Name: Interview with Pat Glass former MP by Grace Stewart-Piercy
Duration: 28 min 4 s
Description: Pat Glass was the MP for North West Durham and also held roles such as Shadow Education Minister, Shadow Europe Minister and also sat on the Education Select Committee.

August 2025

Eighteen months after his daughter was born, Dom and his wife still hadn't had a full night's sleep. An ambitious family trip to Colombia loomed, but they knew their little one just wasn't ready for the trip. Everything was booked, and the trip tied in with work commitments for Dom's university job, so a tough call was made: Dom would travel alone. What followed was a series of lonely nights in hotel rooms; the cribs they had arranged in each destination stood empty. And yet, the silver lining: This was something to write about. With as yet no clippings or travel writing publications to his name, Dom took a chance. The resulting piece, 'My Daughter's Laugh' won the 2016 Bradt New Travel Writer of the Year award and catapulted Dom into the world of publication. Since then, he has been featured in The Times, The National Geographic, The Independent, and elsewhere, often writing about traveling as a father. Dom's appearance on the Travel Writing Podcast forms an instalment of our Traveling While Dad series. 

How Travel Writing Awards Catupulted Dom Tulett into Publication

"See the mice in their million hordes," Bowie sings, "From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads." 

For most, these lines, from Bowie's culture-bending 1971 track "Life on Mars?" are intriguing, amusing, or perhaps just baffling in Bowie's inimitable yet irresistible way. Yet for James Briggs, they were a route map. He set out to make real the journey Bowie merely obliquely sketched, cycling for over 100 days from the Spanish island of Ibiza to the English network of rivers and lakes known as the Norfolk Broads. Along the way, he meets Bowie fans of all ages and explores the many and varied cultural influences that informed the iconic English musician's journey.

Taking the journey was one thing; getting the story published was another. As James shared in our interview, over eight years passed between the initial trip and the eventual publication of the resulting story: From Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads, a Bowie Odyssey. 

James Briggs joined the Travel Writing Podcast to talk about the journey, the book, and everything in between. 

James Briggs Followed David Bowie from Ibiza to the Norfolk Broads - And Lived to Publish the Tale

One day, the writer and professor Kurt Caswell received a cryptic mission from an editor. Laika, the Russian dog who would become the first living creature sent into orbit, had a window in her spacecraft. "I want you to think on this," the editor said, "and write a book about it." The resulting book, Laika's Window, won a Foreword Indie Silver Medal for science writing.

Kurt's connection with Intrepid Times began with the story, Driving the Dalton Highway, a fascinating meditation on the experience of driving and being driven, which we discuss in the podcast. We also talk about Kurt's work as a professor of creative writing at Texas Tech University, and his life in travel and writing across Iceland, Russia, the United States, and far beyond. 

Kurt's most recent book is Iceland Summer: Travels along the Ring Road (2023), the first in a series about travel on islands. You can learn more about Kurt and his books at his website, kurtcaswell.com

Laika in Russia, Driving in Alaska, Myths in Iceland, and the Writer's Life with Kurt Caswell

When the entire world shut down in early 2020, Brad Fox was not at home in New York. He was instead in the high jungles of Peru, embedded with a family of Quechua-speaking traditional healers, known as curanderos. "I have never felt so sober in my life," Brad said of his many months stranded there, which involved getting to know the local pharmacopoeia, some of which had profound psychedelic effects.

During his time of isolation, Brad Fox wrote "The Bathysphere Book", which was named Winner of the 2024 National Book Foundation's Science + Literature Award and A Washington Post top 10 best book of 2023. The book shimmers with a logic-bending mystique, and it's hardly surprising why. For his next book, Brad returned, literally and in theme, to the Peruvian jungle and told the story of his time there. The resulting book is "Another Bone-Swapping Event," it's out in November through Astral Press in the US and Icon Books in the UK. 

In our episode of the Travel Writing Podcast, Brad Fox talks about his time in Peru. He traces the journey of his two most recent non-fiction books, and brings us into the strange yet piercingly clear world of tradition, ayahuasca, and healing, he inhabited far from the high rises and emails of modern life. We also talk about Brad Fox's earlier travels, including years spent as an aid contractor in Serbia, and a mysterious diving expedition in central Budapest. L

Stranded in Remote Peru, Brad Fox Ate Psychedelic Plants and Wrote About the Depths of the Ocean

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Pat Glass was the MP for North West Durham and also held roles such as Shadow Education Minister, Shadow Europe Minister and also sat on the Education Select Committee.  

Interview with Pat Glass former MP

Grace Stewart-Piercy

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