Simon Calder's Independent Travel Podcast

Whatever disruption you might be encountering this summer, August is so much better than it has been.In today's travel podcast, I look back at stories I wrote over this corresponding weekend over the past few years and let me tell you, things could be worse. Much worse.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I've been in Dover talking with the port's chief executive, Doug Bannister, who says additional staffing and expanded facilities have proved effective in keeping a lid on delays.“The numbers are turning up as we expected they would,” he said. “And the ‘dwell times’ we have had before border controls have only once reached the maximum peak we had warned people might be the case.”It comes after some motorists faced delays of 12 hours or more in July 2022 as the first big post-Covid getaway came into conflict with new post-Brexit passport rules.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Five weeks from today, two of Florida’s biggest cities will be linked by express trains. Brightline is due to extend its existing Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach route to a station close to Orlando airport. The 240-mile journey will be covered in three-and-a-half hours for a one-way fare of $79 (£62). A vision of the possible resurrection of US railroad travel ...This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

British Airways passengers on an Airbus A380 from Johannesburg to London Heathrow went on a 10-hour “flight to nowhere” when Niger’s airspace was suddenly closed late on Sunday night. Other flights between the UK and South Africa have being re-routed or diverted to take on extra fuel or have returned to their starting points as a result of the closure. Airspace over Sudan and Libya is already closed to commercial aviation. The addition of Niger means there is now a block to north-south flights across Africa stretching around 2,600 miles from western Niger to the Red Sea.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

And they're off (or at least they will be at 10 am on Saturday) on the great Race Across Europe from London to Istanbul, using only public transport. It's a brilliant endeavour, but I won't be one of the 100 contestants. Here's why...This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

I am in southern France, where three splendid new openings have taken place this summer, and I suggest you add them to your list. Specifically, I am on the verandah of the Hotel la Prison, perched on a high bluff next to the cathedral in Beziers. It has just opened as a boutique hotel, and beautifully done it is too. Stay here before it catches on and the prices rise. To the east, in the town of Agde, Chateau Laurens is a one-man folly: an extravagant mansion created by Emmanuel Laurens, with Art Deco, Art Nouveau, and Hollywood flourishes. And to the west, in Narbonne, the spectacular new Narbo Via houses a collection of funerary monuments rescued from the old Roman walls. All are easy to connect by rail in a matter of minutes, and I urge you to add them to your travel list.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Holidaymakers whose trips to Rhodes were cut short by wildfires have been offered a week’s free stay on the island by the Greek prime minister. After wildfires ravaged up to 15 percent of Rhodes, Kyriakos Mitsotakis told ITV Good Morning Britain: “The island is perfectly back to normal.”Around 20,000 tourists were evacuated from resorts in the southeast of the island when wildfires spread on 22 July.Many overseas visitors were placed in emergency shelters set up in schools and other public buildings, and flown back early in an airlift.Anyone whose holiday ended early is, according to the prime minister, entitled to a free week.It is not clear how the offer will work, with key questions unanswered. I have had a stab at answering them with my colleague, Charlotte Hindle.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday to your inbox. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Airports are like hospitals and prisons: you really don’t want to be there, and when you are in one you just want to get out as quickly as possible. But it’s important to keep travel etiquette in mind. With peak month for air travel beginning, here’s my essential guide.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Subscribe here to have it delivered every Friday. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

France has some weirdly inexpensive train tickets, for example the AVANTAGIO' FUTÉ deal in southwestern France this summer that offers flat fares from €3 upwards, well below normal levels. no need to book in advance. There are some even more extreme deals, such as just €1 for a rail journey of almost two hours from Beziers to Millau. Many €1 buses run implausible long distances too. And with driving a pain in France in July and August, they're well worth snapping up.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Sign up here to get it delivered to your inbox every Friday. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

To round off the week I have tracked down the centre of the universe – at least according to the great surrealist Salvador Dalí. It’s Perpignan railway station in southwest France. Not every cosmologist will agree with his conclusion, but the city is a most agreeable location.This podcast is free, as is my weekly newsletter. Sign up here to get the latest travel news every Friday. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.