Forming the British half of an American-British couple, Paula spends a lot of time hopping across the pond, torn between the bright lights of London town and the bucolic New England countryside. Typically, this makes her decade-long romance, with bella Italia, complicated. Although it’s nothing a few dates with the Sistine chapel, or an Alpine or Apennine tryst can’t fix, and form the basis of a new travel guide, or two. When not working off the worst excesses of the Italian table, Paula commissions, edits, publishes and presents her way through projects in film, radio and online. She has worked and lived in New England, Morocco, Libya, Ethiopia, Namibia and Kenya, where she was born. These days she happily resides in London, although she’s off for the weekend quite often.

Kay is a cookery writer and broadcaster, based in London. A former model agent in New York and London, and a movie co-ordinator in Bangkok and Los Angeles, Kay is the co-author of the best-selling Cook Yourself Thin: Quick and Easy and Bryn’s Kitchen: 5 Brilliant Ways To Cook 20 Great Ingredients with the award-winning London chef, Bryn Williams. Her forthcoming books include The Leon Family Cookbook with John Vincent, Simply Thai, Food: The Women’s Issue and Travels with My Appetite, drawn from Kay’s Food Adventure tours. In addition to her writing and presenting, Kay runs a bespoke location catering service for the fashion industry and writes the popular blog, Kay Cooks.

Border-hopping is a way of life for British writer Nicola who lives in a French village on Lake Geneva. The best journeys start with a boat ride, and food and wine are her raison d’être. Hunting for Tuscan white truffles, meeting melon farmers in Provence, dining incognito in the next best Parisian néobistrot or drinking with experimental winemakers in Languedoc is the essence of her work as travel journalist, author and consultant. France, Switzerland and Italy is where she is most, but nowhere is too far, no adventure too far-fetched. Combing storm-stirred sands with the kids for Lithuanian amber, dancing to the beat of brass-band trumpeters in Serbia, hopping across Lake Geneva for a playdate and lunch: As the mother to three, young, trilingual children who need constant action, it is the weekend that presents some of the sweetest opportunities.