It used to be easy for British holidaymakers to get away from it all. But now with flight cancellations peaking earlier this year, queues and delays at airports becoming interminable, more and more bureaucracy to navigate and prices rising everywhere, it can feel like leaving the UK for a break is more stress than it’s worth. Yet, for all the extra complications, Brits don’t seem to have been put off from heading overseas.
So, are holidays abroad still worth the hassle? Writer and stand up Ariane Sherine Juniper and travel writers Kash Bhattacharya and Mike MacEacheran give their perspectives.
The arid steppe of western Mongolia is a strange place to stumble across a piece of home. Full of Kazakh nomads and eagle hunters wearing fox fur hats, it supported very little in the way of tourism when I first visited 20 years ago.
In July 2006, I was in the city of Ölgii on that dry steppe, standing in a dusty outdoor bazaar. Under a dusky pink sky, I found a beaten-up outdoor pool table surrounded by locals and, with a cue in hand, another Brit traveller who was enthusiastically taking on all comers. We played the appreciative Mongolians, shared our good humour and paid for their cheap beers, even if we struggled to communicate properly with them. What a night. What strange bedfellows.
