So glad we are covering our King and Queen’s Royal Tour of Australia.

I’m a royalist, will always support their position in our country and along with many others look at the financial spread sheet which unequivocally proves they put more into UK Ltd than they take out. 

It’s a sunny day here in London and without even putting my nose outside I feel in a good mood. Always amazed at how the colour of the sky can have such a profound effect but we’re creatures of the earth shaped by its energy, light and rhythms so today I’m either in tune or just British and grateful.

Thank you My Weekly for supporting Breast Cancer Awareness month. We can never talk about this subject enough as the statistics are still frightening. Anything you can do to help yourself and others goes into ‘The Good Pot’ 

Does the ‘To Do List’ ever get finished and what if it did, is that it? The end?!! I was, in all seriousness thinking about this, worried about what would happen to me if there was nothing to do. I discussed it, (mentioned) to Mark while dropping him off at Heathrow for a 2-week business trip to the US. He laughed, said ‘impossible you’ll always find something to do, it’s in your DNA’. 

Wonderful, Wonderful Copenhagen and in my 14th year on this planet, it was. Up until 1974 I’d never been on a plane but in this year of my teenage life all was about to change. Dad, who’s company ‘Turner and Son’s’ made display cabinets for Wedgwood’s Pottery, had a business trip to the famous Daell’s Department Store, Copenhagen and as a treat I was allowed to tag along. 

You can only imagine the innocent excitement, a new outfit, probably involving purple, (Donny Osmond’s favourite colour) and the best bit..  I was allowed a lip gloss!

My Weekly this week is talking my language ‘Get Fit Without Trying’ is the way to go.

To be honest I’ve banged this drum for years and have mentioned it when writing to you. From standing on one leg while cleaning my teeth, to parking at the far end of the supermarket carpark so I walk back, taking the weight of my 2 heavy shopping bags, to engaging and strengthening my core muscles by walking everywhere with shoulders right back, to my whole dog walking routine. This is a little crazy but very effective particularly when walking a pooch with a magnetic attraction to every lamp post, tree, wall corner and random patches of grass where another dog has already peed. 

So excited to learn in this week’s magazine that Richard Osman has a new fiction book out, I’m a big fan.  I chomped through his last 4 on various holidays and loved every page turned. If you’ve not read any of them, treat yourself, great characters all with colourful back stories and by the time you get to the last book ‘The Last Devil Too Die’ they will be your friends. I wish I had time to read more. 

 Mary Poppins is 60! Now that ages us, we are the generation who learnt, a spoon full of sugar makes the medicine go down and proud of being able to say Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious and those who learnt it backwards were just showing off!

Beginning today with an aging observation.

2 weeks ago, we avidly read in this magazine a fabulous article by Alison James entitled ‘The Other Fab Four’ about the wives and girlfriends of The Beatles. In it were many quotes from model/It Girl, at the time, Pattie Boyd. Pattie met and quickly fell in love with George Harrison on the set of ‘A Hard Day’s Night while playing a schoolgirl. Just over a year later in1966 they were married but in 1977 went their separate ways with Pattie leaving George for Eric Clapton. I’ve known Pattie for about 20 years, I used to live near to her and we share many mutual friends.

My tip for snack attacks is the small click lid box I travel around with. Inside is a collection of nuts and seeds, pumpkin, walnut, brazil, almond, hazelnut, sunflower and to give it all a kick, tiny pieces of 80% cocoa dark chocolate. Then in a second box I have my blueberries, a delicious fruit packed with antioxidants and easy to eat on the go.

How do you eat a pizza?

Obviously asking in relation to our delicious article on homemade pizzas.

According to Mark, who spent his early years growing up just outside of Milan with an amazing Italian Mother accomplished in all cooking and consuming matters, I make a mess, in fact an embarrassing mess.

Great to see Hannah Waddingham on our front cover celebrating her 50th as I’ve had a total girl crush on this lady since watching her play AFC Richmond owner Rebecca Welton in Apple TV’s Ted Lasso. Love, hate or have no emotion about football, please give this series a try and by the 3rd episode you will no doubt be glued, clutching the remote saying “oh just one more”.

Writing to you this week from the beautiful Greek island of Santorini. This trip isn’t work related, its absolute and total pleasure. I love island life here, it’s our fourth visit We always hire a car and over the years if it’s worth seeing we probably have.

Last night before crashing out – (Sleep like the dead here first night a whopping 12 hours, now down to an acceptable 7 to 8) I set an alarm to get up and write to you and then enjoy the beautiful, quiet tranquillity of the morning.

Just returned from a fabulous 3 day shoot with one of my best friends. Can’t tell you too much about it until the programme airs in October but, it’s on the BBC, involves a classic car and a lot of antiques. I’ll give you the total lowdown nearer the time, but this is what I wanted to share with you. This particular episode of the series was filmed in a location that has a history of outdoor speed skating and has recently opened a brand-new ice rink.

This week, because it’s taking over my life, I need to share with you my drippy eyes that I now know is called Blepharitis – How did this happen? Since March the skin around my eyes has been irritated, I put this down to something I was allergic to but failed to find the culprit. Also, my eyes started to randomly weep, this went on for a short time completely stopping when I when I visited The Galapagosoff the coast of Ecuador. Hmm, is this where I need to live for the rest of my life? Two weeks ago I was practically booking a one way ticket as it was back with little relief.

This week I’m writing to you from the beautiful Aegean Island of Crete. I’m here making a film about a truly special hotel called The Mistral Hotel and for the last 30 years its doors have been open exclusively to single travellers who come here for companionship.

From the moment they arrive at Chania Airport they are literally scooped up and brought to an oasis of calm where fears of being alone and the biggest of all, eating alone, dissolve away.

Anyone want to talk about the weather? No, I thought not. What’s going on? I’m sitting here in my office at home writing to you in my winter socks and its June! I always try and console myself with an upside, so how about this… The grass is green and women in hot countries have more age-related wrinkles than we do – Lets hold on to that.

Love a bumper edition and this one is packed – I’m off to Crete at the weekend to film a little report on a hotel so the 22-page mini mag with all those stories I’m saving for the plane journey. But will only open it when I’ve spent at least 1 hour deleting rubbish pictures from my phone. I am obsessed with cleaning up my electronic life and the only way to do it, is by being tough.

Lovely to see Joanna Lumley on his weeks front cover, oddly I bumped into her last week at Chelsea Flower Show. We were both helping the RNLI celebrate 200 years of saving lives at sea. As they are a charity, raising money to support their work is paramount, so one of the country’s leading rose breeders Ian Limmer of Peter Beales Roses created and launched a rose in their honour with the hope of rising £40,000 The rose is called ‘With Courage’.

So, safely back in London after a truly amazing trip with Dad and my sister to The Galapagos. Keep a look out on my Instagram for pictures which I’m still going through and madly editing. How many Iguanas, sealions and blue footed booby shots can one possible need?