Celebrity traveller
WHAT’S BEEN YOUR MOST MEMORABLE HOLIDAY?
I went to the Outer Hebrides in my early 20s and it rained nearly the whole time but when it stopped it revealed the natural beauty of the Scottish coast that’s stayed in my mind forever.
You had tiny fields going down to turquoise sea and white sand and there was no one around.
Some of the fields were full of buttercups and daisies and there were long-haired Angus cows looking at you as if to say, “What are you doing here?”
AND YOUR WORST?
We went to New York for a promotional tour just as we were emerging as a band. They put me in a hotel – I can’t remember what it was called as it was so long ago but it was devoid of anything except the colour white. The only “soft furnishings” were a desk made of stainless steel and a plastic black-out blind.
It was air-conditioned to the max and when I went outside it was boiling. As a Brit I had hoped to get some sun and enjoy the heat but then you walk into your room wearing a strappy vest and shorts and it’s freezing and you feel like you’ve been put behind bars.
BEST SOUVENIR?
A guitar I bought in Spain. I ran away to Andalucia when I was 18, with a rucksack on my back and my guitar.
I was hanging around trying to learn flamenco from the experts and I didn’t realise the sun was melting the glue that held the bridge on to my guitar, so it went ping! I had to buy a new guitar and I’ve still got it today.
BEST HOLIDAY READ?
I’ve just finished reading Death In Ten Minutes: Kitty Marion: Activist. Arsonist. Suffragette by Fern Riddell and it makes you question everything – history, how to enforce change, terrorism, politics, elitism. It’s an astonishing story.
HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR TIME ON HOLIDAY?
I like to go where the locals go. For me it’s about finding out what the local tipple is, the local fruits, the local dishes, what do they listen to, where the local jazz bar is – just trying to completely immerse myself in a different culture.
I’m not a shopper and now a lot of the cities are starting to resemble each other with the same high-street shops everywhere.
For me, it’s all about the memories you make and the things you do and learn, rather than the things you buy.
WHERE WOULD YOU REVISIT?
The Outer Hebrides. I once had to turn down going to the Hebrides International Film Festival because I was busy.
I was half-gutted but I didn’t want to blow that bubble of my memories, because once you go to a lovely place, do you go back?
WHERE ARE YOU OFF TO NEXT?
I haven’t spent much time in Italy, so I’m hoping to go truffle hunting in Tuscany.
I’d like to cycle around and speak some bad Italian because I love languages.
I love those language-learning apps such as Duolingo – I’m the annoying sod in the corner trying to speak the language. It is annoying, you ask my husband.