Carol Duval
Writer
Educator
Lifestyle Researcher

2023 has been a year of revisiting places and friends. We started the year in wet, snowy England dog sitting and suffering from various...

I was struggling to come up with a title for this final blog of this series. What could capture the essence of the Costa Brava--the...

Well, close enough. From northern Spain to our first stop in France, two days at Les Bruhasses, near Condom. The French/Canadian owners...

After the usual harrowing airport experiences and chaotic car rental in Madrid, the silver lining was being upgraded to a rather gorgeous...

The M1 north to Leeds is never fun but in winter its litter-strewn hard shoulders without the camouflage of bushes in leaf made for a...

From one side of the country to the other--Kent to Wales. This time we're staying in a converted barn deep in the Welsh countryside, ...

Unplanned changes can have unexpected--and sometimes positive-- consequences.This was the case when we had to leave Markyate a day early...

December began with a drama trifecta, the least important being the rush to complete School Gaze. Then there was Noah's surgery with all...

To all my friends and family. AT LAST! THE book is now available as paperback and on Kindle. I've kept the price as low as possible. This...

School Gaze takes readers on a round-the-world school trip spanning six decades. Each chapter is a snapshot of life from the ‘50s to the...

COVID-19 has been the defining feature of the year but so has gratitude. Never have we been so grateful for science and vaccines, to live...

I admit to not entirely looking forward to this year after Australia's horrendous bushfires in 2019 not to mention the crazy political...

Podcast (Part 1) Author Interview

This has been one of those consolidation years, settling back after last year's wonderful house swapping experience with Elaine in...

Trying Lives: A House Sitter's Tale. This book tells the stories of house sits and swaps across four years and five countries.

We're lucky to live so close to Sydney's beautiful harbour. Down the road at Balls Head, we have the Coal Loader, now reinvented as a...

To get us right into the winter holiday spirit, we spent an unexpectedly joyful day at the Weald and Downland Living Museum which...

It’s been an eventful year with a hefty mixture of good, bad and everything in between. We started the year with a fantastic road trip to...

23rd November 2018 Harrogate—A bit like a northern Arundel but with department stores. Lovely Christmas lights and festive shop windows....

Chichester — Nearest to 'home' and so our local shopping town. Cathedral, ancient walls, Roman Museum, buzzing shops—what’s not to love?...