Sifnos is the island next-door for me. Serifos is “my” island – I started going there a good 25 years ago, and from the moment I set foot on it, I knew I’d be back and start spending my summers there. I still do. It’s mountainous, wild and unpolished; beaches are virgin, and the occasional […]
There was a time period at the end of the 70’s, when rock and roll belched up 15 minute ballads sticky with hairspray, and the efficiency of a 2-4 beat and counterculture got lost in the woods and egos of stadium shows. We ended up with “Paradise By The Dashboard Light”. Fortunately punk rock and […]
Last week Conde Nast Traveler released its annual Travel Specialists list, kind of like the Oscars of the travel world. And with another record-breaking 7 Trufflepig planners with their names in lights (again), we feel more than usually justified in describing ourselves as the Tiny Company with the Great Big Nose. We are of course […]
After spending a good part of two decades hunting for small (and charming) hotels in Greece, it’s the question I get most often: “Which hotel is your favourite?” It’s not an easy one to answer. It so depends on the circumstances. What the mood is. Who is coming along. The season. The budget. Ask me […]
Holidays are lurking and with it, more Coronavirus cases and renewed lockdowns. It’s all been enough for anyone to reach for the bottle. As we hunker down for the winter, we asked around our planning team to see who’s got the bartending chops in the Trufflepig farm. Below are some road-tested recipes that came back […]
I am trying to recall my first introduction to Greek music. I was a teen when my parents took me on holidays to the island of Corfu. Was it during the taxi ride to the hotel – taxi drivers love their music, and they like it loud – or was it that night we signed […]
We’ve been out on the road this year…. a lot. At half-time on 2019, our trotters are worn smooth, and it’s time to take stock. The pictures above flooded my inbox when I naively wrote to our planning team to ask for a few shots from recent research trips. I was struck by the awesome […]
Jacoline Vinke, Trufflepig’s Greece planner, heads to Euphoria Retreat in Mystras, and finds that taking it easy ain’t so rough after all… : Give me some Greek dirt to dig into and I am happy. I find truffles. An old man – son of a miner – taking me for a walk into abandoned mineshafts on […]
We were saying. Mayieritsa. You’ve got to taste it to believe it. It smells quite good actually (that’s the spring onion), but it’s a kind of an, um, acquired taste. And I never quite succeeded in acquiring that taste. (Honestly, I tried.) My Greek husband swears by it. To the extent that during the years we […]
It’s lent. The 40-day period prior to Easter, during which the Greek Orthodox church prescribes that we should all abstain from eating animals with red blood flowing through their bodies as well as whatever they produce (dairy, eggs), as well as fish. Boneless seafood – shrimps, octopus, fish eggs – is fine. Pretty much every Greek observes […]
Take me to the shoe store, and all I can think of is blisters. (My toes prefer the feel of beach sand and water.) Shopping for clothes? As fast and infrequent as possible. Jewellery and accessories? I don’t care much. But set me free on the Athenian street market, something happens to me. I am […]
My first tag was in Bangkok (I write that as if I did more, but there was only one lame attempt). It was premeditated, illegal, and fun as hell. It was lame because I couldn’t even come up with my own tag idea, I bought a book of pre fab stencil tags in the Hong Kong airport and […]
Greece is just about my favourite country in the world, and there’s little I don’t like about it, from the pom-poms on the shoes, to the grilled octopus, the arid islands, the lively people, the ancient marvels, and even the astonishing modern pop music. I’ve biked around it, walked across it, sailed through it, swam all over it […]
Because travelling on ferryboats is cool. Because creamy yoghurt with fruits & honey make a yummy breakfast. Because the national guards in front of Parliament (with those pompoms on their feet) look so funny. There are umpteen reasons why Greece is a great country for family holidays. Here are my top 12. 1) Greeks love […]
Palia (old) Peritheia is reputedly Corfu’s oldest village. The guides will tell you it’s a ‘ghost village’. The oldest it may well be, but a ghost village? Not really. Here’s the story. Go back to the 14th century. The island’s inhabitants, the corfiotes, were suffering regular pirate attacks, and many sought refuge away from the […]
This Fall, Town & Country magazine had the hare-brained scheme of planning a 170-day Grand Tour around the world for their 100th anniversary. And then they had the wise idea of asking Trufflepig to plan 43 days of it. We were tickled pink with [false] modesty. There’s a world of difference between good trip-planning and most […]