Low Season Traveller Insider Guides

This year, we have launched a small selection of intimate signature low season journeys with our partners which show off each destination in their very best light. One of the first trips we created was a unique adventure with the Tuk Tuk Club in Thailand which will see us travel around the beautiful hills and countryside of Chiang Mai and the Mae Hong Son Circuit in Northern Thailand. I’ll be joining you on this trip in August and in order to whet your appetite for what you will be able to expect, in this episode we catch up with Bruce Haxton from The Tuk Tuk Club to learn more about this unique, once in a lifetime trip. And if you’d like to join myself and Bruce later this year for this journey, the tour runs from 13-24 August and costs just £1,299 with no single supplement for the first 3 confirmed solo travellers.  This price includes 11 nights fabulous accommodation, most meals and activities, your very own bright orange tuk tuk with all fuel, a £100 donation to the elephants and mahouts of Northern Thail

Launching in April, we are delighted to bring you the world’s first travel magazine entirely dedicated to travel during the low season months in each destination.  And so what better way to start our new podcast season than by interviewing the amazing and inspirational Editor of Low Season Traveller Magazine, Rachel Jacgung, to learn more about what we can expect to see in the launch issue which, incidentally, you can be among the very first to get your hands on by subscribing here.

We are talking Regenerative Tourism, Local Tourism, Community Tourism and of course, Low Season Tourism. What are the challenges facing us for 2022 and are we, as an industry adapting quickly enough? Welcome to this year’s penultimate episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. This year we’ve recorded over 60 episodes of our podcast and one of the most popular guests we’ve had on has been Carolyn Childs from MyTravel Research. Based out of Sydney, Carolyn has been a wonderful ambassador for “doing tourism the right way” for many years as she works with many high level organisations to help them to take decisions on evidence based research and insights. We recorded this today on the 21 December 2021 and I wanted Carolyn’s help to make sense of the year we have just had in regard to the world of tourism. Have a listen to one of the sharpest minds in the global travel industry and also an all round wonderful person...Carolyn Childs. Let us know what you think about the issues discussed in the comments secti

Welcome to this week’s episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. Today we're delighted to be joined by Denis, the general manager of the wonderful Maslina Mindful Luxury Resort in Hvar, Croatia.   This podcast was recorded earlier this year when we visited The Maslina Resort during the low season month of September when much of Europe was in lockdown. Denis showed us around his beautiful property and I must say, was the most incredible host not only to me, but also the many guests who were visiting.  Denis is the epitome of a luxury hotel manager; charming, attentive, efficient and unbelievably “present” as he was at all times clearly visible and leading from the front. We were grateful he found time to speak with us about Maslina as we sat overlooking the azure sea at the Maslina’s fabulous A Bay Beach Bar... Huge thanks again to Denis and his wonderful team at the Maslina for their hospitality and for taking the time to share their insights with us today and , if you’d like to book your next low seas

Today I’m delighted to be joined by the charming Marc Clement who is the General Manager of the Iberostar Grand El Mirador hotel in Adeje in Southern Tenerife. This podcast was recorded earlier this year when we visited Tenerife during the low season month of May when much of Europe and indeed the world was in lockdown.  The El Mirador was welcoming guests who were taking the opportunity to escape the stresses of daily life and who were visiting the El Mirador to re-charge their batteries after a long hard winter. The El Mirador, like most of the Select Properties in Adeje, had robust procedures in place to protect their clients from Covid and I must say it was all very reassuring to see this done in such a way that the client experience remained a highly positive one.  Without doubt, these procedures will have been even more finely honed since last May and therefore you should have every confidence in booking you escape to the El Mirador this winter. Finally, Iberostar, as a group, have some incredible

Recently, there has quite rightly been a more focused shift in the travel industry, towards more sustainable forms of tourism and this is something which we really want to help promote at Low Season Traveller.  We know that travelling in the low season is a more sustainable option but we also want to look at modes of transport, community engagement and local destinations as ways which we can ensure that our travel is not adding to the environmental problems. As winter approaches lets find out what we can experience right here in the UK when we buy our railcard and head out to some of the places we barely knew existed!

The Pyrenees form the natural border between France and Spain and stretch from the Atlantic in the West to the Mediterranean in the east. They're easily accessible by train, with a new night train service now linking Paris with Toulouse, and the ferry is another low impact option.  Here we speak with Penny Walker to learn more about The Pyrenees; this unspoiled, authentic mountain destination which is a great alternative for outdoors lovers who'd like a change from the busier Alps.

Today we're joined by Bob Garner who is the owner of Casal Dei Fichi Sustainable Holiday Apartments in Italy and is also a volunteer at Tourism Declares Climate Emergency. Here at Low Season Traveller, we recently signed up to Tourism Declares as we firmly believe that tourism organisations of all sizes and forms have a responsibility to take action on sustainability issues impacting both people and planet. This episode was recorded 2 days before the COP26 conference started in Glasgow and astonishingly, the following day, the UK government announced that Air Passenger Duty taxes would be halved for all UK domestic flights.  In essence, this incentivises people to choose travel by air domestically when of course, trains and other more climate friendly forms of transport are readily available.  This is why we believe that tourism’s private sector has an important leadership role to play on sustainability issues, as the public sector clearly have a different agenda. Our thanks to Bob for taking the time to shar

Welcome to this week’s episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. Today we are delighted to be joined by Alex Herrman who is the Director UK and Ireland at Swiss Tourism. Followers of Low Season Traveller on Facebook and Instagram will have seen that last week we had the opportunity to visit Switzerland for the very first time courtesy of Switzerland Tourism, as we represented Low Season Traveller at the Swiss Travel Mart or STM as it is known.  This is an event which is held every two years where Switzerland invites travel companies to visit the country to meet up with swiss hoteliers, transport companies, tour operators and more so that we can understand what Switzerland can offer to travellers.  Fortunately for us, October and November are the low season in Switzerland so it was a great opportunity for us to sample the low season experience in this wonderful country.  We caught up with Alex to learn a little more about the background of STM21 and also to share with you all just why you should definite

Welcome to this week’s episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. Today we're delighted to be joined by Chalana Perera who is the Founder of Retrace Hospitality in Sri Lanka. Now, Chalana has been a friend of Low Season Traveller for quite some time and when you hear from him, we think you’ll see why. Chalana is on a mission to help hospitality businesses progress with purpose. He partners with investors, developers and operators to regenerate long-term value by repositioning real estate and hospitality assets.  He founded RETRACE Hospitality with a conviction to prioritise responsible business practices, embracing regeneration as a catalyst for change in hospitality development. He is dedicated to the promotion of Sri Lanka as a truly sustainable destination and we are so proud to call him a friend of low season traveller. So let’s hear from the man himself as we welcome Chalana to the podcast to tell us all about the wonderful low seasons in his home in the Indian Ocean….  

Welcome to this week’s episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. Today we're delighted to be joined by Paul Melhus who is the Canadian Founder and CEO of an utterly wonderful organisation called Tours By Locals. Tours By Locals have over 4,700 local tour guides in 190 countries throughout the world who provide their guests with an authentic, local experience of their home destination in a way that few other tour companies can manage. What we absolutely love about the Tours By Locals concept is that they have created a platform whereby local small, knowledgeable tour guides can promote their unique experiences all over the world via this simple portal.  We think of it as the democratisation of tour guiding and it is just wonderful. So without further ado, let’s learn more about the concept and the tours from the man himself as welcome Paul Melhus to the Low Season Traveller podcast…

Welcome to this week’s episode of Low Season Traveller Insider Guides. Today we’re joined by the always insightful and equally charming, Carolyn Childs from MyTravel Research, which is the foremost market intelligence company for the global travel industry. As regular listeners will know, Carolyn is a frequent guest on the show as she has such a breadth of expertise and insights on the global travel industry and is arguably one of the most highly regarded “insiders” we know. We caught up with Carolyn to learn more about the International Toilet Tourism Awards and to learn more about just why beautiful toilets can play a huge roll in tourism… If you would like to nominate your favourite loo for the awards then you can do so here: And to learn more about the awards in general then please visit MyTravel Research here.

So welcome to this final episode of our special 6 part series where we have been speaking with some of the brightest and most considerate social media content creators around.  And today I’m delighted to be joined by Petrena. Petrena is a travel media content creator.  Her channel on YouTube has millions of viewers and when you watch one or two, you’ll be hooked and it immediately becomes clear as to why her content is so popular. Petrena is real. It's evident that she cares deeply for the communities and destinations she visits. As she tells me in this episode, it’s as much about travelling between communities as it is travelling between destinations. Petrena is also a passionate fan of low season travelling. By travelling in the low seasons she tries to integrate more deeply into the communities that she visits.  She gets under the skin of the community. In this episode, we talk about her travels through Africa, massages, marriage, food, Mallorca and the traveller's art of conversing when neither side speak

Tolu is a travel content creator who specialises in affordable luxury travel and providing travel tips to her rapidly growing audience on social media via her channel which is called Travel with Tolu. In her feed, Tolu shares photographs of her travels, useful advice, travel tips and generally provides inspiration for young people to travel and explore the world more. As with most of our other guests in this series, Tolu does not travel full time – although she wishes that she could!  She works a 9 to 5 in the finance world and travels for the love of travel. We talk about how Tolu started her blog, her travels in places like Sierra Leone, Malta, Dominican Republic and many more… So join us as we discover what the world is like when we Travel With Tolu…

In this special episode for World Tourism Day, we speak to Dayana Brooke who is the Founder of The Sustainable Traveller, about her aim to change the way we travel so that we make a better impact on our environment, our lives and our planet. Dayana is deeply passionate about the benefits of travel as well as the challenges which it can bring.  For some time we have admired her relentless enthusiasm as she encourages travellers to carefully find an appropriate balance as they explore the world with consideration to people and planet.

Dasha is a travel content creator and tour guide focusing on her adopted city of London.  After spending many days walking through lesser-known parts of London such as Brick Lane on her way to work, Dasha set about discovering more about these hidden gems.  She became so passionate about all that she learned, that she started up her very own audio tours of London so that she can guide people around the city and let them know exactly what they are seeing as well as learning more about the wonderfully diverse culture and heritage to be found. We just love hearing about London through the eyes of a relative newcomer and it helps us to gain a new appreciation of this amazing city. So join us as we Discover with Dasha…

Talia is the face behind the hugely popular Talia’s Bucketlist and Travel With Talia.  She is a content creator for travel, fashion and lifestyle and her photographs are visually stunning! With over 120 thousand followers on Instagram and 1.6 million monthly views on Instagram Reels, its easy to understand why Talia recently took the plunge to do what she loves full time.  But don’t be fooled that this is about the money for Talia.  She clearly works incredibly hard on her content because she is absolutely passionate about all she does. I was bowled over both by her humility and her clear passion for being a responsible traveller.  Talia recognises that she has an influence on people’s travel dreams but she takes that responsibility seriously, with good grace and with a sense of fun. I caught up with Talia to learn more about what makes her so successful, where she has been during the past year and where she hopes to visit in the future. So join us as we head over to California to Travel with Talia…

Here at Low Season Traveller, we've been looking out for some autumnal low season trips in the UK and today’s guest is the perfect man to help us!  I am delighted to be joined by Sean Taggart who’s going to help us get to know what it’s like to travel around the UK by coach with his new company, Toureasy. Now…Sean is somewhat of a legend in the UK coach holiday industry and his new company, Toureasy,  which launched last week not only has some amazing experiences on offer with some terrific prices…but it also happens to be the UK’s first carbon-neutral coach tour operator – which of course, makes the whole concept even more appealing for Low Season Traveller. Have a listen and let us know what you think....

Bugo is a London and travel blogger who travels the world with her husband focusing on the romantic notions associated with travel.  Like many of us, Bugo has spent a great deal of the lockdowns at home in London but this hasn’t stopped her from travelling. In fact, she has travelled considerably throughout the UK discovering new and exciting destinations closer to her home in London. As with most of our guests in this series, Bugo works a 9-5 in the city and creates her content out of a genuine and authentic passion for travel.  The photographs and videos on her feeds are authentic and natural and she always has a huge smile which encapsulates the joy she is feeling at that moment. We caught up with Bugo to find out what makes her tick, destinations she has loved the most and crucially…where she would go if we gave her £50 grand tomorrow! So join us as we discover the pure joy, of life with Bugo…

Emma Gill is a travel photographer and videographer.  Uncomfortable with the label of influencer, Emma travels and shares with her audience how she creates the shots and videos that she shoots to inspire her ever-growing audience of 60,000+ followers.  In a way, she brings her audience on a tour behind the scenes of travel photography and videography. In this episode, we learn from Emma how and why she does what she does and we discuss how we can celebrate authenticity more in social media.