Travel Writing Competition 2013 Entries Page1

The hacking cough of a fellow traveller kicks up clouds of choking dust. Fine grains of sand scratch my eyes and the air tastes like a filthy cloth stuffed down my throat.

Sometimes when an offer looks too good to be true – it often is!

It was 1:30am when the train inched its way slowly into the eerily empty station, lit only by a single orange light that managed to feebly cast its dim hue just a few feet, more of a magnet for flying insects...

After a month travelling in Africa my husband, Doug and I felt we'd become fairly well acquainted with the public transport system in Malawi.

Easter at the end of March in Cornwall was bound to be cold and wet but we went with happy hearts out into the freedom to Hellman Tor.

The trip to Europe was set! Business before pleasure was the itinerary. At the Tampa airport, my flight to Atlanta was delayed due to bad weather.

The sun had shone all day yesterday, a perfect day on the New Zealand coast. Today however was dull and raining; I could have been back home in an English winter.

Dreams of sun-kissed beaches, golden sunsets and golden rum supped to the soundtrack of steel bands ran round my head. The prospect of the weekly party on Shirley Heights; the island steeped in a shared...

Happily, we boarded a British Air flight to Moscow on a Thursday afternoon. After the successful completion of a business trip to London, my husband and I were headed for a reunion with our son Wes and his Russian wife...

I was a stranger in a strange land so it seemed right to visit the two women in a Haitian prison. I spoke their language and the friend I was visiting on holiday told me they might be innocent.