travel diaries

How does a professional tennis player organise his travel? Is the way new generations travel the same as yours? Paul-Henri Matthieu - Today's players travel in the same way as we used to, flying almost every week and organising their own trips. At the beginning, I tried to...

I like these places where you check that the West is not the law of the world" The only time you really travel is when you don't find what you already know. In Brazil, for example, there's always a Portuguese church that takes you back to your own roots. The same goes for deep in Mexico; in Africa,...

I prefer to stay with local people or in guest houses, where the human aspect is paramount and you're always made to feel very welcome. "I travelled a lot as a child. My father used to take me and my brother everywhere. He used to show us museums, all the museums in the world, and he also had a hobby that didn't belong to him...

I love the soul of cities, even if it's said that they all tend to look the same." There's no doubt that travel influences my work; each country and each city has its own specificity. For India, for example, it's the exoticism, the colour, a different sensibility... For Japan, it's undeniably the gastronomy. And for America, I'd say...

I've travelled practically around the world. First for my reports when I was a science journalist, then later as a writer. I've taken every opportunity to present my books abroad, since I've been translated into 37 languages. What interests me about travelling is discovering other systems of...

"Of course I'm nostalgic! Anyone who says they don't feel nostalgia for the 60s is lying! I had a lot more fun at 25 than I did at 78, that's for sure! My first big trip was when I was 16. It was with my father who, as I didn't...

Interview by Serge Barret Sitting in a bar, reading a book and letting the atmosphere of the place sink in; listening to people, trying to understand local life and experiencing these moments as if I were in the theatre... I clearly have a very strange attitude to traditional tourism. When I'm travelling, I need to...

Interview by Serge Barret "I travel a lot. I've never really counted, but it's enormous; at least twenty business trips in a year. It's a change from what my grandparents used to tell me when I was a child, which gave me a taste for other places. Because, basically, that's what my first trips were:...

Interview by Cécile Balavoine. "Of course, I remember my first plane trip. It was 1952, I was nine years old and it was the first time I'd left Argentina. My parents and I were going to live in Israel. It took us 52 hours to get to Rome, with stopovers in...

I hate airports, all airports... Too many people, too much stress; my own, other people's. Too much noise, too much stress. Too much noise, too much too much. I'm like a bear in an airport. I shut down. People ask me if I don't find them a bit more welcoming now, they tell me that some...

"I confess, I'm not a great traveller. In my life, I've had to make a few short trips here and there; once to Tunisia, another time to Morocco. They were very beautiful places, but I never felt the need to go back. To say how attached I am to other details,...

"In the end, I'm a great traveller without realising it, because I hate transport. Or rather everything that happens before the journey: ordering a taxi, going to the airport, going through security, taking off your shoes... it all gets tedious in the end. After that, once I'm on the plane, I don't give a damn. I like it, I trust it...

"I was lucky enough to have been brought up with a taste for travel by my parents, who wanted us to be curious and exposed to other environments. My father was passionate about deserts, appreciating their immensity, serenity and authenticity. He introduced us to North Africa, and Algeria in particular, right up to...

"With my parents, we never went very far, but my first memory is of 1978, when we went to Barcelona. That first trip gave me a taste for travelling. After that, when I was eighteen, I set off, backpack in hand, and became a professional traveller. For years, almost twenty years, I...

Director and screenwriter Alexandre Arcady is publishing his second book, 7, rue du Lézard, in April. In it, he recounts his personal journey and memories, as well as his artistic collaborations... and all his emotions as a citizen of the world. "My second book is obviously about travelling... I was invited to the...

"As an only child, I travelled a lot with my parents. They were maths teachers and, for them, holidays weren't just about relaxing by the sea. Every summer, we went to Italy, Greece and Germany. When I was a teenager, I had a passion - almost an idolatry - for classical music, in particular...

"I grew up in the Bronx, in a modest family, at a time when air travel wasn't very accessible. So my childhood travels were fairly straightforward: the Catskills, Boston and Washington. My first big adventure came in 1962, the year I started my own business...

"I was born in 1966 in La Ciotat and grew up in Marseille. These cities are already, in themselves, invitations to travel. Because of the Mediterranean, which is everywhere and magnificent, but also because of the cultural mix that the city of Marseille offers. My maternal grandparents and paternal great-grandparents were not French, they were...

"For me, the word 'travel' has long rhymed with 'holiday'; that positive state where you settle into a space of freedom without any worries. Having said that, flying today has changed a lot. The protocol before entering the cabin is sometimes worthy of an obstacle course. I realised this on my way to...

"I was born in New Zealand. Over there, you grow up in Pakeha, the Maori word for people of Anglo-Saxon or European origin. Very early on, because of the remoteness of the country, New Zealanders, like Australians, travelled to discover the world. Even as a child, I had this intuition that I was going to live in Europe, a necessary step towards self-knowledge....