Lapland by car club car

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

It feels mean spirirted to begrudge children a trip to see Father Christmas but that’s how I feel about the day trips by plane to the Arctic Circle. The answer has to be bringing Santa here and that’s exactly what Lapland UK has done in a secluded bit of Bedgebury Pinetum in Kent. Inevitably the pre-xmas, meet Santa tickets sold out within days of release so Lola, Nell and I decided to go after Christmas and just enjoy the snowy atmosphere reaching the site in a car club car so that we could also visit friends who live near the forest.

I’d expected to see reindeer and pat Husky dogs but did wonder how we’d pass two hours. However Lapland turns out to be a very captivating place which is staffed by cheerful elves who chat about their lives with Father Christmas to any child who wants to know. They eat elf salad (sweets) and gingerbread; are born when the Northern Lights flicker and believe that Lapland FC would beat West Ham 27-nil.

There’s two workshops – one for making toys and another for decorating gingerbread – but we were also able to explore the Post Office and write to Father Christmas. The highlight for me was sitting on a thick reindeer skin and listening to a traditional Swedish folk story in a kota (like a big wigwam or yurt). Nell was lucky enough to peep into Father Xmas’s log cabin and see the big man’s slippers warming by the fire (a woodburner). When we got home she told her dad that Father Xmas isn’t concerned enough about climate change…

Lapland UK was a really well-thought out adventure, run by enthusiastic people who stayed in character all the time. It also gave us real insight into life in the Arctic. Best of all we arrived at dusk and left in the dark so were able to enjoy the twinkly lights and crunch of foot on snow as we followed the trails around Santa’s forest home fortified by a glass of hot apple punch.

Saturday: must be Germany

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

A strange transformation takes place at Lola and Nell’s school most Saturdays. There’s still children and teachers going into the place, learning their lessons, and enjoying the playground but it is a whole new school – the German school.

For an out of body experience I sometimes to go to the German shop that comes with this school. Arranged under the pergola we planted the stalll holder sells dark breads, stollen and other delicious cakes to anyone who happens to notice that a German deli gem has transported itself to London, N5. It’s a pity that our London school doesn’t offer a similar treat during the week, even if the goods might turn out to be a mix of jellied eels and fake cigarettes (traditionally sold at the Nags Head, Holloway up the road).

Even if Germany is on the move, it is surprisingly easy to find it in London if you have time to go to Hyde Park which has transformed itself from classic green space to London’s largest open air ice rink. And all around the rink is a German Christmas market housed in little wooden huts. Go see for yourself - you've got until 6 January.

Enjoy our Christmas markets

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola (pic of Pete by the Bath xmas markets - it looked better at twilight with fairy lights & glorious when the rain stopped)

I’m not sure if I like shopping, or love it. As an avid buyer of local produce, craft etc I seem to buy items all the time rather than all at once in a supermarket.

The challenge is not finding things to buy – but finding locally sourced, fair trade items, or better still feasting my eyes and making something similar back at home.

Lola and Nell enjoy more practical feasting so they loved going to Oxford recently to see Broad Street turned into a French market where they could taste cheese, olives, jams and best of all get me to agree to buying them each a toffee apple. That’s why reading about the people who promise to buy nothing all year truly impresses me. And now there's Mark Boyle who plans to be a community pilgrim and walk from Bristol to India (a mere 12,000km) without a single penny. He's off on 30 January 2008, see more about his plans and the Freeconomy Community at http://www.justfortheloveofit.org/.

As more and more banks succumb to the American sub-prime mortgage debacle you can see capitalism’s foundations wobble. Maybe people like me who love finding stuff on the roadside, at carboot sales, via freecycle, even growing our own veges etc deserve some blame too?

Pete and I have also just visited the Georgian city of Bath – a real treat to spend time together. The weekend we picked also drew vast, umbrella-weilding crowds for their gift shopping at the Christmas markets. In between our trips to the warm waters of the Bath Spa we weaved through the market of little wooden sheds under the abbey. Here stall holders were selling everything from chocolate and Christmas tree decorations to mulled wine and hot water bottle fleeces. It was extremely atmospheric, despite the three-day downpour and I loved overhearing snippets from other visitors claiming it was “So very Dickensian” or just like “Being in a German Christmas market” said by the couple downing Eierpunsch (egg nog) and Gluhwein (mulled wine).

Meanwhile Lola and Nell were taken around the Christmas market at Freightliners Farm, in London N7, and managed to extract all sorts of foodie treats out of their aunt and uncle, and the first visit to Santa of the 2007 season.

Reading the travel section of the Sunday papers I see you can fly to Hamburg's Christmas market for a shockingly low #38 (plus another #20 in transfers to and from the airport) which is a bit more than it cost me to get a weekend return to Bath on the train (tip two single tickets were cheaper). Now remind me, which one did the Romans prefer? Which one is World Heritage Listed and which one is daytrippable? That'll be one nil to us then...

Story food

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola

It’s cheating to just go to a restaurant and pretend you are somewhere else. But when the rain is beating down on a winter mini-break it’s a pleasure to do just that. This weekend Pete and I managed to enjoy noodles in a satay sauce and green curry at a Thai restaurant in Bath, earwigging conversations about cricket and art, and then the following night go to Spain.

Visiting La Flamenca is an atmospheric, quick, carbon-light way to get to Spain. It is built into vaults, giving a cave like feeling. I was soon talking about paradors (those glorious Spanish state run posh hotels) and festas, a theme that was easy to maintain seeing as everyone was eating tapas and downing Sangria. Pete saw his opportunity and as a result I now also know a lot about Real Madrid. He of course maintains that he didn’t talk to me about football at all…

Christmas tease

Pete, Nicola, Lola, 9, and Nell, 6, spent three happy months during summer of 2007 traveling around Britain. Now we’re home, but the travel bug is still there. Join us for the occasional sightseeing plus tips on how to shrink your carbon footprint. This post is from Nicola.

We’re going to have a green Christmas. Nell wants it white of course and Lola wants what the Christmas cards depict. I want it to be fun and as keeping to our principles as possible – so locally acquired food, homemade treats and a sense of celebration without excessive spending.

That's easy to sort out for food and gifts. But what to do about the Christmas tree?

Around 6 million get cut down each year for their two week stint holding up the fairy. In some ways this is good – fast growing trees soak up carbon and if they are then left out with the recycling and shredded they act as carbon sinks. Where we live there aren’t many locally grown pine trees around so I’ve been toying with the idea of getting a potted real tree with healthy roots. The hitch is that potted trees don’t thrive in dry summers, especially with the neglect it will have to expect in our family.

And even if I’d gone down the tree from the corner shop route (with no certification that it was from a well managed woodland) it is still difficult to carry home. Last year I re-used the school’s real Christmas tree – for just a fiver – but it was needleless from the start and this year impossible as they’ve switched to an artifical creation.

I’ve also tried making glitter twig arrangements but the kids don’t really approve. Besides I love the idea of having a tree in the house, especially as we are having friends to stay in the run up to Christmas and family on Christmas Day.

So I lucked out when I found an artificial tree dumped on the roadside for the bin men. It’s about 1.5m high, folds flat - which made it easy to carry home - and will look fantastic covered in decorations. Not only does our tree come with a story, I hope it will be with our family for life without ever dropping a needle.

There'll still be real trees at Christmas for us as I'm planning a trip to see the lights switched on the huge Norwegian spruce in Trafalgar Square (from December 6 or if you missed it, see the pic above). This is one of those gifts - from the people of Norway given each year since 1947 - that Londoners can really look forward to, even though they know what they are getting. I'm also hoping that Pete will get me a very special Christmas present this year, a young apple tree to add to our mini orchard (three espaliered fruit trees) from tree 2 my door.