Can you believe what you’re reading!? Paris, the most magical city in the world, now has a fully vegan hotel!
HOY Paris is a beautiful Parisienne hotel located in the heart of Paris, just a short walk from Gare Du Nord and the iconic Sacre-Coeur in Montmartre. The rooms are thoughtfully decorated with sustainable natural materials, a peaceful minimalist style, and are donned with a stretching bar to encourage a relaxing start to the day.
HOY has a yoga studio where you can book an array of classes, and a stunning glass-roofed restaurant which serves 100% plant-based vegan cuisine. During our stay, my mum and I enjoyed the most decadent, delicious Purple Corn Pancakes. Topped with seasonal fruits, vanilla yogurt, roasted almond butter, banana, toasted coconut chips & yacon syrup, the pancakes were the most nourishing start to the day; especially when paired with oat milk coffee and hot chocolate.
We had the most amazing time exploring Paris and HOY really was the perfect base for our trip – I can’t wait for my next visit. If you’d like to see more details of Hoy Paris and what we got up to, you can watch my TikTok videos from our trip.
To learn more about HOY Paris and book a stay, head to their website: hoyparis.com
HOY Hotel very kindly gave us a press discount to stay and review the vegan food. All opinions expressed in this post are entirely my own & we are so grateful that we were able to stay at such a beautiful hotel – I will definitely be booking HOY Hotel again on my next trip to Paris.
Over 2 years since our last trip, Matt and I were extremely excited to head to Roca Nivaria all-inclusive hotel in Tenerife. We chose Roca Nivaria for their beautiful sea front location, stunning infinity pools, and most importantly, because they offer a great selection of vegan options. Roca Nivaria is perfectly situated with panoramic sea views from most rooms, a beautiful beach cove close by and a very short taxi ride from Costa Adeje, where there are lots of beaches, restaurants and a harbour perfect for boat trips. The hotel staff went above and beyond on our trip to ensure we ate an incredible variety of vegan food, whilst looking out at the most beautiful views; it really felt like a vegan paradise and I’m so happy to share all of the details of our stay with you all.
DINING OPTIONS
Roca Nivaria’s main restaurant, Garoé Restaurant, is open for buffet breakfast and dinner with stunning views of the pool area and sea. Lunch is served buffet style pool-side under umbrellas or in a very cool cave area if you prefer to be fully shaded. Roca Nivaria also has two à la carte restaurants – one serving Italian cuisine, and the other Spanish.
The lovely manager Sarah showed us around on our first day and introduced us to restaurant managers: Frederico, Jesus and Martin, and to chef Sergio. Sarah informed them we were vegan and they were all absolutely incredible, ensuring we had a constant flow of vegan food throughout our stay; we’re talking 2 large plates full each seating, 3 times a day! We were so impressed by head chef Sergio’s creativity, he served us the most exciting and varied dishes, and was excited to create new things for us to try, even when the vegan buffet options were great.
In this post you’ll find a summary of the vegan food we ate during our stay, across the hotels’ restaurants.
Breakfast Buffet – Garoé Restaurant
The breakfast buffet had lots of vegan options including an abundance of fruit, soya yoghurts, churros with maple syrup, and then the classic vegan breakfast options: toast, baked beans, grilled tomatoes and mushrooms. There was also soya milk for tea/coffee or cereal. As you can see, Matt enjoyed a very generous serving of toast, beans and hash browns every day, whilst I enjoyed churros drowned in maple syrup with a side of fruit.
Lunch Pool Bar Buffet – Ahemón Bar and Restaurant
The lunch buffet had great vegan staples every day: a huge selection of fruit and salad, fresh bread, rice, chips/fried potatoes, veggies and the most delicious tomato sauce I’ve ever eaten! In addition to this, the wonderful chefs kindly made us vegan pizzas every day which were absolutely delicious. We were also super happy to find a vegan paella on the buffet one day – paella is Matt’s favourite food so it was definitely one of the food highlights of our trip.
Dinner Buffet – Garoé Restaurant
The dinner buffet has a veggie/vegan corner with new dishes every night. Most nights there were great vegan items in this section, but on the occasions that most items contained dairy or eggs (and even often when they didn’t), chef Sergio prepared a special meal for us. The creativity of his dishes continued to amaze us throughout our trip. We enjoyed such a huge variety of delicious, nutritious meals and found ourselves having two to three plates full each night as the food was just too good!
Some of our highlights from the veggie/vegan corner of the buffet included: seared seitan and tofu with brussel sprouts, chips and salad, nachos with guacamole, mushroom and seitan stir fry with rice noodles, and vegetable stew with rice, grilled aubergines and salad.
Some of the highlights from our specially prepared vegan meals included: grilled seitan with guacamole and sweet potato puree, mushroom truffle pasta, and thai green rice noodles with seitan and edible flowers.
We also enjoyed some delicious deserts including: mango mousse, chocolate mousse and, hear me out on this last one, it sounds weird but tasted incredible – tomato cake with soya cream and berry ganache!
Spanish Restaurant – Burgos
The Spanish restaurant has both indoor and outdoor seating with stunning views over the pool. The menu didn’t have many vegan-friendly options so the chef very kindly created a special vegan menu for us, and oh my goodness, were we in for a treat!
For starter, we had leek and potato soup and a tofu and caramelised onion dish served on a bed of salad. Both were absolutely delicious but the soup was definitely our favourite – it was so creamy and flavourful.
For main, we had a veggie pasta, and then what Matt described as “one of the best things I’ve ever eaten”: creamy mashed potato served with tomatoes, mushrooms, sweet potato crips and an incredibly flavourful sauce. The veggie pasta was delicious, but definitely overshadowed by the mash which had the most wonderful combination of flavours and was one of the food highlights of our trip.
Italian Restaurant – Verona
The Italian restaurant has the most beautiful outdoor seating under a pergola decorated with climbing flowers, next to a gorgeous fountain, making you feel like you’re in Italy. The team adapted some of the items on their menu to create a wonderful vegan meal for us. For starter, we had cream of asparagus soup and bruschetta. The avocado puree was such a great addition and twist on traditional bruschetta, and the soup was so creamy and delicious that we could have happily eaten a couple more bowls each! For main we had a hearty mushroom risotto with crispy onions and mushroom focaccia bread on the side. I’m not usually a big fan of risotto but absolutely loved this dish!
Hotel Facilities
Not only was the food and service impeccable, the hotel itself was absolutely beautiful. We had the most relaxing time swimming in the infinity pools, looking out over the ocean view, and enjoying cocktails whilst listening to live music every evening.
We vlogged our entire trip so you can see more of the hotel facilities, the delicious food and everything else we got up to in Tenerife.
We’re so incredibly grateful for the wonderful hospitality and divine food we experienced throughout our stay. Roca Nivaria very kindly gave us a press discount to stay and review the vegan food, but as always all opinions expressed in this post are entirely my own, and as a vegan visiting Tenerife, I cannot think of a better place to stay – we will definitely be returning to Roca Nivaria on our next visit to Tenerife.
Matt and I took a day trip on the eurostar to explore the city of Brussels. Although our trip was brief, we still managed to find some delicious vegan food and experience some of the cool activities the city has to offer.
WHAT TO EAT
GREEN WAY ►►►
Green Way, one of the highest rated vegan restaurants in Brussels, is actually located at the train station, which made for the perfect arrival meal – who said 10am is too early for burgers & fries?
They offer a selection of plant-based burgers, wraps, salads & desserts. We ordered one of the kebab wraps & the meat lovers burger with sweet potato fries on the side and it was all delicious – the perfect way to start a busy day of exploring.
EXKI ►►►
Exki is another eatery we found at the train station which had some well-labelled vegan options, including the tofu sandwiches pictured below. We didn’t get a chance to try any of the Exki’s vegan options as we were full from our 10am Green Way burgers, but it’s great to know there are so many vegan options available.
THE SISTER BRUSSELS CAFE ►►►
After a day walking around exploring the city, we were craving some waffles, so headed to The Sister Brussels Cafe which had this mouth watering vegan waffle and ice cream feast.
WHAT TO DO
ATOMIUM ►►►
Our first stop was the iconic Atomium, a super cool piece of architecture built for the World Expo in the 1950s. Not only does it offer an amazing view over the city, there is also a variety of art and history exhibitions inside the spheres.
MINI EUROPE ►►►
Located a short walk from Atomium is Mini Europe, an attraction featuring miniature figures of European landmarks. It was a great way to learn about the history of various European cities; and if you’re like me, take the opportunity to absolutely nail the leaning tower of pisa photo.
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As our visit was short, there’s so much of the city left to explore and so much vegan food left to eat, so I’m sure we’ll be back soon and will be able to update this guide. In the meantime, please do leave any of your recommendations in the comments below.
Matt and I spent two days exploring Venice and during that short time we ate as much vegan food as we possibly could, whilst also hitting the tourist hot-spots and discovering some hidden gems. We ate at various vegan & vegan friendly restaurants which I am excited to share with you; and throughout this post I’ll also share some of my top tips for how you can enjoy delicious vegan food at non-vegan eateries.
WHAT TO EAT
LA TECIA VEGANA ►►►
La Tecia Vegana is the only fully vegan restaurant on Venice’s main island, so of course we had to check it out. Everything on the menu looked amazing so it was really hard to choose, but eventually we ordered: the lasagne, lentil veggie burger, seitan roast and then for dessert, of course I ordered the tiramisu.
All of the food was delicious, but the lasagne was a clear favourite for both of us, closely followed by the tiramisu.
BELLA & BRAVA VENEZIA ►►►
Bella & Brava is a pizzeria that was located a short walk from where we were staying. Their entire menu is pescatarian with several vegetarian and vegan options and all of the pizzas are pre-made so you can’t go off menu. We ordered both of the vegan pizzas to share: marinara (no cheese) & vegetariana (vegan cheese & veggies) and added garlic oil to both. We loved both of the pizzas, and had we stayed for longer I definitely would have gone back.
HOW TO EAT VEGAN TIP: IF YOU VISIT A NON-VEGAN PIZZERIA, OFTEN THE MARINARA WILL BE VEGAN, JUST CHECK THERE’S NO MILK / EGG IN THE BASE, AND TO MAKE IT A BIT MORE EXCITING, YOU CAN ALWAYS ASK TO ADD GRILLED VEGETABLES.
AMORINO GELATO ►►►
We were super lucky to stumble upon Amorino, a cute little gelateria which had an abundance of clearly labelled vegan options, including chocolate – my favourite.
HOW TO EAT VEGAN TIP: THE DARK CHOCOLATE AND FRUIT FLAVOURED GELATOS IN MOST SHOPS ARE VEGAN, SO EVEN IF IT’S NOT LABELLED, BE SURE TO ASK!
PIZZA L’ANGELO ►►►
Pizza L’Angelo is a vegan-friendly take out pizzeria which serves small pizzas, family size pizzas (of course this is what we went for), paninis and falafel. Despite their abundance of varied vegan options; being the boring bettys we are, we decided to order a family size vegan margherita which ended up being one of Matt’s favourite meals of the trip!
FIUMEFREDDO BIO ►►►
On our way back from our boat trip to Murano & Burano (two beautiful little islands a short boat trip from Venice), we stumbled across a cute little cafe in a courtyard with a sign saying vegetarian and vegan. We decided to take a look inside and the lovely waitress chatted us through the menu, most of which was vegan. We decided to go for a selection of their smaller dishes and they were all delicious; the tofu & potato triangles were especially great.
WE LOVE ITALY ►►►
Even though we’d already eaten that evening, Matt really wanted to try some of Venice’s famous take-out spaghetti, so we headed to We love Italy which offers take out pasta and has vegan options. Matt ordered the spaghetti pomodoro and loved it! In fact, he wolfed it down so quickly that I didn’t even get a chance to take a photo!
VENICE AIRPORT ►►►
Despite Venice Marco Polo being a relatively small airport, on our very long stay at the airport (2 hour flight delay!!), we managed to find lots of vegan options at the various eateries located on the upper level.
As soon as you come up the escalator, you’ll find a coffee shop which has soy milk for hot drinks, some clearly labelled vegan pastries and most excitingly, vegan magnums! At the burger place at the far end, you can veganise the veggie burger by ordering without the bun, tartar sauce & mayo. Finally, in the main shop, alongside all of the regular vegan-friendly airport snacks (pringles, oreos etc), we found two viva la mama vegan sandwiches – a mexican one and a tofu one.
WHERE TO STAY
Matt and I stayed in a beautiful little bnb which I found on airbnb but is also available on hotel booking websites.
As the bnb is located in Cannaregio which isn’t in the centre of all of the tourist spots (but still only a short walk away), it is super reasonably priced compared to other accommodation; especially considering it had an amazing canal view and the vegan friendly breakfast and bottled water was included in the room rate. The staff were also super friendly and helpful, so I would definitely stay there if I visited Venice again.
WHAT TO DO
PRIVATE SPEED BOAT TRANSFER FROM THE AIRPORT ►►►
This is definitely a luxury and not a necessity but as our trip to Venice was my birthday gift to Matt, my mum treated us to a private speedboat transfer from the airport to our hotel. It was such an amazing experience and a great way to get to see Venice by boat.
You can purchase my Kula vegan rucksack, which was the perfect travel bag for a short trip, by clicking on my affiliate link here.
EXPLORE BY FOOT TO DISCOVER HIDDEN GEMS ►►►
There is a super reasonably priced water taxi service which stops all around the island; however, if you feel up to it, Venice is a relatively small island so it is easy to explore all of the tourist hot spots such as Rialto Bridge & St Mark’s Square by foot. This is also a great way to get lost down side streets and discover some of the more beautiful areas that aren’t overrun by tourists.
One of the most iconic Venetian tourist activities is of course the gondola ride. As this is pretty pricey & we’d already been on our speedboat trip, we got our gondola experience by gondola watching from a beautiful little bridge in a side street.
VISIT THE ISLANDS OF MURANO & BURANO ►►►
Murano is famous for its creation of Murano glass so the island is full of glass making workshops and galleries; whilst Burano is known for its beautiful brightly coloured buildings. Both islands are very picturesque, so are definitely worth the short boat ride from Venice. You can purchase tickets at various water taxi stops around the island.
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I hope you’ve found my Venice Vegan Guide useful, and as always, if you have any recommendations for places to visit / eat / stay, be sure to comment them below.
Rome is a beautiful city filled with historic landmarks to visit and so much incredible vegan food. Not only are there lots of restaurants and cafes with clearly marked vegan items on their menu, but pretty much every restaurant we visited was able to easily veganise their dishes by simply removing the cheese. This made it super easy to eat vegan with little to no planning! However, I’ve compiled this city guide of all of the food, attraction & accommodation highlights of our trip so that you can come to Rome feeling prepared, without having to do any of the planning! I hope you have an awesome time in Rome!
WHERE TO EAT ▹▸▹
As we visited Rome with non-vegan friends, the majority of our meals were not at vegan restaurants, so before I get into the delicious meals we ate at restaurants with vegan items on their menu, I thought it’d be helpful to share how we veganised meals at most restaurants. For starter, we would typically order bruschetta which was nearly always naturally vegan without any modifications required. Then for main, we would order spaghetti pomodoro or arabiata (and be sure to check there was no egg in the pasta) or a marinara pizza (which naturally has no cheese) with added veggies (and be sure to check there was no milk or eggs in the base). For desert, we would head to a gelateria , lots of which had clearly labelled vegan options.
Rifugio Romano
Rifugio Romano was by far the food highlight of our trip. I loved it so much that I wrote the restaurant its own full review here, but I’ll sum up the key details in this guide too. The restaurant is located close to Termini station and has a small seating area both outside and inside. Both times we visited it was super busy – a testament to how amazing the food is – so be prepared to wait a little while if you’re in a bigger group. The restaurant has an extensive vegan menu as well as a non-vegan menu, making it the perfect place to visit with non-vegan family and friends.
We were spoilt for choice so decided to order lots of dishes to share – falafel, arancino, crocchetta, carbonara, lasagne, tiramisu & a creamy caramel biscuit desert that I can’t remember the name of – they were all absolulety delicious.
Vivi Bistrot
Vivi Bistrot is located in Piazza Navona and has both vegan and non-vegan items on their menu. After days of eating exclusively pizza and pasta, we all ordered burgers, and let me tell you, this burger is one of the best I’ve ever eaten!
Ristorante Porta Castello
This cute little vegan-friendly restaurant is located close to the Vatican and serves delicious pizzas that are so big, they are bursting off the plate, so be sure to bring your appetite.
Di Quà
Di Qua is a beautifully decorated restaurant near the Spanish Steps which had a few dishes that could easily be veganised. I had a mixed bruschetta and Matt had a spaghetti arrabbiata which he absolutely loved!
Arena Del Gelato
This little gelateria located close to Vatican City has a huge range of vegan gelato including this delicious dark chocolate flavour.
WHAT TO DO ▹▸▹
The Vatican & Sisteen Chapel
A tour of the vatican is a must do whilst you’re in Rome as the architcture and art is breathtaking! Be sure to book your tickets in advance, as the queue to get tickets on the day can be hours long! We purchased entry tickets with an audio guide so that we could explore at our own leisure.
The Colosseum
Not only is the Colosseum a stunning piece of architecture, it also has a fascinating and extremely gory history so I would definitely recommend purchasing an audioguide on your visit. Once again, we booked our tickets in advance, to avoid hours of queuing on the day.
The Trevi Fountain
The Trevi Fountain is another must visit whilst you’re in Rome. As it is an historic piece of architecture and is in a public place and therefore free to visit, it is always packed with tourists in peak season. Despite the crowds, it is still a beautiful place to chill out with some gelato (we found an awesome vegan-friendly gelateria close by – Antica Gelateria Trevi).
WHERE TO STAY ▹▸▹
We stayed in a beautiful hotel which was walking distance (assuming you don’t mind 40 minute walks) from all of the major attractions. The best part of our hotel was definitely the rooftop terrace which was a cool place to chill out in the evening with a few cocktails with a view overlooking St Peter’s Basilica.
I hope you found this guide helpful and if you have any awesome vegan-friendly restaurants to recommend, be sure to comment them below.
The food highlight of our trip to Rome was definitely visiting Rifugio Romano – a cute little restaurant with an extensive vegan menu, as well as a non-vegan menu – making it the perfect place to visit with non-vegan family and friends. The restaurant is located close to Termini station and has a small seating area both outside and inside. Both times we visited it was super busy – a testament to how amazing the food is – so be prepared to wait a little while if you’re in a bigger group, it’ll definitely be worth it!
The menu is full of traditional Italian dishes that have been veganised and everything looked so delicious that Matt and I really struggled to decide what to order. So we decided to order a few extra dishes and share it all.
For starter, we ordered the falafel, arancino and crocchetta. All 3 were delicious, but the falafel with vegan mayonnaise were my favourite – the mayonnaise was definitely one of the best mayonnaises I’ve ever had!
For main we ordered the carbonara – which is one of Matt’s favourite foods – and the lasagne. Being a pretty much life-long veggie, I’ve never tried carbonara before but I absolutely loved it, and I’m pretty sure Matt was an even bigger fan!
We also both loved the lasagne, which was creamy, tomatoey and full of flavour.
Although it is super easy to veganise italian main courses, aside from gelato, most of the vegan dessert options on non-vegan menus were sorbet or fruit. So, I was super excited to indulge in a decadent vegan dessert at Rifugio Romano and decided to go with the tiramisu.
Matt went for this creamy caramel biscuit dish (the name of which escapes me) which he loved!
If you find yourself in Rome, Rifiguio Romano is a must visit. We absolutely loved every dish we tried and there is so much choice that we could have eaten there every day and enjoyed something new!
At the end of December last year, I spent a week volunteering at Elephant Nature Park in Chiang Mai, Thailand with two of my best friend Maria and Natalie. We had an absolutely amazing week, and if you’d like to find out more about our experience, be sure to check out my volunteering vlog and volunteering Q&A at the end of this post.
After we left the park, Maria, Natalie and I were chatting about some of things that we wished we had brought with us, as well as the things we did bring that proved to be essentials. I thought that it would be really useful to put this into a blog post for any of you who are planning on visiting the park to use as a kind of packing checklist. So, here are the not so obvious items you should definitely consider taking with you:
Mosquito spray – there are lots of insects around at night so a good insect and particularly mosquito repellent is essential. I took the Incognito* spray and it worked really well for me!
Insect repelling shampoo – I took the Superdrug 3 in 1 Conditioning Shampoo Tea Tree & Lemon, it’s super cheap and its ingredients make it naturally lice repelling (I assumed this meant other insect-repelling too, and it worked really well for me! I actually liked it so much that I have continued to use the shampoo at home). Be sure to also bring a good hand wash/shower gel combination as there are no toiletries in the accommodation bathrooms.
Dry shampoo – as most of the showers were cold on our visit and we didn’t find the hot showers until the day before we left, we didn’t end up washing our hair very much when we were there (like maybe twice in 7 days) so a dry shampoo would have been really useful!
Hand Sanitiser – there is a lot of picking up poop and dirty work so a little bottle of hand sanitiser comes in very handy!
Microfibre towel – towels aren’t provided at the ENP accommodation and as microfibre towels are really light-weight and super absorbent, they won’t take up a lot of room in your luggage and will come in very handy!
Packing cubes – ever since our trip to Australia 2 years ago I take my packing cubes with me everywhere I go as they are such a great way to organise your luggage; so really this is more of just a general travelling tip rather than an ENP specific recommendation but is still something worth considering!
Ziplock bags – ENP has a great washing service which is super inexpensive and ideal if you are continuing to travel afterwards and want to re-wear your clothes; however, if choose not to get your washing done, ziplock bags are really useful as your clothes will get super dirty throughout the week, so putting your dirty items in the ziplock bags stops them from contaminating everything else in your bag.
Old clothes to donate – at the end of the week, there is a box where you can donate any unwanted items such as shoes/clothing; so I would recommend taking some old clothes with you that you can wear for volunteering, then get washed and donate at the end of the week! You can also donate any towels/blankets to the dog sanctuary, so if you have room in luggage, I’m sure that would be really appreciated.
Long sleeved and long legged clothing – although the hot weather makes it tempting not to bring anything long-sleeved with you, on the cutting corn/collecting hay days you will want to cover your arms and legs if you don’t wanna get scratched to bits. It’s also nice in the evening to have some leggings/trousers and a hoodie to throw on if it gets a little chilly.
Vegan snacks – if you’re fancying a snack outside of meal times, there is a little shop which sells chocolate bars etc; however they all contained dairy. So, if you’re vegan I would definitely recommend bringing some little snacks with you such as Cliff Bars*.
Torch – the short walk back from the communal area to the accommodation can be a little bit dark at night so if you don’t have a torch on your phone, it would definitely be useful to bring one with you.
Portable phone charger – with so many incredible photo opportunities, your phone battery can die really fast at ENP (at least, I know mine did), and when you’re not busy volunteering, you won’t want to be stuck in your room waiting for your phone to recharge, so having a small portable phone charger will be very useful.
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I hope you guys found this list useful and as always, if you have any questions please feel free to comment them down below. To find out more about our volunteering experience, check out the two videos below:
My Elephant Nature Park volunteering vlog:
My Elephant Nature Park volunteering Q&A:
* Links marked with an asterisk are affiliate, this means it won’t cost you any more to purchase but I may earn a small commission if you purchase the product using my link 🙂
At the start of January, Matt and I spent four days in the beautiful city of Prague. The combination of snow, beautiful architecture, christmas markets and an abundance of vegan and vegan-friendly restaurants made it our new favourite city! Whilst exploring the city, we tried out as many vegan eateries as possible and I’m really happy to be able to share them all with you today.
Mama Coffee
Type of food: Cute café with a huge variety of vegan options
What we ate: Soya hot chocolate (amazing!!!), pita bread & hummus, sundried tomato & sesame paste on toast, veggie burger & Ukrainian dumplings
Type of food: Beautiful vegetarian restaurant with lots of vegan options (Matt’s new favourite restaurant in the world!) Be sure to book in advance during peak times as it can get very busy. We didn’t get a chance to try out Lehka Hlava, Maitrea’s sister restaurant, but it looked awesome too!
What we ate: Veganised tempeh bruschetta, vegan cream of split pea, vegan maitrea vegeburger, vegan paella à la barcelona & warm vegan pancake (from the kid’s menu)
Although this wasn’t a vegan restaurant, I thought I’d let you guys know about this little gem as it is one of my favourite places we visited in France, and I’m pretty sure we visited at least 3 times!! The rooftop bar has has such a fun vibe and amazing views over Prague so be sure to check it out during your visit!
I can honestly say that we enjoyed the food at all of these eateries but we of course had our favourites and I’ll be writing more detailed posts about these in the coming weeks, so be sure to look out for those.
My Prague Vegan Diary video will also be going live on my youtube channel tomorrow, so look out for that if you’d like to see more behind the scenes footage of these awesome restaurants.
As you all know, I absolutely love travelling and have shared lots of vegan travel posts on this blog and on my YouTube channel over the past couple of years. So, when I was asked to give a speech at the first ever Surrey Vegan Fair (which took place last weekend), I decided to talk about: MY TOP TIPS TO MAKE TRAVELLING AS A VEGAN AS FUN, EASY & STRESS-FREE AS POSSIBLE! It was such a fun experience and I think the tips are all super helpful, so I decided to write them up into a blog post so that you can all access them any time you like! If you have any tips to add, be sure to write them in the comments down below!
RESEARCH RESTAURANTS
I always set aside around an hour before going on a trip to research vegan / vegan-friendly restaurants in location where I’ll be staying. The main resources I use to do this are:
Happy Cow – great website for finding vegan & vegan-friendly restaurants
Blogs – google vegan (location) i.e. vegan LA and lots of blogs will pop up
YouTube – search vegan (location) and you can watch loads of travel diaries / guides
Instagram – searching #vegan(location) is a great way to find delicious looking food
Google / Apple maps – go to the maps app on your smartphone, type in ‘vegan (location)‘, it will pop up with a whole bunch of pins and you can find restaurants near where you’ll be staying
After I’ve done a little research, I prepare a list of the top restaurants that I want to visit and take that with me on my trip.
BE PREPARED
Being prepared will require a little bit of pre-planning but it will save you so much time and stress on your trip so will definitely be worth it. There are 3 main ways I prepare:
Take snacks: As you’ll probably be going on trips / exploring during the day, you won’t always be able to plan where you’ll be and if there’ll be a vegan restaurant near by. I therefore like to take snacks with me, and any type of protein / breakfast bar such as Clif bars are great, as they’re filling and fuel you for your day.
Find a supermarket / health food store near by: before my trip, I always do a quick google search to see if there’s a store nearby where I’ll be staying, so that I know I’ll be able to buy snacks there, and therefore don’t have to bring them with me.
Contact in advance:
The accommodation I’ll be staying at to see if they offer vegan meals or if anything they serve can be veganised.
The airline I’ll be flying with to book a vegan meal for the flight.
USE A LANGUAGE AID
If you’re travelling to a country where you don’t speak the native language, you’ll need a way to communicate your dietary needs. The way I do this is to:
Learn how to say: ‘vegan / vegetarian no eggs or dairy‘ if I feel comfortable speaking in the native language (which doesn’t happen very often).
Save translated phrase on phone / print card: before my trip I use google translate to translate the phrase ‘vegan / vegetarian no eggs or dairy‘. I then print screen it and save it as a photo on my phone to show to the waiters/waitresses in any restaurants I visit. You could also write out / type up a card to take with you and keep in your wallet.
Learn specific cultural things to look out for: for example, in Thailand fish oil is often added to lots of dishes, so it would be useful to take a card with you saying ‘no fish oil, please’ in Thai.
Siri is your friend: iPhone’s siri and similar voice-recognition softwares on other smartphones can be so handy on your trip! For instance, when my mum and I were in Italy last year, I activated siri and said ‘find dairy-free ice-cream near me’ and it led us to a great little gelateria that served delicious vegan ice-cream!
MAKE YOUR TRIP VEGAN-FRIENDLY
If you don’t have a particular place in mind to travel to, there are plenty of ways that you can make your trip vegan-friendly:
If possible:
Choose a vegan-friendly location: PETA releases an annual list of the Top 10 Vegan-Friendly Citites, so choosing one of these cities to visit is a great idea
Go on a vegan specific holiday: there are now lots of vegan-specific holidays you can go on, such as vegan cruises and vegan camping trips! These trips are a great way to not only enjoy delicious food, but also to meet like-minded people. A quick google search will pull up lots of vegan holiday options.
Find vegan hotels: I use the website veggie-hotels.com to find vegetarian / vegan hotels all over the world.
Stay in an apartment / airbnb / hostel: or anywhere where you have access to a kitchen so that you can veganise your holiday by cooking your own food. This is also a great way to save money!
MY TOP 5 VEGAN CITIES
In case you’re looking for ideas of great vegan-friendly places for your next trip, here are my top 5 vegan-friendly cities that I’ve visited!
LA, San Francisco & San Diego in California are collectively by far the most vegan-friendly places I’ve ever visited. Matt and I ate every type of vegan food you can imagine during our trip, and got most of it delivered to our hotel rooms! There are also so many fun things to do and lots of beautiful beaches to hang out at.
New York is such an awesome city with so many fun touristy places to visit. It also has a great vegan-food scene, so is definitely worth a visit.
Berlin has so much historic culture to explore and also is insanely vegan friendly. During mine and my mum’s visit, we stayed in a vegetarian hotel, visited lots of vegan restaurants, and even shopped at Veganz – an entirely vegan supermarket.
Sydney, especially the Bondi Beach area, is filled with awesome vegan restaurants and also has so many fun places to explore.
Queenstown is hands down the most beautiful place I’ve ever visited and it was made even better by the fact that we found lots of great vegan-friendly restaurants there!
ANIMAL ATTRACTIONS
When travelling as a vegan, you want to ensure you don’t support any unethical tourist attractions that exploit animals. However, this doesn’t mean that you can’t interact with animals on your holiday; in fact, travel provides a great opportunity to see animals in their natural environment and perhaps even to volunteer at a conservation project / animal sanctuary. And fear not, as for every unethical tourist attraction, there is an awesome alternative:
VIDEO OF MY FULL SPEECH
If you would like more detailed tips, you can watch my full speech from the event here:
After just over two weeks travelling around the USA, I am now back in the UK and am finally getting back to my normal routine after losing almost a week to jet lag, seriously. I’d like to say that was an exaggeration but unfortunately it isn’t; for almost an entire week I was practically nocturnal – going to bed at 6am and waking up at 3pm!!
Anyway, now that I’m back home (and awake in daylight hours!) I’ve been reminiscing about all of the fun things that we did and all of the delicious vegan food we ate, and there certainly was a lot of it. We started our trip in LA, then we headed to San Francisco, then to San Diego and finally Las Vegas! I loved every one of these cities in a different way and all of them had an amazing vegan food scene (we’re talking everything from deliciously healthy cafes to late night pizza deliveries).
As always, I wanted to take you all along with me as much as possible, so I vlogged our entire trip, posted restaurant reviews, and also instagramed a lot of our #veganfoodporn! However, there were also lots of eateries we ate at that I didn’t get a chance to share with you guys, so I thought I’d create this blog post to collate all of my vlogs and restaurant reviews from our trip, as well as adding in some of the other eateries we loved.
If you guys are from the US/travelling to the US/just curious about what the US has to offer, then I hope you find this post useful :).
ps – if you have a favourite vegan friendly eatery in any of these locations, be sure to comment it down below!
Matt went for this creamy caramel biscuit dish (the name of which escapes me) which he loved!
jadegreenvegan.com 