A Local’s Guide to England’s Best-Kept Secrets

On this episode of Unpacked, join host Aislyn Greene as she explores hidden England with travel journalist Lottie Gross. From rebellious Bristol to underground cave networks, discover the layers of England that even locals often miss. Lottie shares her insider knowledge on experiencing authentic English culture, avoiding tourist traps, and finding magic in shoulder seasons.

Transcript

Aislyn Greene, host: I’m Aislyn Greene, and this week on Unpacked we are exploring the England most travelers miss. Our guide is journalist Lottie Gross, who was born and raised in England, caught the travel bug and explored the world. And since then has dedicated much of her career to England to uncovering the layers of her own country that even locals often miss.

This episode is a continuation of our Off the Tourist Trail series, which is available on afar.com and via this podcast. You’ll find links to Lottie’s England story as well as previous destinations in the show notes.

So over the years, Lottie has, of course, witnessed England’s complexity way beyond the royal stereotypes and afternoon tea cliches. She’s explored rebellious cities and visited underground cave networks. And today she’s sharing her local expertise on experiencing the real England, away from the tourist crowds.

Lottie, so nice to meet you. Welcome to Unpacked. How are you doing today?

Lottie Gross: Good. I’m good. Thank you. Thanks so much for having me.

Aislyn: And it’s funny that we’re talking about England because you’re actually in Scotland right now. How is that going?

Lottie: I am, it’s going really well. I have just been for a lunchtime swim in the sea. I’m up in Shetland, which is as far north as you can get in the UK, which is the northernmost archipelago in the UK right now. So yeah, it’s an amazing place, but very different to England.

Aislyn: Yes. Are you an open water swimmer?

Lottie: I mean, I would say I’m more of a dipper than a swimmer. They call it in Scotland, they call it “duking.” I don’t know why. I think it’s a kind of different word for “dunking.” But that’s basically what I’m doing is I dunk my body in the sea and I float about for a little bit, and then that’s it. I’m not a like, hardcore swimmer. I’m not doing lengths up and down the beach.

Aislyn: Got it. OK. It’s more like a cold plunge, a nice cold plunge—or a duke. Well, we can return to England where you grew up. Can you tell me what that was like, how you got into the travel space? And then I’ll ask you one other question related to that, but yeah, what was your early life like there?

Lottie: So I grew up in South Oxfordshire which is about, I think maybe 50 miles or so from London—quite a rural area. It’s very beautiful. Over the road from my house you walk over the main road and there’s this really beautiful farmland and countryside and rolling hills, and we have an Iron Age hill fort and beautiful nature reserves and the River Thames where the Romans settled 2000 years ago.

So I grew up around all this kind of ancient history and obviously as a child, never really appreciated it.

Aislyn: Of course.

Lottie: It was a very, you know, I had a really enjoyable life out there in the countryside. And then as an adult, a young adult, I went traveling around the world. Before I went to university, I went on a little gap year, as we call it in the UK, and I kind of got the bug for travel there. I traveled around Southeast Asia and found my travel bug and then that led me into a career in travel. I worked for a UK guidebook publisher when I finished university, and then I gradually made my way back to traveling around England. And I’ve been kind of exploring my home country now for about a decade. Really exploring it properly.

Of course, as a child I traveled in England and around the UK quite a lot with my parents, but really I have been exploring it properly in the last decade and it’s just, you know, it has endless surprises for me.

Aislyn: Yeah. And we’re here today to talk about some of them. I mean, it kind of sounds like you grew up off the tourist trail—that was the focus of your piece—but it sounds like you grew up in a place that maybe people don’t spend a ton of time in or isn’t the first stop when they come to England.

Lottie: Exactly, exactly. And I do, I mean, I actually wrote about it—where I live—for the Afar Where to Go list last year, so for the 2025 list. So South Oxfordshire is a real kind of it’s very rural and it’s very beautiful and we’ve got the River Thames running through and it’s got these lovely market towns and, but it really is off the tourist trail. It’s, you know, we have Oxford, that’s kind of our main city. And obviously everybody knows Oxford for the university and and for the river tours and stuff, but south of Oxford is not, it doesn’t really get the attention that it deserves and it really does deserve it because like I said earlier, we have the ancient history. We have beautiful market towns and we do have some really gorgeous bougie hotels. And who doesn’t love that?

Aislyn: I know, you get the rural aspect and a great place to sleep at night. I mean, that’s a winning combination.

Lottie: Exactly, we actually in Oxfordshire have the only Soho Farmhouse, so Soho House, which is a very well-known members club in London. They have a hotel out in Oxfordshire.

So, you know, it’s obviously, it’s the place to be really.

Aislyn: Clearly, clearly. Well, and I love that you have dedicated, you know, your kind of recent career to really exploring your home country. I mean, that’s a, that’s a special thing. What would you say—obviously you travel to other places—but what keeps you there, and why would you argue that, yeah, that travelers should come and explore beyond the big, the usual suspects?

Lottie: Of course, I mean, I have to be very practical about this and say, really the main thing that keeps me here is my dog. It’s harder to travel so much when you have a small four-legged creature that isn’t allowed on planes. In the States, you’re allowed to travel with your dogs on planes, but in the UK we don’t get to do that.

But I think the other thing is that while most travel writers in our industry like to focus on going to the farther away places, the far-flung places, and there are certainly, I think, fewer people in the travel industry and travel media particularly who want to be desiring to write about and sing the praises of our own home countries because lots of people get into travel writing to go and travel the world. And of course that’s why I got into it too. But I also, you know, I actually really love traveling around my home country and learning about it. And I find it so much easier to write about as well, because I know the culture, I know the people. I can communicate with people and I can, you know, I really can use my knowledge and my kind of experience of growing up and living here to inform my travel writing, which I really love to do.

And I think really England is so diverse that you don’t necessarily need to travel the world, unless you really want, you know, guaranteed sunshine for two solid weeks, then yeah, you probably need to go to the Caribbean or something. But otherwise England kind of has it all.

Aislyn: How cool. Well, and it really taps into this idea that we’ve been talking about here at Afar of, you know, leaning into this local expertise, like you said, especially on the cultural side. Like when you live in a place, you just know it in a way that takes time, you know, when you’re traveling and when you’re kind of parachuting in. And I think it can make writing and kind of sharing travel tips with people so much, you know, richer. So I’m curious if you could, since we’re talking about culture, if you could describe English culture at this point in time. That is maybe a big question.

Lottie: It’s a big question. I mean, English culture, it’s very, our culture is very diverse. We have lots of different cultures within England. And so for starters, I would say, you know, when you think of England and you think of culture in England, you might think of, I don’t know, you might think of the royals or you might think of afternoon teas and things like that. All of the kind of cliché stuff, right?

Aislyn: Sure. Yeah.

Lottie: But it’s obviously it’s not just about that. And, you know, the everyday, the everyday England is very different to all of that. And I think seeking out the kind of everyday England is maybe difficult for tourists because we like to kind of almost talk about this caricature of England, you know, the afternoon teas, the fanciest estates, the houses, the palaces, whatever. But actually the everyday England is is much more kind of sedate and subdued and subtle, I think. But I think in terms of English culture, I mean, when I think of English people, I think of people who are quite self-deprecating, maybe. I think we’re not that great at shouting about how great we are. Or at least how great the tourism offering here is. And I think yeah, we’re, we are, we’re relatively modest people, I think. And so yeah, I think English culture, it’s a very difficult one to define because we’re such a diverse country and, you know, culture in the South is so different to culture in the North.

Ultimately I think creativity pervades everywhere. We are a very, very creative country whether that’s through food and drink, through, you know, the way we’re farming and the way we’re, you know, our farmers are very creative with the way they’re farming and using regenerative agriculture and things like that. And then that kind of pushes the restaurateurs to be a little bit more sustainable and think about responsible eating and responsible cooking. And it’s just, you know, we have—there’s little things like that that you wouldn’t necessarily see as a tourist, but it’s all going on behind the scenes and it’s very interesting.

Aislyn: Yeah. Oh, I love that. Well, so given that, and I understand that there’s diversity, but do you have any etiquette tips for travelers, especially travelers coming from America? What do you, what do you notice that maybe rubs locals the wrong way? Or I could frame it more positively?

Lottie: No, that’s a good question. I think being conscious of the way you are treating our homes—very important—and I think in particular, I’m thinking of places like the Cotswolds where I have, I have been writing about the Cotswolds for over a decade now. And over-tourism is a real issue there because we’ve got all these quaint cottages, we’ve got the golden stone and the thatched roofs and the roses in the gardens and the white picket fences. And it’s so quaint and it’s so cute and it’s absolutely irresistible to photograph, however, these are people’s homes.

If I came to Florida and I started taking, if I came into your front garden and started taking pictures of your front door, sitting on your steps and taking selfies with my friends, how would you feel about that? It’s, I think that’s really important—a really important thing to consider is the way we treat people’s homes and public spaces.

And I think for tourists, and it’s the same for English people when we go abroad, it’s really easy for us to stand back and look at things and go, “Oh, look, I’m gonna take a picture of this house because it’s so pretty and I’m gonna put it on Instagram,” or “I’m gonna share it with my friends on WhatsApp or whatever.”

But what we’re not considering is that that’s somebody’s home. And they might be in there and they might see you doing that, and they might feel that’s intrusive. They might feel violated by that. And I think it’s just really important to remember that while large parts of England look like a movie set, it does look like a holiday destination, it’s true, however, it is not, and it’s real, and there are people just living, and so it’s just really important to respect spaces and maybe just don’t point your cameras through people’s windows. I know that that’s a real problem in the Cotswolds.

Aislyn: Yeah. That’s a great tip and I think one that, you know, people when they get swept up in the charm and like the movie set and you know it’s true when you’re not at home it doesn’t feel as real. It’s easy to forget that there’s real people behind those doors. So that’s a great suggestion. Okay, well, most travelers are going to fly into London. And in your story, you had a really cool urban alternative to London. So could you tell me a little bit more about this city and paint us a picture of what it’s like to be there?

Lottie: Sure. Bristol is frenetic. I have never been to Bristol and felt relaxed. It is chaos. It is noisy. It is—it is essentially, you know, the London of the West, I would say. It’s massive. It’s a huge city. It has one of the longest high streets I think in the UK—a high street is basically one long street full of shops and restaurants and things like that. So we call it High Street. I don’t know if you use that term in the States, but we have one of the, it’s got one of the longest High Streets, lots of independent shops.

Bristol generally has a really independent spirit. I remember interviewing someone, a shop owner, several years ago, maybe even eight years ago now who told me that rebellion really was the main kind of vibe in Bristol. Just Bristolians are—they’re rebellious. And they really proved that during the pandemic, during 2020, when the community came together and they tore down a statue of Edward Colston, who was very heavily involved in the slave industry. And they tore his statue down and they dumped it in the harbor.

And it was a real turning point in the UK. That particular protest. It was covered quite heavily. Lots of people were involved and it was a real turning point for the discussion around colonialism and the way we celebrate these past figures that now we know may not have necessarily been involved in positive activities. And so it was Bristol that really started that public conversation during the pandemic, and I think that really encapsulates how—just how rebellious the city is in terms of the way the way its people act, the way its people think and speak.

And I just think it’s it’s a really exciting place to be. It is very welcoming. It’s very friendly as long as you’re not Edward Colston. It’s a really fantastic place to visit and I think it shows you so many different aspects of British culture because you’ve got, so I’m sure you’ve heard of Banksy. We have Banksy. He is probably the most famous street artist in the UK. He’s from Bristol. He started out painting in Bristol. And you can take tours with a company called, I think it’s called [Where] the Wall. And they do tours all around Bristol, looking at Banksy street art.

There’s lots of his artworks there, but also other people who have come after him and used him as inspiration or people he may have trained or, you know, whatever. And so it’s a really amazing place just for the artworks on the street alone.

But then you also have like proper, you know, English heritage that is Brunel. So there’s the SS—I think it’s called the SS Great Britain, which is this big ship in the harbor. You can’t miss it. It’s it’s on land I think. And so they’ve kind of got it propped up on land just off the harbor and you can go in and see this ship and it’s just a really impressive centuries old, beautiful, tall ship with sails and it’s got fascinating. I think it’s steam powered, I want to say it’s steam powered. And so it’s got the engine rooms and things like that so you can go inside and see the inner workings of the ship. And it’s just really, really cool. Very interesting. And he did a lot of work around Bristol. He built the railway that leads from London to Bristol so it’s, you know, that’s a really big part of our history. Particularly around progress and industrialization.

Aislyn: It sounds like there’s this kind of spirit of independence and rebellion that even plays out in the artists and in the historical figures that are celebrated there. And it’s a UNESCO City of Film too. I didn’t realize that until reading your piece. What a fascinating addition.

Lottie: It’s kind of I don’t know that anybody really talks about that about Bristol, but it is, it’s very interesting that that’s a thing. I didn’t know a City of Film was a thing until I learned about it but yeah, it’s a super, I mean, again, it’s that creativity. The city is home to various media companies and so it’s now become quite a media hub. The BBC has quite a big office there. But obviously it’s also got the Aardman Films who are famous for creating Wallace and Gromit. I don’t know how much airtime Wallace and Gromit gets in the States, but over here

Aislyn: We know them.

Lottie: You know them?

Aislyn: Yeah.

Lottie: Over here it’s a it’s a big deal. People love Wallace and Gromit. I fondly remember watching the movies when I was a kid. I now find them way too frustrating to watch because I just, I don’t know, I’m too old for it now, maybe—I’m not sure, or maybe I’m just a Grinch about it. But they are still making films. They made a Christmas special last year, I think, which was quite good fun. So yeah, that’s all made in Bristol. So they’re real kind of pioneers of animation and stop motion animation down in Bristol.

Aislyn: So cool. Well, for travelers who do want to base themselves in London or spend some time there, you also had some suggestions for neighborhoods, some really cool sounding neighborhoods. Could you share those places and kind of again, paint us a picture of what they’re like?

Lottie: Of course. So I think one neighborhood I probably mentioned in the piece would’ve been Southwark. You will read it as Southwark, but it’s actually Southwark. So yes. So—etiquette. Yes, yes. And I mean, don’t even get me started on places like Loughborough, which is, I don’t even, oh, no, Loughborough is actually not that complicated. Worcester, Worcester is the one that’s gonna throw you

Aislyn: How do you spell that again?

Lottie: So it’s spelled Worcester, W-O-R-C-E-S-T-E-R. Yeah, place names are a whole thing. We need a different podcast just to talk about place names, I think.

Aislyn: I know. Actually, I think we should do one that’s like just kind of going through, you know, the top 10 words that you need to know when you travel to England, or pronunciations you need to know.

Aislyn: Sorry, please continue.

Lottie: So Southwark is a neighborhood. It is kind of like right in the middle of the city. It’s really in there. It’s in the middle of the action, but it just doesn’t get quite as many tourists. I’m not entirely sure why I guess because you know, it’s not got any of the kind of main attractions in London, but it’s a great place to stay because it’s kind of around London Bridge. It’s south of the river, it’s around London Bridge area. So you’re near the train station, which is really handy for getting across the city.

And it’s a real living neighborhood. It’s not just it’s not like being in the City of London or being in Canary Wharf where it’s all just tall, glassy buildings and there’s not a lot going on. Like there is real community in Southwark. There are real people living there and working there and stuff. So it’s a really nice place to base yourself in terms of being central and accessible to the other parts of the city, but also you are gonna be within walking distance of Borough Market and from the South Bank, which is a really great place to hang out, especially on a summer’s day. And then you can also go, you know, further south from Southwark. There’re places like Maltby Street Market and things. So you can kind of get a bit of the best of both worlds in terms of you get access to all the big sights, but then you can also hang out in some of the less touristy places.

I do also love Paddington. Not just the bear, but also the neighborhood. Paddington is

Aislyn: Was the bear named after the neighborhood?

Lottie: Yeah, I think so because, well, he came into, he, I think it’s something to do with him coming into Paddington Station on the train. So Paddington is the

Aislyn: That makes sense. Yeah.

Lottie: The train station. I believe that he arrives there with his bags and his little duffel coat.

But Paddington as a neighborhood—I think it’s wildly underrated, especially because now it has the Elizabeth Line and the Elizabeth Line is the new purple Tube line that goes across London and it goes Paddington, Bond Street—it’s got Tottenham Court Road. So you are from Paddington to Tottenham Court Road in about 10 minutes max on the train. And that is—previously I Paddington is my kind of local station in that the train station my train comes into if I’m going to London from home. And the Elizabeth Line has changed my life and I will never stop singing its praises, not only because it’s also air conditioned, which in summer is an absolute godsend.

And yeah—cultural tip number three: bring a fan for the Tube in the summer at least. Sometimes in winter, actually, it does get super hot down there. But Paddington is gorgeous because it has all of these—it’s got big old kind of townhouse mansions with columns and steps leading up to them and lovely tiled entrances, all of these amazing mansions. And then it has kind of these smaller mews houses. Mews houses are kind of—a mews, I think, is like a little lane like a little alleyway basically with lots of cute little cottages down—little stone cottages. They’re really cute. So Paddington’s full of these kind of places and there are some good hotels in Paddington. It’s, you know, five or 10 minutes to Hyde Park. It’s you are on the Elizabeth Line and you are on the London to Bristol line. The Paddington to Bristol is the kind of big train line that runs through to the West. So Paddington’s a really good place to base yourself if you want to experience London and Bristol.

Aislyn: Do you ever worry that—we talk about this also a lot here—that we share these places that are kind of maybe off the tourist trail or off the beaten path, and then are we sending travelers there to kind of ruin them? Do you ever feel like you don’t want to share your secret spots?

Lottie: Oh, yes. But I also think that in a way it’s a blessing that the internet is full of so much information because for every one person that follows my advice, there’ll be a million people that don’t. So I don’t I don’t think that I wield enough power to suddenly ruin a destination.

Aislyn: Well, we’ll find out if all of our listeners descend

Lottie: There we go.

Aislyn: Into Paddington in the next year.

Lottie: That’s the other great thing about Paddington is actually, it’s also on the Heathrow Express, so if you’re flying into Heathrow, it’s

Aislyn: Ah, oh.

Lottie: I think like half an hour on the train to Paddington. So it’s

Aislyn: That is where I’m staying next time.

Lottie: So underrated.

Aislyn: Yes. Okay. All right. Well, hopefully you haven’t ruined it, but thank you for sharing it.

Lottie: I hope not.

Aislyn: We’ll be back with more from Lottie after a few words from our sponsors.

I would love to transition from urban spaces to more of the outdoors because you shared two really cool sounding national parks that I think would take travelers beyond the usual suspects, beyond the Lake District, into these places that sound incredible, but just not as well known outside of England.

Lottie: For sure. So the two places I mentioned were the North York Moors National Park and the Peak District National Park. So they’re not too far from each other. The North York Moors are on the east coast of England. Look for towns like Whitby, that’s kind of the big town on the coast in that national park.

And I’m trying to think of what the other towns inland are called now. But but the North York Moors are a really beautiful place, particularly in summer—at this time of year, as much as it is peak season. And I encourage you to go in other seasons, which I’m sure we’ll talk about later. I do have to say that in summer, the North York Moors are spectacular because they have lots of heather, so it’s all moorland, which means there’s not, you know, it’s not forest, it’s not trees, it’s kind of open wide space, empty moors, and it’s got loads of heather.

And at this time of year, the heather is in flower. So the moors are just purple. They are all this really gorgeous, rich, purple color. And they’re really amazing for walking. You’ll find wildflower meadows, you’ll find grazing pasture with cattle and sheep. One of my favorite things about the North York Moors is it’s not just about walking. There’s a really gorgeous heritage railway that passes through the North York Moors. You can get on at Pickering, which is a really quaint market town, really gorgeous little town. You get on at the train station there, which I think is a kind of relic from the 1920s. I don’t think it’s used at all for normal trains. You can hop on at Pickering. It’s a really cute, old school train station.

And the trains, the steam trains, they’re often steam. Sometimes it’s diesel, but often it’s steam trains. They’re all kind of vintage carriages from maybe the 1950s or the 1920s, the 1930s, and you ride the rails all the way through the national park and out to the coast to Whitby, which is on the coast where you have Whitby Abbey which is famous for its links with the Dracula novel. And it has this big Goth festival in the summer, which is very interesting and frankly quite exciting.

Aislyn: How fascinating.

Lottie: Teenage me would’ve absolutely loved it. I’m devastated—I didn’t know about it because I was a real Goth when I was a kid. So Whitby is it would’ve been my place back then, but I just didn’t know. Maybe one day I’ll go back and relive my Goth days. I don’t know.

Aislyn: You should, yes. And send us photos.

Lottie: Send photos. There we go. So Whitby and Whitby is great. It’s a beautiful place. It’s quite quirky. There are boat trips you can do from Whitby. So you take the train from Pickering all the way out to Whitby. You have a whole day in Whitby. Go on a boat trip or go and hang out at the Abbey. Go and find yourself a slice of fruit cake with some cheese on top. I know it sounds weird, but it’s good, I promise.

Aislyn: Okay. Okay. I’ll take your word for it.

Lottie: It’s really strong, like a really, really good wedge of fruitcake with a very, very salty, strong, mature cheese. I’m thinking Wensleydale is probably the one they would use there but a nice wedge of cheese on top. And it’s a really, really good combo, I promise. And, or maybe like a pint of bitter or something, some English ale, if you can stomach it. So you can do that for the whole day. It’s just amazing. But then obviously there’s gorgeous walking as well. Walking is also a really big deal in the Peak District. It’s kind of in the name. It has peaks. We don’t really have mountains like you have in the States, right? So you are you’re not gonna go and you’re not gonna see massive summits.

Aislyn: Right, different scale.

Lottie: No, there aren’t there are summits, but they’re just modest. You know, they’re you’ve gotta readjust your expectations. My favorite is Mam Tor, which is very accessible. It’s very easy. You can you’ll see kids running up there. It’s really not hard to do. Everybody knows about it. It’s great. So it is there’s great walking there. But the other thing I love about the Peak District again is that it’s not just about walking. And one of the absolute revelations I had when I visited the Peaks was like you know, everyone’s there. They’re doing their hiking, they’re they’re summiting the peaks of the Peak District. And I’m I have to say I’m not really a hill walker. I don’t really like walking uphill. It’s not my favorite direction of travel, anyway. And so that that kind of side of it never really appealed to me massively. I love the views, but I just don’t like the effort you have to go through to get there.

Aislyn: Yeah.

Lottie: And so I just I’ve discovered all of these caves instead. So while everyone else is hanging out at the top of the peaks, I’m going underneath them because there are all these fascinating, amazing caves. They are old mines. So the Peak District is one of the few places in the UK where you can mine. But they have mined in the past a stone called Blue John. It’s called Blue John, but it’s actually purple. It’s Blue John, which is a kind of bastardization of the French name that I’m not gonna pronounce because my French accent is frankly terrible. But it essentially is this kind of purple mineral semi-precious stone that you can find in the rocks in the Peak District. And they used to mine it, along with other other kind of minerals and things and metals, I think that have been mined in the Peak District. But Blue John is the kind of most famous, and they are still mining it today in one specific mine. But leftover now are all of these cavernous mines underneath the peaks. Which, if you think about it too much, is quite alarming to think that people are walking on top of these mountains and beneath them are these massive

Aislyn: Yes, exactly.

Lottie: Holes, but just don’t think about it too much and you’ll be fine. I’m sure the geology I know I’m sure they’re strong enough to hold up under the weight of all the tourists, hopefully. But they are certainly not for the faint-hearted, I have to say. There is one cave in particular I think it’s called the Speedwell Cavern, where you descend lots and lots of steps, maybe about 60 to 80 steps down into this cave. You then arrive at the bottom and there is essentially an underground canal. You hop on a boat, and you take a boat trip on this underground canal through to the cave at the end where you have, as the Victorians named it, the bottomless pit, which is absolutely not bottomless. But the Victorians just didn’t really understand how to measure it properly, so they thought it was bottomless when actually it’s, I think it’s only about 12 feet deep. However,

Aislyn: Oh my gosh.

Lottie: It’s still very exciting and there’s this nice, you know, there’s this big cavernous cavernous cave and it’s just stunning. There’s, you know, stalactites and stalagmites, all of the usual funky geology that you are gonna find underground. So that was a real revelation for me in the Peaks, because like I said, hill walking is not my vibe, but although I did have to then ascend those 60 to 80 steps afterwards, which was less fun.

Aislyn: I feel like this is also tying into your Goth past, you know, that you’re descending into the underground

Lottie: Yes, into the cave with the bats.

Aislyn: Into the cave with the bats. Yes. No, that’s fascinating. I really love it. And the idea of like going down and then taking a boat trip and then seeing another cave, how cool is that? I would love that.

Lottie: It’s crazy. Yeah, it’s great.

Aislyn: Well, you mentioned seasons earlier and you also in your story talked a little bit about England’s shoulder season. So can you share when that is, when you recommend people travel to England, and why?

Lottie: Of course. So the shoulder season, when I say shoulder season, what I mean is I guess spring and autumn. So low season, I suppose, in the UK or in England would be the wintertime. Lots of people don’t come to England in the winter except maybe for the period of Christmas and New Year. Wintertime, particularly January and February can feel quite bleak and cold and wet in England. So it’s very quiet at that time of year. And often you’re not gonna get the best weather. So unless you really love the cold, then come along in winter, but spring and spring and early summer, and then autumn are probably my favorite times of year in the UK.

Spring, I would say, you know, come from April through to mid-June is a really beautiful time because it’s warming up. People are in a good mood because we’ve just come out of winter. And so there’s this kind of festive atmosphere at that time of year. You’ve got bluebells coming out, you’ve got daffodils coming out, like the flowers are starting to appear. The wild flowers come in June and July, but it’s a really gorgeous time of year. The trees are growing their leaves again, and there’s just this optimism in the air and it also is cheaper. It’s just cheaper to stay here, to travel around. It’s just easier and cheaper. It’s quieter.

Aislyn: That’s nice.

Lottie: In England, we have a kind of a long six-week holiday from July, end of July, mid to late July until early September. That’s when all of the schools in England stop for summer. And so that means that it gets kind of busy at that time of year. So if you try and come either side of that, you know, so in the May, June—May and June, early July-ish. And then kind of mid-September, right through to November, you’re gonna have a much quieter time.

The October-November time is magical because it’s kind of the opposite of spring because you’ve got all the leaves falling. And so particularly in places like the Cotswolds which I would say is not off the beaten trail at all—it’s extremely beaten, beautiful, but very, very busy—there are certainly ways to experience the Cotswolds without the chaos and without the crowds. But I think it is a particularly gorgeous place in autumn because it kind of just takes on this whole more muted tone. It’s almost like looking at like an old photograph. It’s gorgeous because you just stand on any hill in the Cotswolds at that time of year, and the whole landscape is kind of just orange and brown and gorgeous and I love that.

But it’s true all over the UK you know, we have all over England at least, autumn is a really, really beautiful time again because the trees are turning and there is kind of this feeling that people are starting to do roast dinners again, and that’s a real, you know, classic thing that you absolutely have to try. If you’re gonna come to England in the autumn, you’ve gotta have a roast dinner. It’s on a Sunday, it’s gonna have a big hunk of meat, and then lots of potatoes, lots of gravy, lots of vegetables. And it’s not good for the waistline, but it’s just really good for the soul.

Aislyn: Yes. Good to prepare you for easing into those cold winters.

Lottie: Exactly. Getting your winter coat on.

Aislyn: Yes, exactly. Well, speaking of winter, you said, I mean obviously it’s a colder time of year, but there is this part of me that loves like or at least the fantasy version of say a cabin on the coast and it’s cold outside and you do kind of morning walks and then come back and warm up by the fire with a book. Like are there places like that that you like to go and do a little winter escape or take a little winter escape?

Lottie: I mean, the Lake District would be perfect for that because the Lake District is very popular in summer, but way less popular in winter, so you’re gonna get much cheaper accommodation. A lot of the old cottages there are, you know, they’ve got these really thick stone walls because they’re so old and they’ve been built to withstand hardcore weather because that part of the country gets a lot of rain and wind. So it’s a perfect time to go and experience the lakes because you’re not gonna have half as many people out on the trails.

If you are a confident hiker, then you can obviously take on some of the fells which are essentially a kind of high hill. Again, they’re not quite mountains but they’re sort of trying. You can take on some of the fells if you’re a confident hiker and you can just sit by the fire in your cottage or in the local pub and really kind of cozy up and enjoy that. I think another place that’s really amazing in winter is Cornwall, and again, it’s so busy in summer. I would absolutely avoid it at all costs in the summertime.

Aislyn: Yeah.

Lottie: But in winter I love to visit Cornwall, not least because I have a dog and my dog is allowed on all of the beaches during winter, which is great.

Aislyn: Oh, how lovely. Yes.

Lottie: I love Cornwall in winter because it’s so atmospheric. You know, there’s nothing quite like getting up and going to the beach at seven o’clock in the morning and watching the sunrise from the seaside. And the benefit of being in England in the winter is that you get late sunrises and early sunsets. And so the light at that time of year, while it’s short-lived, it’s absolutely gorgeous and it can really make it magical. I think another really good place actually is the east coast of the UK is great because you get those late sunrises, right?

So you can get up and you can watch the sunrise from the east coast. So I would go to places like Northumberland which has an incredible coastline. There’s a beautiful little village called Bamburgh with this amazing castle called Bamburgh Castle. It sits right on the beach and you can just sit there and watch the sunrise over the sea with the castle behind you. And the castle kind of glows this gorgeous red color because it’s built from red sandstone. And it just absolutely glows and it’s just gorgeous. So yeah, the east coast is stunning.

Aislyn: So many reasons to not visit in the summer. You know, so many great alternatives.

Lottie: Yeah.

Aislyn: I love it. Alright, well I’d like to close with just if you could share maybe your most surprising off the beaten path discovery in recent years in England.

Lottie: Oh, there are so many in England. Okay. Okay. Let’s talk about, can I share two? Is that okay?

Aislyn: Yeah, of course, of course. Yes.

Lottie: So let’s talk about Cornwall. Right? Cornwall, there’s not really anywhere in Cornwall that’s off the beaten path these days on the mainland of England. However, England is home to some very interesting islands. And one of the best places I’ve visited in the very southwest of England is the Isles of Scilly, which it’s Scilly spelled S-C-I-L-L-Y.

Aislyn: Yes. Yeah.

Lottie: We don’t make jokes about them being silly because the locals don’t appreciate that. But you just keep that to yourself if you want to make those jokes. But the Isles of Scilly are like, they look like Caribbean islands at times. Like the beaches have white sand, there are tropical gardens because they have their own microclimate, they’re basically off the very far southwestern tip of England.

And I think there’s maybe six inhabited islands and lots of, maybe almost a hundred uninhabited islands, but they’re about a 20 minute flight from Newquay or a couple of hours on a boat from Penzance, which is right in the south of Cornwall. And these islands are just absolutely stunning. They’re very low lying, they’re very quiet. And in winter, actually, a lot of the tourism places shut down. So it’s a very short-lived tourist season which is actually kind of great because it means that if you do visit out of season, you really will have the beaches to yourself.

Obviously the great thing about the Isles of Scilly is that they are islands and so there’s a capacity issue. You know, there’s only so many flights and there’s only so many boats that can bring people in, which means that it will never feel overrun like mainland Cornwall does, because they just can’t get that many people on the islands because of the boat and the planes. The planes only seat about eight people or 10 people I think. So very small planes. So those are just absolutely beautiful down that way. The other place I would recommend is on the east coast in Norfolk. I think I had never spent any time in Norfolk except as a child. I think maybe once we went to the Norfolk Broads, which is this beautiful kind of wetland area within Norfolk. But Norfolk is in the east of England. And there is a small village called Holkham. Have you heard of Sandringham?

Aislyn: I don’t think so.

Lottie: Sandringham is a royal palace, royal estate, palace. I’m not sure what they call it, but Sandringham is essentially one of the favorite places where the Queen used to go and spend some of her time. And it’s very famous for its royal horses and, you know, great beauty and all that jazz, and next door, or almost next door, you have Holkham, which has this big estate called Holkham Hall which has this big manor house and there’s this absolutely incredible beach, which in wintertime is full of seals and often at that time of year, the seals are having pups and so you’ve got all these cute little white, fluffy pups and they’re just absolutely adorable.

Aislyn: Oh my gosh.

Lottie: So the north of Norfolk, this is on the north coast of Norfolk, where you’ve got Holkham Beach and Holkham Village, and I stayed at the pub there. It’s called the Victoria Inn, I think.

Aislyn: Mm.

Lottie: And I had, I would call it a life changing venison curry. It was spectacular. Probably one of the best meals I’ve ever had. And it was, I think it cost me 15 pounds for a two-course meal where I had, you know, bread to start and some soup. And then I had this venison curry and oh, it was divine, absolutely divine. So I really recommend Holkham—it’s a really beautiful little place. And it was just a real kind of surprise to me.

Aislyn: I love it. And that’s a bold statement to make. So, you know, food-motivated travelers, I think would go for a life changing venison curry.

Lottie: I mean, I just hope they still do it. And I should say the venison is shot locally as well. It’s venison from the Holkham estate. So I mean, you don’t get more sustainable than that. Deer are very much a kind of invasive animal in this country, and we have to cull them anyway, so it’s really amazing that they’re cooking with locally shot venison because it’s just super fresh and it’s really sustainable.

Aislyn: Amazing. Well, Lottie, thank you so much. This has been so inspiring. I basically want to get on a plane right now, so…

Lottie: Come, come and see me.

Aislyn: And that concludes our exploration of England with Lottie Gross. In the show notes, you’ll find a link to Lottie’s afar.com piece about England plus all of her recommendations for everything from heritage railways to life-changing venison curry spots. You can also follow Lottie’s ongoing adventures across the UK and beyond.