?

Why’s it spooky?

Didn’t you hear us? It’s an inexplicable city of the dead.

Just to make matters even creepier, the older Russian locals reportedly shun this haunted place, telling an old tale that no man who enters the Dargavs necropolis will leave alive...not that this stops sight-seers, of course. (And in fairness, at least some of them have clearly survived to return and leave a glowing TripAdvisor review).

How do I get there?

If you catch a train from Moscow to the city of Vladikavkaz, you’ll be able to hire an experienced tour guide for the two-hour drive up into the mountains.

A warning to the curious, though: North Ossetia is close to the Chechnyan border, and the UK Foreign Office continues to advise against non-essential visits to the region due to its long history of political instability. 

In other words, until the situation changes you may want to play it safe and check out those creepy crypts via virtual tour instead.

4: La Isla de las Muñecas (The Isle of the Dolls)

What is it?

A chinampa, or ‘floating garden’, located deep in the Xochimilco Canals of Mexico City. But while most of the chinampas are picturesque, the Isle of the Dolls is outright eerie; its trees and ruins come decorated with thousands of disfigured dolls, staring at visitors through sightless eyes.

Why’s it spooky?

According to local legend, the garden’s original owner, Don Julian Santana Barrera, spent 50 years obsessively hanging up dolls across the island, all in an effort to please (or perhaps ward off) the ghost of a girl who he’d watched drown nearby.

Creepier yet, it’s said that Don Julian eventually died of a heart attack, in the very same spot where the poor girl drowned…

If all of this sounds a bit too sinister and serious for your liking, it’s worth remembering that this is a tourist destination, and Mexico loves a good ghost story. At one time or another, Mexico City’s local storytellers have declared that pretty everything from the Metro to the International Airport is haunted by Aztec spirits, ghost trains, and more.

How do I get there?

Hire a canal-boat from one of the Xochimilco docks (apparently Embarcadero Nuevo Nativitas will get you to the island quickest).

The canals are a World Heritage Site and famed for their natural beauty - bring your own drinks and snacks and you can spend a very pleasant and un-spooky morning enjoying the views.

If you do head for the Isle of Dolls, make sure you stay sharp and read up on the advice from previous travellers, to ensure you don’t get a nasty scare when it’s time to pay up.

More than one tourist has stepped into a canal-boat, only to be taken to a smaller, ‘fake’ location by dodgy hawkers - then charged extra for the privilege of moving on.

For the first time in human history, Omani explorers have descended to the bottom of the 112-metre-deep ‘Well of Hell’. What could possibly go wrong?

Thanks for reading!